Here is a copy of the speech I gave today in Canberra, when I received the Malaspina Award from the Spanish Ambassador to Australia. The Award was for the significant contribution I’ve made to furthering cultural ties between Australia and Spain through my Camino book and film, The Way, My Way.

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Thank you to Her Excellency Ambassador Esther Monterrubio Villar, to the Malaspina Awards Committee for granting me this wonderful award, to the Spanish Education Office and Rosa Maria Prieto Gallego for nominating me, and to the Spanish shipbuilding company Navantia, for sponsoring the Awards. 

NOTE: This speech has NOT been written with the aid of ChatGPT, that’s why it’ll be a bit ropey – so hang on!

Where did this start for me – my love of Spain?

It started in April 2013. It was late in the afternoon. I was walking across the Meseta, on the Camino, which is a long straight stretch of flat plains. I’d already walked forty kilometers that day. I had another three ks to go before I got to a town where I could bed down for the night. 

I was in enormous pain from a knee that I would later discover was bone on bone. And I was exhausted. I was also anxious that I might not get a bed in the next town.

I remember that afternoon vividly. It was coming on sunset and the sky was dark with rolling thunder clouds. Yet the setting sun had broken through a crack in the clouds and these God-like fingers of golden ethereal light were casting a magical glow over the track ahead of me, as if guiding me the way. 

I remember a pre-storm wind was causing the grass-covered plains either side of me to sway and ripple like a river. A gentle light rain had started to fall. And suddenly all the pain, all the exhaustion, all the anxiety was gone. 

Here I was, alone on a track on an ancient pilgrimage route, and the sheer beauty of my surroundings lifted me into a state of complete bliss. I remember feeling an enormous sense of elation, of pure joy at being out in Nature in all its wild glory. And I remember this as being the moment that I fell in love with Spain.

How did I get there?
How did I come to be walking the Camino?  
And why?
Why was I on a pilgrimage? 

I wasn’t a Catholic.
I wasn’t, at that stage, even particularly religious or spiritual.
So why?
I later wrote a book to try and answer that question. 
And later still I made a film. 
And even now, I’m uncertain. 

But what I do know is this: 
Spain tugged me to do this walk. 
It wouldn’t let go.
I just had to do it. 

Three years earlier, my wife and I had spent time in Galicia. Our daughter was writing a book on Spain for a big New York publishing house, and Jennifer was editing the book. While they were working, I’d go on drives out into the Galician countryside, and that’s where I first discovered “pilgrims.” 

They were an odd species. 

They dressed oddly. They were unkempt. They carried backpacks and some used poles like they were walking through snow, although this was northern Spain coming on summer and there was no snow. They walked in a line and to me they looked like dreary lemmings walking headlong to their death. 

I became like David Attenborough stalking a curious flock of rare ostriches or giraffes. I hung out at pilgrim cafes, I eavesdropped on pilgrim conversations, I followed groups of pilgrims into bars and restaurants to see what they ate and drank. I finally worked up the courage to talk to a few of them and they told me about the Camino.

Most of the pilgrims I spoke to weren’t religious. And many weren’t Catholic. Quite a few didn’t even know why they were doing the walk. It seemed like such a stupid mindless senseless thing to do that it immediately appealed to me.

So I bought a pilgrim staff and began to go on long walks, dreaming that one day I too would be a pilgrim – that one day, I too would walk the Camino. And so I did. In April of 2013 I set off from St Jean Pied de Port on the French side of the Pyrenees to walk the 800kms to Santiago de Compostela. 

And it was in walking that Camino that I fell in love with Spain.

• I mean, how can you not love a country that has huge legs of ham hanging from the ceiling of a service station when you go in to pay for your petrol? 

• How can you not love a country that drinks red wine refrigerated? 

• How can you not love a country where you can’t get dinner before 10pm? 

• How can you not love a country that covers live, on national television, rampaging bulls chasing fleeing crowds in a Pamplona back alley?

There’s something going on in Spain – on this Camino – and the numbers are evidence; 

This year, it’s expected that 570,000 pilgrims will receive their Compostela – their official certificate from the Pilgrims’ Office – for having walked the Camino. That’s a record, and a 14% increase on last year. But you can get a Compostela just for having walked the last 100kms into Santiago. Many more pilgrims walk longer, many walk shorter distances and never receive a Compostela. 

Camino experts claim that for every one Compostela issued by the Pilgrim’s Office in a given year, a further ten to twelve pilgrims walk some part of the Camino that year – even if just for a few days. Do the maths on that and you get more than six million people walking some part of one of the many Caminos in Spain this year. 

Think about that ~
By the end of this year, six million people will have walked some part of the Camino. 

That’s a major cultural movement. 
That’s a major spiritual movement. 
Dare I say it, that’s a shift in human consciousness.
And Spain is at the heart of that tectonic shift. 

Why?

This is more than bucket-list stuff. And there are easier ways to have a cheap holiday in Europe, let me tell you! I’ve come to believe the reason why is three-fold:

MEANING
CONNECTION
UNITY

Meaning –
At a time when our world seems to be spinning out of control, with the spectre of AI and Climate Change hanging over our heads, when material things aren’t so important anymore, I believe many people are seeking meaning in their lives. And what better way to find meaning than to walk the Camino – and undertake a journey across Spain and into your very soul.

Connection
With social media we’re all so connected yet so many of us are desperately lonely. Many young people are turning to AI chatbots for companionship. And yet pilgrims are finding true connection on the Camino. Bonds form in a few days that last a lifetime. 

Unity
There’s so much division in the world right now, yet on the Camino, you find unity. Because of the intensity of the shared experience, race, colour, politics – differences of all kinds simply melt away. They’re just not important. On the Camino, you truly do experience a union with others that transcends division. Bring that home with you from the Camino and the world will have to be a better place.

So the last question is: 
Why Spain? 
There are lots of long pilgrimage walks across Europe, the UK, the US. the Middle East, even South America. Why do so many people gravitate towards Spain?

I believe the answer is simple – Spain has a unique Life Force. 

• Think Flamenco
• Think Barcelona vs Real Madrid
• Think the Running of the Bulls
• Think of the groups of people spilling out of bars onto the streets late at night just to talk and laugh. 

Of course there’s the wonderful food, the glorious wines, the beautiful historic cathedrals and monuments – but I believe it’s the energy of its people, their generosity of spirit and their kindness to strangers, that’s at the heart of why so many pilgrims come to Spain, and return time and time again. 

It’s why I fell in love with the country. 
After all, how can you not love a country that calls wifi – whiff-ee?