Noel Braun - I Guess Ill Just Keep On Walking: Continuing the Search for Meaning

I Guess Ill
Just Keep
on Walking

Continuing the Search for Meaning

Noel Braun

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Noel Braun commenced his working career as a country school teacher, then moved into a corporate career, which took him from Melbourne to Perth and Sydney. He has had a lifelong passion for writing and wrote the first words of his novels nearly forty years ago. After a busy career and raising a family of four, he has found the time in retirement to fulfill his long-held ambition and see his work in print.

Noel has published two novels: Friend and Philosopher and Whistler Street . He has also published a memoir, No Way to Behave at a Funeral , which describes his journey following the death by suicide of his wife Maris, and The Day Was Made for Walking , his first exploration of Le Chemin de Saint-Jacques-de-Compostelle and El Camino de Santiago de Compostela. He is working on other manuscripts and on developing a new career in writing.

Noel lives in the Snowy Mountains. He is a keen walker and enjoys getting out in the national parks surrounding his home.

Published in Australia by Sid Harta Publishers Pty Ltd,

ABN: 46 119 415 842

23 Stirling Crescent, Glen Waverley, Victoria 3150 Australia

Telephone: +61 3 9560 9920, Facsimile: +61 3 9545 1742

E-mail:

First published in Australia 2017

This edition published 2017

Copyright Noel Braun 2017

Cover design, typesetting: WorkingType Studio

The right of Noel Braun to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Braun, Noel

I Guess Ill Just Keep on Walking

ISBN: 9781925282719 (eBook)

eBook edition distributed by
Port Campbell Press
www.portcampbellpress.com.au
eBook Created by

CONTENTS

Preamble Another Day for Walking

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   Act Three France and Spain

   La Via Tolosana Chemin dArles Camino Aragons

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    Intermission The journey is far from over

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    Act Four Portugal and Spain

    Camino Portugus La Via Lusitana

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Nul ne peut atteindre laube sans passer par le chemin de la nuit (No one can reach the dawn without passing through the night)
Khalil Gibran

Here we go again! The planes ready for take-off. Monday, 22 nd July 2013. The day has arrived, so quickly after all the work preparing my body. My French guide book describes this Camino route as solitary and much less travelled. Much of it is in forests, its terrains are diverse, the hills are serious, with soaring altitudes even before climbing the Pyrenees. Therefore:

Le marcheur doit sy prparer et tre en bonne condition physique.
(The walker should prepare himself well and be
in good physical shape).

Every Camino route requires a decent level of fitness. This one sounded far more arduous. I attended the gym every other day and toiled with Jenni, my gym trainer. She put a lot of work into preparing me for my earlier walks; she was equally enthusiastic, bossy and caring. I was her oldest client (eighty years of age) but she worked me hard and took no prisoners. Really, she was proud of me and told everyone what her Noel was up to. With her encouragement, I attended gym classes in yoga, Pilates and stretching, often the lone male in a class of older biddies or young leotard clad dolls. I went for long walks with a fully loaded pack in the National Park adjacent to my home.

I was hurting in the left leg, knee and hip. Some days they ached separately, other days they joined together in a painful chorus. I didnt want to look too closely into the cause. They werent going to stop me. I visited my chiropractor, Steven, one of my scouts back in the eighties. I had sessions with the gym physio, Gary. He could see that staying at home wasnt an option, so he prepared a sheet of stick figures with exercises after each days walking. I had a check-up with my cardiologist. He had inserted a stent into my left anterior artery back in May 2007. He did a stress test and had me walking on the treadmill at 7 km per hour up an incline level of 17. No wonder I was exhausted. He said he detected something and had me return for a sound echo test with one of his colleagues. He had me doing more stress testing. He wanted to see my heart during exercise and at rest. This second cardiologist said: You can pack your bags. I can detect a difference but its very subtle. My cardiologist didnt actually say Dont go ! but he stressed that men of my age usually dont go in for long distance walking in difficult terrain. No, of course not, they go on cruises and sit around in deck chairs drinking beer and putting on weight.

A distraction was seeing my latest book through to publication. I was hoping to see the final galley print before going overseas. I began writing as soon as I returned from Spain and France in October 2011. My aim was to check the copies, make any final corrections and give the approval for the commercial run. The book would be ready for release by the time I returned, I hoped. In frustration, I checked the letter box every day up to the last. I was annoyed because checking the galleys would be delayed by another three months and the book would not be available until 2014. I gave the publisher an address in Montpellier, France. The galley print of my first book chased me across the world back in 2005 and eventually found me in Oregon, USA. I read the print on internal flights and finished it late at night in a hostel in Washington DC.

I should have known what to pack, having already walked the Camino twice. On my first trip, I set out with a backpack of eighteen kilos. By the end of the second trip I had reduced the weight to ten. I travelled with the essentials. Yet I was tempted to take this and that item just in case... I should know by now.

I recalled the lessons learned from my two earlier pilgrimages.

• Travel lightly that applies to life as well.
• Stay with the moment. Dont go fretting about what might happen. What I worry about never happens.
• Im far more resourceful than I think. I may have thought that Id struggle with the languages or be hopeless with directions, or be awkward with new people, or couldnt cope with a crisis. But I was thrown into the deep end, and not only survived, but thrived.