our navigation is like the rocks we walked over – but if you persevere i’m sure some of the stories will amuse – not least day 2!
Unfortunately to get there you have to scroll down the page and click previous entries – apologies – it could take as long to read this stuff as to walk the route – there’s some good research for those contemplating the walk but mostly its just straightforward hysteria!
you guessed it – www.westhw.wordpress.com is the brother and sister site for shorter Scottish walks. Much easier and as we get older much more comfortable. The training regime was identical, 4 pies and a pint of lager. The smoker ran out of puff going up the first wee hill – no problem though by the end. We had an easy walk from Drymen to milngavie, party at the McCorkindale’s and we even got to see the bairn. Read on if you want to know about the Camino Frances de Sanitiago de Compostela.
Santiago We lit a few for people – hope we got everyone – The Santiago de Compostela Cathedral candles burn quite bright on film!.
Its a long way 500 miles. Its an even longer time without the news. That’s what makes it all the more amusing or confusing when you hear it. I’d always been taught to think globally act locally, which is lucky as I’ve never been in a position to act globally, but I have been looking out to see who decided to install the slot machines to replace the candles. I’m not sure if it was Health and Safety, the EU or a throw back to the Spanish Civil War.
We met few people who’d discuss the Spanish Civil war with us but we knew it was all around us and had left more than an emotional scar. Monuments, art works etc are a reminder but it is a rarely discussed subject as families were often split down the middle. The one clear thought we left with related to their fearsome pride at the autonomous region status they held.
So what news on the wires prompts today’s topic. The two factions have reformed this time the roles are reversed. The Pope has decided to do a mass beatification of 489 martyrs who were dedicated to the word of God and of Franco whilst co-incidentally the Socialistas have been busy preparing legislation which will ban the celebration of the fascist dictator on the grounds that they dont like what he represented, oh and the mass murder his troops committed.
It looks like a mission for Nelson Mandela as we should respect both lots of dead and remember that war is a terrible thing, but I dont think that’s on the agenda.
We know nothing really but it hits the spot on many different levels, especially if you want to start a debate.
You could argue for example its down to a battle of the purse strings. There are huge state subsidies for the upkeep of churches and monuments to Franco, some are upset that a socialist government can be funding a celebration of someone responsible for murdering their ancestors, never mind the readings of Marx.
On the other hand commemoration of the dead and those who gave their life to God is a standard thing for religions to pursue and they do celebrate those who have done well for them in the past.
On this note I must just take my leave as news, just in, about the monkey situation in Delhi is still causing concern. As a venerated lot these monkeys are kind of running amok, and one of the latest incidents had a monkey dropping a plant pot on the head of the gentleman passing below. He died which aint so good but to be fair the monkeys are not generally malicious, I think it was the colour of shirt he was wearing that bugged them.
The picture below (to be added this evening) is of the candles we lit at the Cathedral in Santiago de Compostela.
This was a big part of the trip, for me it was the primary reason.
Over the length of the walk, whether by miles or hours, you give up a lot of your time to your reflections by thinking of the many people’s brothers and sisters, children, mums, dads, grannies, grandads, cousins, uncles, aunties and all the workmates, friends and family.
We wont go into all the names but there were a lot of candles. I mean, one person’s brother is another one’s son, is another one’s uncle is another one’s friend, cousin, workmate. It can keep you thinking for a long time.
After 500 miles its a fitting end to the trip. When we got the letter from CHAS today thanking you all for sponsoring us – it reminded me.
Are made of this…..and who am I to diasgree, we have after all, travelled the world of the Camino….and now
We’re home in our own beds. Simon in his and me in mine. No snoring – well that was the theory.
Clean clothes, I’m not known for my sartorial elegance but I do like my rags to smell clean.
No queues for the bathroom. Hmmn, maybe not, I’ll exchange stories with the Big Fella later..
Today seems a reasonable day to say thank you for being our 4000th visitor to the blog, that seems like a lot of hits.
We’ll continue to update this as there are a number of gaps, the full photo album and the ever squirming expressions of gratitude for all those who have donated money to CHAS. There are a number of pledges due to come in after pay day in a fortnight, but for now
Thanks – TSB today anyone?
Well actually – we haven’t – for ages – that’s the point.
This taxi to the airport is so disorientating. He doing 5 minute walks in 20 seconds.
Makes your head spin faster than his wheels.
It took us 3 hours in the baking heat on tuesday and this boy’s done it in 18 minutes.
Big tip!
Such is the way of the camino, St James has looked after us all the way.
First Michael O’Leary 300 euros for Stansted and then we walked faster and he wanted 20 for liverpool.
Now Virgin rail want 93 from liverpool or 90 quid from Wigan, so we asked Santiago should we try Preston. Good old Santiago 19 quid from Preston and a fiver to get us from Wigan to Preston on the same train. At least we can warm our seats up.
If there’s one thing the Camino teaches you its watch the path!
Our route home is simple but someone needs to ask the question why did they try and nick so much money from us for the 13 minutes from Wigan to Preston.
The great news is we get home at 18.17 and Caitlin will doubtless steal a posh car to drive us home!
As Si said this morning “it’ll be strange to sleep without tissue in my ears”
www.500m.wordpress.com is the blog for Si and Al as they walk 500 miles across Spain to raise money for CHAS. Please read and comment.
CHAS is a children’s hospice and all donations are gratefully received. www.justgiving.com/deadbeat
Lets make this brief as you all know we made it!
Started 8.15am
Finished 5.30pm ish.
Passed through several delightful places on the way, some lovely scenery and thats about it. When you get this close to the finishing line you kinda blank out everything else and just focus on getting to the end. The feet hurt like hell, but it was worth it!
Got 2 nights in 5 star Parador Hotel to enjoy now. No more walking! Whoopee!
Just a final thnak you to all who have supported us along the way, those who have left messages of encouragement on the blog, and those who have graciously contributed to CHAS, the charity we were walking for.
For a final time – Adois Amigos!
I checked with Si first but under a blood red sky, there it was, I said Si, allegedly Bono from U2 said to the Edge
“I still haven’t found what I’m lookin’ for”
And the Edge said
“Fer fecks sake Bonu, ye’ve dragged me 500 feckin moyles across Spain and ye haven’t even got a song. Even Charlie Reid said “I could walk 500 more”
For those of you unfamiliar with the technology employed near Santiago I can confirm – yes!
4khandles – you do the joke!
I was lighting candles for numerous people. On the route there were thoughts that kept my head engaged for ages.
We left town at 8.14 and bought water donuts etc as we headed down out of town.
Bad move. Down means up – just delayed.
At the 34km stone the hill grew in front of us.
This was the general plan for the next 6km.
We went up for 500m along a flat for 50m and then down for 450m.
Let’s do it again shall we?
On the third lung breaking exercise I suggested to Si that surely Santiago knew our hearts would burn out with all these jump starts.
We were talking 4 steps forward 1 metre up – a set of seriously tough climbs or falls as your knees prefer.
Thankfully it stopped. We evened out to 80m climbs and we can both do them.
The mind wandered when we hit the 25km stone. 1987 I thought. All the worst of Blue Arrow and County NatWest WoodMac. I actually thought Tom Marchant – laid a stone – and thought fittest man ever to walk up and down 28 floors of drapers garens in our London office during his lunch hour. Fit as hell though hardly the sharpest tool in the box. Kenny B was and appointed me, Andy Crocker and Paul O’Brien to sort out the 500m backlog. It took us a year but at least Natwest got their money back unlike Barings! Our only regret was we didn’t get commission on the interest saved.
Anyway – that’s the short version! We had Tony Connor, Simon Stevenson, Paul Wynne all rolled into that kilometre. Funnily enough in my head you walk, you arrive too soon. Its like my dreams, I want to sleep longer they’re so good!
So 24km Si says, “its one foot in front of the other kidda, no time to think – you think too much”
“Too much, surely you mean too little, I have too little time for all my thoughts”
And then like the sword of Santiago, I was struck by the way of the Camino,
“Hit Rock, Shut up, you’re bugging him again!”
I was ingratiated by two further stones on the way.
With 18km to go Stibs entered the mind. The metaphorical stones had been laid but the cricket joke wouldn’t leave me.
The joke was, man walks in with cricket ball up bum,
Doctor says – “How’zat”
Stibs version – how did that happen
For the whole kilometre I thought Stibs, great joke, bad punchline, I’ll light a candle in Santiago and smile.
We stopped for lunch at just after 12. My feet were sore Si’s weren’t.
We met up with the English couple from two nights before. He has a stick he picked up on the way. He has acquired a fondness for it which this writer suggests mean he won’t, throw it away!
We had lunch and a brief “expose”. We talked about employment. We said broking he said FSA, we said and how high does yer kite fly!
Truth is it worked fine, he was on investor relations, hated money laundering legislation as much as Si.
Having said that?
Would you disagree with a Kettles’ boiling at 2pm 28 degrees…..
I said yes – so did David’s wife kicking David under table!
When we got to 14km I thought, Caitlin.
I don’t tell blog world I love my daughter, she gets 1’s for everything and then gets the marks for effort too.
I like to think it goes wiithout saying.
I hjave just walked 500 miles and can I tell anyone as stupid as me, it does not go without saying.
I love you Caitlin and am extremely proud of your achievements. I’m also extremely proud of Jackie, your mother, that you have cared for on your reduced budget while I’ve been on “unpaid leave”.
I have to ask you in this quietly public way.
Any chance you could drive down to Liverpool and pick us up?
Love
Dad
To Robin our webmaster – please take a bow.
To Jackie, Al’s wife please sit down and leave the pavement outside Tiger Tiger alone
To Caitlin, Al’s daughter you are a star. All 1’s a commendation for effort and a mother cared for and an all on a budget of 2 pound a week – the job is yours!
To all our sponsors and supporters and web commentators – what can we say – when the flesh was weak, the cash came flooding through and we had to slap each other sensless!
Another news item – just in!
Today’s candles were lit in a lovely ermita on the edge of town. You put 50 centimes in the box and 5 electronic candles are illimunated before your eyes. The 6th one flashes to let you know its available. There were two candle stands, or machines. We lit 12 in total and left another couple flashing – hmmn – has Amsterdam come to Santiago!
I’m sure I heard my cousin Iain have a wicked laugh!
www.500m.wordpress.com is the blog for Si and Al as they walk 500 miles across Spain to raise money for CHAS. Please read and comment.
CHAS is a children’s hospice and all donations are gratefully received. www.justgiving.com/deadbeat
And that’s just what they did.
Owing to luggage restrictions they will be replaced by a large Galician Ham on the way back.
I am not referring to myself.
We are delighted to announce the arrival of the fat bloaters in Santiago de Compostela.
More importantly, we´re delighted to say thank you for all your support.
We stormed the citadel through the hours of broad daylight having thought we´d reach hereb under the cover of night.
Its fantastic and the feet hurt – but now we must go for a healing thing or two.
We´ve got a nice hotel – its got 5 stars and is next door to the Cathedral.
Thank you all very much – we did 111km in the last 3 days – or to put it another way walked 30 hours which is a long round of golf!
We´ll update the blog later, www.500m.wordpress.com
Thank you again
Si and Al
Or should that be stoned. Whatever as we approached the fine viallge of Barbadelo, Si decided to ignore the Yellow arrows, normally, a perilous thing to do.
Luckily for Si, he walks with a dwarf, who can only manage 10m to his 20m, which as a result means the Drawf Al shouts, “hoi ya big lummocks” (is that the correct spelling) yer marching aff in the wrang direction, again. (I´m never one to let a little mistake go by quietly am I.)
To be fair, the bitching sessions about how fast he can walk and how fast Al cannae are merely a side show to how many items we , sorry he, can lose. The best is still the scissors. His pride and joy went missing in a hotel room one day. I said, “plus ca change, cést la memechose”, which he reminded me was French and not Spanish, to which I retorted, at least he recognised it.
Back to the scissors though. He knew they couldn´t be lost or mislaid. He´d used them that evening to cut more chunks out of sponges. Sponges that had been bought that day. They were in the room.
He was wrong. They were in the bathroom. We are very tidy travellers. We clean up wherever we go. We hand our glasses back. We hand our cutlery back. We lick the plate clean. We are tidy.
The scissors as you have now guessed were in the bin. The only bin resides in the bathroom, and Inspector Cluedo, took Professor Plum and Miss Marples out on a blind date.
Talking of which, I dont.
So back to Stone 108. It was called “Oblivious” and the next stone (107) was passed as I sang ”High Land Hard Rain, goan, doon, knee, pain” the famous Aztec Camera Album which is probably on sale for buttons nowadays.
Talking of Roddy Frame, you cant forget “Pillar to Post”, or Pillar to Pillar as I erroneously described it in Deadbeat 25 years ago. Glad to hear Keith my co-conspirator in that darling fanzine of the early 80´s, has been embarrassed into donating – tell your friends KB!
When we interviewed Roddy, his Roadie came out with the infamous “its all Sex´n´Drugs´Sausage Rolls” when asked to describe life on the road. It was a location joke and unfortunately our budget never allowed photos in those days.
So that was 107 – a bit of a stiff downhill, but then we went around into Barbadelo. As we left the town headed up again, but at least, gently.
These stones were taking on a new meaning in my ever deteriorating head.
I´ll fill in the gaps later but the exciting numbers were
99 – “We´ve less than 100 to go Si!”, Caitlin was 7, but in the January I had visited Si in Boston for a 5 day session Superbowl and gambling session which was concentrated into a weekend as Icelandair left me in Reykjavik for 2 days. I loved Iceland! We managed to re-enact Snooker final 17-16 on pool table, do the horse racing at Suffolk downs, followed by the dogs at Wonderland, followed by Celtic beaating Saints 5-1, Liverpool beating Ipswich 8-1 followed by Superbowl. This guy had seriously gone through gambling withdrawal! We went through 3 changes of waitress and enjoyed the company of many´s the local Scot at Bad Abbots.
95 – I´m sure it was a Rugby World Cup year but all I remember is the Doctor who looked more like Jonah Lomu than Jonah Lomu. He was 9 feet 8 and had fingers like my arms. This man was to perform a vasectomy on me. There was a ladder I had to climb to get on his operating table as he was a 57 inch inside leg. As I am only 71 inches with a straight back this made it the equivalent of a pole vaulting contest, without the pole.
I remember it all vividly. There is a map of Edinburgh from the air on the ceiling on the Dean Clinic surgery rooms. When you´re lying on your back on 4 feet away from it, is easy to see your birth place.
It is easy to see where you were brought up. It is easy to see where you had moved to. It is easy to see where you now lived. It is easy to see where some Giant Ogre is poggling with your tweeses!
Ok, they give you an injection into each sphere that they´re going to tamper with.
Ok the injection doesn´t always work. Ok, when it feels like one of your teeth is connected to one of your toes and someone is trying to drag them closer. ARRRRGGGHHH!
Ok, so the right one wasn´t a wholesale success. The Jonah Lomu lookalike asked if I´d like another injection. He brought out what I would term a mini exocet and said this had a bit more beef. I suggested I was a vegetarian and asked him to continue while I did my 247 times table.
1 247 is 247, 2 247s is 494, 3 247s is 741, 4 247s is 988………43 247s is …….10 thousand 6 hundred and 21 – you´re finished´- YYYEESSSSSSSSSS!”
“Is 43 times 247 really 10621″ he asked
“I dont know, nor do I care, the left one didn´t hurt!”
And lo behold we arrived at stone no. 94 – we continued downhill but it was a lot more gentle than the maps suggested. I´ll leave the historical banter for later. 94 was a great year, and also a great age. There aren´t many people I know who reached that fine number but its becoming ever so popular.
When I saw the stone for 93 I smirked. Its a terrible embrrassement to be reminded that when ýour daughter was only 6 weeks old you nipped off to France for a weeks holiday with your Dad looking after the farm.
88 – as we left Portomarin with a full belly, we climbed a very stiff 1 in 5, with 1 in 3 in parts. We passed the stone marked 88 and as I looked at it I realised part of the reason we´re walking. The kids at CHAS should be allowed to live until they´re 88 like the rest of the “average” in the UK. They wont. I laid a stone on the top and moved on.
87 – much easier – the plan said it would be a steep downhill but it wasn´t. It was fairly level, a bit downhill. Si and I discussed work in 87 – He was at the Canongate Youth Project, I was in WoodMac.
86 – we continued along the flatter plain and life was becoming a breeze. Talking of when we were kids was passing the time and kilometres.
To be continued
Michael O´Leary has been chasing us along the trail, and we´ve responded. His encouragement in the form of 600 euro to fly on Friday, and that´s before Stelios grabs our buts with another 400 to get up to Edinburgh encouraged us to run yesterday. Hmmn, are we being stereotypical Scotsmen or what.
The truth is yes. Frugal, is what we are, and we could give a few bob more to CHAS if we dont waste it so that´s the deal.
We´ve still to work out how we get from Liverpool to Edinburgh – but its only 250 miles so a bit of a skoosh, see you in two weeks Jackie. We could get a train to Glasgow as Alec´s always good for a lift home.
So we arrive on Thursday at 12.45 and will be delighted to hear if anyone has any great ideas how to get home. I´m sure if Mr Mould logs in – his luxury coach could pick us up!
Those of you who are betting on our arrival in Santiago will now guess its sooner rather than later. We may make it tomorrow at 6.42pm if we get up early and run like dogs, that´s greyhounds, not chihuahua´s.
Of course, we look more like sausage dogs so running wont be an option.
No, we´ll have a gentle glide again, like today. We did ok again. We got another 30+ day under the belt and hopefully the diet will have helped us lose a stone. We´ll lose even more when we get back when any muscle formed returns to fat!
Tomorrow the trek will take us to 4km from the gates of Santiago, or 10km from the church door.
If we get there and nobody´s in, we´ll be mighty unhappy.
Scene Day 31
Knock on door
“We come bearing gifts, messages from the east.” cry the Pellegrinos Si and Al
“Aye,” comes back the sound from the sky, ”We´ve seen your type before!”
Hi folks,
After the highs of yesterday, walking so far, could we get up and walk today?…….. Of course. Us highly committed, fit young men can do anything now!
Today was 30k. This would get us to within 40k of Santiago. Our Holy Grail.
Before I continue I will prolong the suspense and add to my observations about Spain.
Stone Walls – Just like the dry stane dykes you get back home! Wonderful!
Tree Fruit – Loads of it. Apples n Pears to cobble dogs with, everywhere in Galicia. Its the same with conkers and acorns (the things Piglet eats). Seriously, you have to be careful when walking under these trees cos u could easliy get brained by falling fruit. ´We´ve had some narrow escapes, believe me.
Pensions – Not those things you get from work. These are kinda low grade hotels, even lower grade than hostels, but higher than Refuges. You get your own room, but share a loo/shower.
Last night´s was a self service job. You went into the place took a key, signed a book saying which room you took and but your money in a box. At 10pm each night someone came round to empty the box. No money, mucho hassle. Money there, nae sweat.
Okay, on with today. 30k. Left Palas do Rei at 8.30ish. Ate breakfast on the hoof and headed off. It was a busy wee path first thing. Many Germans trying to get there first. With our superior fitness now, we waltzed passed them, although you have to perform the odd swerve to get past the more obstinate ones. Armed with plenty water our first aim was to walk non stop to Melide, 15k away. The halfway point. We cruised through Casanova. I dont think he lives there anymore……, and on to Leboreiro. Once again the mist was all around us so scenery shots etc just not possible. The lanes, paths etc we walked were cool and shaded, although you still have to dodge the cow dung and bands of stray dogs. By 11am we had reached Melide. Here we stopped for an hour to rest our feet and eat.
Noon, back on the road. During our hour stop the mist had cleared and the sun was now beating down. This instantly slows you done.
As Alan stroud on I spent the next hour chatting to this Canadian girl called Anna, from Montreal. ( No Sharon she doesn´t know Paul n Susan). She was in Spain for the year to learn Flamenco dancing. Maybe she could teach me a few steps?..
Anyhow Al n me stopped at Castanedra for drink, so that brief encounter ended.
Around 3pm we finally made Arzua. It was just as well as the temperature was now in the 30´s.
Got a great room in a hostel, got the washing done and now having a drink. Fantastic. 30k tomorrow and we got it done. Even the flights home have been booked!
Manana a´body.
Okay, if we ever gonna get to Santiago by Wednesday we had to have a plan. Er….. lets just walk as far as we can today and see what happens. Good.
We left around 8am. Felt pretty good to. Two previous days doing not a lot walking wise had left us kinda rejuvenated. On we went. Our first Goal was Portamarin, 20 k away. As is the case in the mornings in Galicia there was a fog first thing. Usually this lifts as the morning progresses and the sun comes out. Today however it just stayed. This made walking much easier as there were no heat issues. The first 5 k took us to Barbedelo, which had we continued yesterday we would have reached. Cést la vie.
We passed by. We carry on through the mist along easy country paths shaded by trees. Very reminiscent at times of being in Scotland! There are little stone markers along the way here at every 1/2 km, so you always kinda know how far it is to the next village. By 10.30am we had reached Ferreiros. We stopped for 20mins to rest feet, smoke etc etc. At this rate Portomarin was on by noon.
The slightly unfortunate side effect of misty weather is that if there is a good view you cant see it!.
Portomarin is an odd place, as the original town was flooded by a new dam construction in the 60´s and rebuilt higher up the hill. When you cross the river before it you can see the remenants of the old town.
We decided to have lunch here and put the old feet up. Now i ain´t one for long stops but in this case it was a wise move. We ate lunch, relaxed etc and left Portomarin just after 2pm. As the weather was still in our favour we decided to go to Ventas de Naron, 12k up the road. The break had recharged us. We zipped up the hill out of town and continued at a good pace, reaching Ventas by 4.30pm, despite a 15min break for Al to get his footy bets on!
Amazingly we still felt okay. Right decision time again! Could we, should we walk the next 14 k to Palas do Rei? If we could make it this would put us back on track. What the hell, lets do it.
Motivated by the fact that if we made it this would be our longest day on the road we bashed on. Downhill into village, uphill out. It never changes!
On we went, passed places we could have stayed in, even past bars! A woman drove passed us and gave us a card to a pension in Palas. If we made it, we would stay there.
Would we make it before dark!?
At 7.30pm, after almost 12 hours on the road we finally got to our goal- Palas do Rei. 46km done!
We were knacked, but elated that we had achieved this.
Tomorrow would be easier, but still 30km to do to stay on target.
We ate, then crashed. a very good day.
Adois zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
What is is about Sundays. The sabbath, day of rest and we batter on past Pontomarin to Pal de Rei and put 45km in the tank. We left at 7.45am and arrived at 7.15pm – a long shift but one that gladdened the heart and left the feet sore!
I´m going to concentrate on the stone marker so as we left town it was 111, a big sweep up and then downhill, to the right for 300m then 200m sweeping a big loop left, and then 500m straight climb.
110km – I wasn´t breathing too well so I only know it was on the flat and eventually we hit a wee village and 109km, followed by 108km still in a nice forest and I´ll finish this later. I´m knackered.
“Arouse the troops Mad Dog, we march on Pontomarin for lunch, and after we take the bridge, we shall sally forth to Ventas our wrath” called out Komindant Kettles as he wiped the sleep from his chin
“But Sire, the men are tired and wounded should we not bed down for one more night, get a bus, a taxi, and pardon me my liege, my name’s Howling Mad Murdoch”
“Howl like a wolf, Bark if you like Mad Dog, we march in 10 minutes” Kettles replied
“Yes Sire”
7.47am
“Sire, we’re like Sherpa and Tensing the two of us, mad devils following the yellow arrows across France and Spain” Howling Mad Murdoch began
“I think you’ll find it was Sherpa Tensing and Edmund ‘my cousin’ Hilary Benn. They climbed hills you fool and didn’t dance around the countryside following yellow arrows” replied the komandant curtly.
“Yes, that’s right he was Aussie, they did very well against England, they got 10 points. Do you know who they play in the Semi Finals” continued Mad Dog Murdoch
“He was a kiwi you idiot and Australia lost to England 12-10″ retorted the kapitan
“Ah, yes, Kiwi, they make great fruit. They’re the favourites aren’t they”
“No, you buffoon, they got knocked out too, as I should’ve done to you last night. Fat lot of use watching the TV did you. No special treats tonight for you Mad Malagan.
“Ah yes, Scotland are favourites now”
“Just march Mad Mulagatawny or I’ll turn you into soup”
“But I walked all the way to Swany’s yesterday and I want a buggy if we’re golfing at this Ventas place…………….
*The komindant and his assistant are purely fictitious characters. Any similarity to Characters real or imaginary are merely a typo.
24 little hours – one minute it’s – Kool and the Gang singing “Celebrate” then it slid into “Candyskin” by the Fire Engines and before I know it “I’m all lost in the Supermarket” and then Kool and the Gang are back on.
I suppose it should be “Tantalise” by those one hit wonders from 1983 that escape me. A great summer song to bounce up and down the hills to.
Yes – we could’ve walked further yesterday, especially as hindsight proved that it took us only just under 2 hours this morning. So we lost a wee bit ground yesterday instead of gaining it.
Today we arrived in Sarria thinking well, we could walk on to catch up the lost 5km and make it a bit less tomorrow but we figured last night that it was an easy thursday or a hard wednesday in Santiago so we found a place, got a wash, got a meal, watched the cabbages put one past another of the wise guys from the west.
Ibrox hasn’t been a happy hunting ground until Ivan was given the keys a few games back. We also watched England crucify the Aussies, or at least the Afrikanner next to us did! Then we did siesta for a moment and then supermarket to stock up on Sunday’s breakfast and then prepare for bed.
In fact a dull old day! They’re getting longer the days and its quite a shift trying to move bones that are fatigued and brains that are frazzled by the restrictive circumstances of one bag contains all. They talk about the hardest part in a marathon being those lost miles between 20 and 23 when your still a long way from the finish. Its like that with us, 400+ miles and probably only 70 to go, but it just feels like miles!
Light relief in the form of a result from home can put that spring back where all have sprung before them. The begging bowl has been good and we’re both chuffed to bits that CHAS have done so well. Your donations have really boosted us, sorry energised us. We saw a plaque today from when Bob Geldof did the Camino, he said, apparently, that the hardest miles were the ones in front of you – profound or what. What I want to know is how did he know this if he hadn’t walked them.
We’ll try and put a big shift in tomorrow and get down to Ventas. If we only make Pontmarin, then we’ll be thursday for sure, flying back friday to do Meze 6.30pm and then TSB – if Niall lays on some Tapas we’ll skip the Meze!
Buenos Noches mis amigos
PS – we’ll be the ones smelling sorry sleeping in the corner.
BYOB
Bring your own babywipes is the general rule here.
The camino pilgrims can be a filthy theiving lot so you frequently enter a cubicle that is empty.
I am reminded of this regularly, as I am, what they call regular.
As soon as I break the 6km per hour chasing the big fella, for more than 5 minutes – the next shout is – “sorry Kapitan, need to stop”.
The Moorish influence is everywhere to be seen in Northern Spain – and the toilets rarely let you down.
I’m not a big fan of crouch and evacuate, especially when the squat position follows the downhill segments and my legs cramp and buckle unde rpressure. I prefer the good solid supports that Mr Shanks provides.
Today – I am lucky. We left in the dark followed mostly the road and arrived in Samos by 9.40am. This makes up for yesterday’s demise. On now to Sarria but first a recommendation.
Best toilet on the Camino – mind you I do hate these timer light switches when they’re outside the toilet!
Recent Comments