MOVING RIGHT ALONG

Despite the effort, blisters and pain, the way to Santiago also presents us with new friends - people from all over the world!

I’M PUBLISHING THIS WITHOUT PHOTOS.  HAVING PROBLEMS

We, us pilgrims that is, experienced a couple of mostly dry days and then the rains came down again.  Luckily only for a day, but it kept the mud nice and wet.  I am slowly progressing along at my desired pace.  Slow is my desired speed and as such it is a special occasion if I actually pass someone.  I can see them ahead of me, and at first I can’t tell if they are going faster or slower than me.  After about 30 minutes I can detect that I am closing in on them.  It may take sometime for me to catch up, but usually they stop for some reason, take a photo, tie their boots and I can gain really fast.  Upon the event of overtaking, I usually slow down to say “Hola” and to find out if they speak English.  If they do, I will dally along at their pace for conversation.  Sometimes we walk together for a long time, other times it is clear that they want to be alone, or I just don’t like them and I pick up my pace again.

One person I met was Karin, from Austria.  She was staying in the same albergue as me a couple of nights.  She speaks English, but I still have some difficulty understanding her because of her strong accent.  We share a couple of meals together along with time walking.  As it is on the Camino, we will cross paths again.

Although I have shared dinner with several pilgrims, Jeff and Deb, Adrian, Phill to name a few, on this camino I meet fewer pilgrims.  One reason is I believe that fewer people are walking. Perhaps it’s the bad weather that Northern Spain has been experiencing.  More than likely is the fact that I’m not following the usual guide book stages.  Let me explain to those of you who are not familiar with planning your daily walk.

There are several guide books for the Camino, plus various apps and web sites to help you decide how far to walk and where to stay each day.  The most popular is one written by and Englishmen named Birelery called A Pilgrims Guide to the Camino de Santiago.  I think I found a better one in The Village to Village Guide to Hiking the Camino de Santiago.  Anyway, most guides are set up with “stages” or comfortable distances to walk between towns which have services for pilgrims.  So what happens, because most pilgrims follow the Birelery guide, that the end town for each stage gets crowded with many pilgrims.  I have chosen to go slower this time and not walk the usual 14 to 18 miles each day.  I am trying to keep my daily mileage between 10 and 12 miles and as such I am often staying in towns in the middle of a stage.  So, I see fewer pilgrims.  In the morning I take off ahead of those who are starting the stage I am in the middle of and I am behind those who start at the end of the aforementioned stage.  Get it?

I was in Logroño the other night, a large city of about 200,000 and the end of a stage.  Still there were not many pilgrims.  I had a private room in an albergue and the bunk room with about 15 beds only had two other pilgrims.  It wasn’t like this when I walked in 2015.

Speaking of Logroño, I decided to walk an entire stage that day because I didn’t want to stay where we had last year.  As such I walked 17 miles and paid the price.  I didn’t even feel it coming on, but I ended up with a blister on my big toe.  Such is the life of a pilgrim.

The next day, not wanting to repeat my experience of the day before, I changed things up a bit and walked about 2 km off the Camino to the hilltop village of Sotes.  The town used to be on the Camino route, but has since been eliminated from the path.  There is a sign in the village square which must have been placed there when the Camino still ran through town. It says in part “The villagers are used to the constant presence of visitors and pilgrims and are noted for their friendly and hospitable character.”  Well,  this day I was the only pilgrim in the village bar filled with locals.  I can’t say that they were really hospitable, but they weren’t giving me the evil eye either.

I spent the night in a Casa Rural, like a B&B only in rural areas.  Most are a family run business and cater to tourist and pilgrims alike.  I was the only guest as most pilgrims keep to the marked path.  Antonio and his wife live in the house next door, so I had the whole house to myself.  Dinner and breakfast was provided, with dinner consisting of soup and salad, bread, thinly sliced chicken breast, fried eggs and desert.  Oh, and don’t forget the bottle of wine to wash it all down.

Next morning out the door at a leisurely 8 o’clock and put another 19 km behind me.  Walking through fields of wheat, rape seed (think canola oil) and endless vineyards.  Stopped in Nájera, a fair sized city with a population of 8,000, for lunch.  Off with the boots to air out the feet and for a sock change.  Enjoyed conversation with Steve and Glen, two Aussie pilgrims.  At the end of the day I ended up in Azofra a sleepy town with not much going on.  Enjoyed a glass of vino tinto while the Aussie’s enjoyed their beer.  Nice pilgrims dinner for 10 € in the local bar consisting of lentils for the starter, two kind of sausage, Iberian ham, fried eggs and potatoes for the main course, flan for desert and of course a bottle of wine.

The last three days, the weather has be great, with clear sky’s and comfortable temperatures. I am currently in Santo Domingo de la Calzada taking a well deserved day off.  Having walked just under 100 miles, my feet need a rest.  Their are enjoying themselves in the Parador Hotel, a 4 star establishment.  Shh, don’t tell Cathie.