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RED LODGE WOMAN TAKES THE 1,200 MILE WALK ALONG THE CAMINO VIA FRANSCIGENA

written by LAURA BAILEY photography by LEA PAGE

SOMEWHERE IN THE HEARTLAND of Northern Italy, a farmer tilled a fallow field, and as he did, the wind picked up a plume of dust. Lea Page saw it coming as she walked the quiet country road, but just before she tucked her chin and tipped her head to brace for the dirty cloud, the farmer stopped his tractor. The dust settled. She passed. As she did, he waved.

“You can go for miles on a simple kindness,” Lea says, remembering the warm and sunny day last September.

She was midway through a 1,200-mile walk, the Walk to Camino Via Franscigena, a journey Lea started in Calais, France, that took her across France into the Swiss Alps and zig-zagging across Italy to Rome. The route wound through the Champagne vineyards of France, up and across the famous St. Bernard Pass in the Swiss Alps, across the interior of Italy, to the Mediterranean Coast, and through the rolling hills of Tuscany.

Looking back at all the beauty she encountered, Lea measures the distance not by landmarks but by the small acts of kindness she experienced along the way.

Camino walks of various distances can be found all over Europe. They are medieval routes taken by early Christian pilgrims as they traveled from one church community to another. The most famous today, Camino de Santiago, starts in the French Pyrenees and traverses about 480 miles across northern Spain to the Cathedral of Santiago. The most popular of the Camino walks, it sees thousands of pilgrims a year, and villages along the route cater to walkers. Lodging is easy to find, except in busier months, and restaurants promise some of the region’s best dining. The scenery is beautiful, and landmarks along the way are stunning. Also known as the French Way, it’s a social and cultural experience.

Lea did that walk in 2018, and it sparked an obsession. She wanted something longer this time, and less traveled. Camino Via Franscigena offered that and, as she discovered, much more.

“This was different. You’re almost entirely alone,” Lea says. “Half the people didn’t even know what I was doing, and I liked that.”

Unlike her first Camino walk, infrastructure on the Franscigena didn’t cater to pilgrims. The scenery was spectacular at times, but sometimes she crossed large, ordinary cities, walked along busy highways, and traversed long stretches of unremarkable farmland between small villages.

Though Lea was hardly ever noticed, her large backpack sometimes gave away her identity as a pilgrim. When they saw she was walking the Camino, locals shouted out a friendly “Buon Camino” or “Buon passegeiatia.” Motorists would often beep their horns and wave.

Lea found lodging as she went and at the end of each day she searched out grocery stores for provisions.

Those grocery stores, and the cold Coca-Cola she’d buy there, were a highlight of each day. Lea knows Spanish and did her best to learn Italian before her trip. Often, she would chat with people if they started a conversation.

“The interactions felt so meaningful,” Lea says.

A vegetarian, Lea lived mainly on bread, cheese and yogurt, cooking what little she could for dinner in her hotel or apartment.

“The whole country is like a mother asking, ‘Are you getting enough to eat?’ I learned to say, ‘I’m eating very well.’ If you did say you were a little hungry, they would mobilize and not let you leave without eating,” Lea says.

Lea Page

the journal changed how I experienced the walk,” Lea says. “I realized I spent the whole day looking for what I want to put on my page. It dialed up my noticing and my awareness.”

Her days became very sensory, and while many pilgrims have a desire to see the beautiful cathedrals and churches in every city and small community, Lea found herself drawn to more pedestrian scenes, like the two old women chatting on a bench outside a grocery store. Or the motorist she watched being scolded by two women for stopping in the middle of a crosswalk.

“I could just sit outside a grocery store and watch people coming and going,” Lea says. “It was fascinating. Utterly fascinating.”

She dedicated only one journal page to each day and followed the advice of poet Charles Simic, who said, “Be brief and tell us everything.” She found the brevity was accessible, simple and poetic.

“I wanted to make my journal pretty too, but I can’t draw, and I can’t paint,” she says.

Lea settled on a favorite pen, a small ruler and yellow marker. Every night when she sat down to write in her journal, creating and coloring the header centered her thoughts on the experiences of the day. It became a conscious transition to rest.

IN NORTHERN ITALY, LEA TOOK A SHUTTLE ACROSS THE PO RIVER, AS IS THE CUSTOM FOR CAMINO PILGRIMS. AFTER CROSSING, THE DRIVER OF THE BOAT INSISTED THAT SHE SIGN HIS BOOK, WHICH INCLUDED THE NAMES OF EVERY PILGRIM HE’D HELPED ACROSS THE RIVER. HE’D BEEN KEEPING RECORD FOR MORE THAN 50 YEARS.

“I’m not very good at resting, which is why l like a long walk,” she says. “The thing I like about a long walk is that I’m actually not thinking because everything is in the now. I can spend the entire day absorbing everything around me without having to think.”

Lea, a writer who lives in Red Lodge, had just finished a manuscript, a memoir, and looked to the walk as a way to clear her head. At home, she usually walks about four miles a day. On the Camino Via Franscigena she walked for about eight hours a day, usually covering about 20 miles.

“I’m not good at sitting still, so walking is meditation to me,” she says. “Walking was not the hard part. The hardest part was being gone. I’m a homebody.”

Lea called her husband Ray every night before bed. He would be just waking up in Montana. Ray joined Lea for the last 10 days of her journey. Although Rome was Lea’s final destination, they stopped just short in the town of Acquapendente. Having been to Rome before, Lea and Ray were not excited about trekking through the huge city on foot to the Vatican as most pilgrims do.

“There were moments every single day that I would never give up,” she says. “It wasn’t about the scenery. The scenery was spectacular, but to me that didn’t have any more impact on me than sitting at the grocery store and watching the old ladies.”

Not a day goes by that Lea doesn’t remember at least some small snippet of her journey.

“How do you take that feeling of wonder and joy and gratitude and bring that back?”

Lea says.

“You stop seeing because you think you’ve seen it. That’s what I want to carry over, the seeing.” ✻

Sharing A Passion For All Things Dance

IT’S NOT REALLY THEIR SECRET It’s more like their “sacred time.” They are members of a small-but-committed group of Billings women who doggedly guard a two-hour time slot every Monday evening.

“We do whatever we can not to have to do something else,” says Leigh Schanfein, smiling. “If you have kids, you make sure someone’s lined up for them. And then you leap out the door.”

Carly Mann considers this her vital “me time,” two hours when she can turn off life’s other distractions.

“We kind of have this mutual sacredness to our Mondays,” she says.

Leigh and Carly are two members of Arc: A Montana Dance Collective. Formed in Billings in 2019, the collective is made up of teachers, business owners, doctors, dance instructors, real estate agents, mothers, physician assistants and attorneys. What brings them together is their passion for all things dance.

“We’re so different from each other but we can come together with this passion and unity,” says Carly. “There’s something so connective about dance.”

Carly has spent most of her life dancing, much of it in cities across her native California. In 2010, after graduating with a bachelor’s in dance, she moved to Billings to live with her husband and she began teaching and mentoring young dancers at local dance studios. Today, as an associate financial adviser by day and dance instructor/mentor by night, she finds special joy watching her 4-year-old daughter follow in her dance steps.

“It’s so much fun,” Carly says. “She seems to love it.”

Leigh’s path took many turns from her native New Mexico. She graduated from high school in Austria, earned degrees in animal physiology and neuroscience in California and a master’s in kinesiology in Indiana — all the while studying and performing in multiple dance styles. Before moving to Billings in 2020, she spent more than a decade as a freelance dancer based in New York City.

Both women have been impressed by the quality of dancers they’ve met locally.

“I’ve found there are really capable, creative people here,” Leigh says. “People with ideas and drive to see things come to fruition.”

In addition to discovering talent here, Leigh is tapping into talent from around the country — choreographers Bethany Mitchell and Alexis Robbins, both friends from New York, and Alexis Gideon, a composer friend from Pittsburgh — for Arc’s upcoming performances.

“I feel including them in this creation for Arc is very fitting as I am bringing friends together with other friends to create this work,” Leigh says.

Arc: a Montana Dance Collective consists of a core group of nine women ranging in age from their mid-30s to mid-40s, though there is no set age limit. Through word of mouth, random emails or perhaps through a child enrolled in a dance class, these women have found one another. Some are Billings natives, while others herald from Salt Lake City, Seattle and even Mexico. Their dance backgrounds vary from ballet and jazz to contemporary and modern dance.

Though their experiences differ, they share the group’s mission: to ignite inquiry, inspire change and connect people through dance. The term “Arc” was chosen for what it implies: a prism or spectrum of light and expression, which encompasses the breadth of everything they do. And that “arc” includes bonds that go beyond dance.

“It’s kind of a sisterhood,” Carly says. “We get together for dinner or drinks. It’s like an extended family — we all really care.”

— Leigh

For Leigh, Arc offered a perfect way to connect and continue performing when she first moved to Billings. “It becomes a built-in friend group,” she says.

That camaraderie fuels the chemistry they present when they perform. “Everything you think you’re seeing, you’re seeing – the way we interact with each other,” Leigh says.

But how do busy young moms and professionals find the time? As Leigh points out, dance becomes an integral part of a dancer’s identity. “When you’re not dancing anymore, you’re taking away a huge part of yourself,” she says. Carly agrees. “When it’s something that you’re passionate about, you don’t have the capability of saying ‘no’,” she says.

And yet, dance is more than serious business – it’s fun, they insist.

“Hard work is fun,” Leigh says. “Moving is fun. Figuring out how to do something is fun.”

The group jokes around during practice, riffing off one another and laughing at their own mistakes.

“We have a lot of humility. We can laugh at ourselves,” Leigh says. “Through the process of creating and attempting, we mess up but we take it in stride. We just keep practicing.”

The dancers not only find reward from Monday night practices, but they thrive on sharing their art.

“I love to perform,” Carly says, “the whole process of working hard toward something and sharing it with other people.”

Likewise, they take heart in dispelling the misguided preconceptions that dance is too serious or that the audience “should” feel one way or another.

When they perform they crave feedback –both complimentary and critical.

“We aim to spark their (audience) curiosity,” Carly says. “There’ve been comments like ‘I’ve never connected so much with a visual piece’ or ‘It brought tears to my eyes’. Or the opposite.”

ARC:

A Montana

DANCE

Collective

will offer shows for its spring recital at the Babcock Theater on April 21 and 22 with shows at 7:30 p.m. on both days.

Arc is currently gearing up for its annual spring recital at the Babcock Theater. Their spring performance marks the culmination of months of practice, after which they shift their focus to smaller events and fundraisers. They’ve partnered with the Billings Public Library – their last library performance demonstrated how a dance piece is created – and last year even danced in the local brew pub Thirsty Street.

As their name suggests, their pieces come together through group inspiration and collective efforts. Certain members of Arc — Leigh and Carly among them — flesh out their ideas through choreography. Costumes, too, are often born from a group decision.

Above all, members of the collective hope to entice “non-dancers” to come watch them perform.

“We really want people to appreciate what we’re doing,” Carly says. “You want to be able to give people something. That is fulfilling.”

“We’re worth coming to see,” Leigh adds, smiling. “People shouldn’t be afraid to experience dance.” ✻

LINDA HALSTEAD-ACHARYA, writer

A long-time resident of the Columbus area, Linda Halstead-Acharya enjoys spending time and learning from her rural neighbors. She has a degree in wildlife biology but for the past 25 years has pursued a career sharing other people's stories in print. She loves riding, writing and traveling.