I found a nice, relaxing restaurant to get a tuna sandwich. Also, it seems to have good internet:). I decided to do an extra post.
It’s warm today, for the first time in quite a while. I’m switching to shorts after lunch. I started off with UnderArmor and a puffy down jacket on. That lasted about 1/2 hour.
The monastery last night was awesome. The monk, Lawrence, and I really hit it off well. I never pictured teasing a monk (because he was so young) or being teased (prostate humor) by a monk It seems that when a group hosts pilgrims for hundreds of years they work out all the kinks:). I can’t imagine how many tens of thousands, or more, pilgrims they have hosted over the centuries. I’m guessing the first pilgrims didn’t have USB ports, or WiFi.
I woke up at 6:00 and tried to be as quiet as possible when loading up my pack and heading out. When I headed out the door to the room, outside doing their packing, was Sergio and Aaron, my young German buddies. This time I took my book to Sergio, pointing to the map where the trail forks, he signaled clearly it was the right fork. I won’t know until the end of the day if they changed their mind;)
Dinner last night, cooked by the Missouri couple, Mel and Michael was amazing. She is a Registered Dietitian, and he is an exceptional cook. His Father-in-Law, John told me how much Mel loves to cook, and it’s always good. Also, being experienced long distance hikers they understand the importance of quantity. There was plenty for all four of us, and really good:)
Sitting with us, but eating her own food, was a 25 year old German woman, with a very big emotional “stone.” It was a heavy, memorable evening.
Many things are similar on the PCT and the Camino, but there are some major differences. Showers each night on the Camino, versus sometimes going a couple of weeks between showers on the PCT is obvious. Not carrying near the weight on the Camino because of food along the way really helps. Sleeping in a bed each night, with electricity, and usually WiFi is different.
Serious discussions are more common on the Camino. Certainly on the PCT when I got to know people, sometimes they would open up about tough times, or traumas, in their lives. It’s just more common here. So many people are dealing with heavy crap (or more like, carrying heavy stones). The reality that people have been dealing with carrying heavy stones on these Caminos for 1000+ years, and the albergues always have people in them, hits home.
We’re all on this journey together. Sometimes the paths are different. I still don’t know the difference between a “Variant” and an “Alternate” path. There are MANY different ways to get to Santiago. Sometimes the way there is easy to see, like the great signs in Galicia, sometimes there are no signs, or conflicting signs (the app shows going one way, the arrows on the ground the other, or, my favorite sign a yellow arrow AND a yellow X, one meaning go this way and the other meaning don’t go this way, on the same post). When an intersection like this happens, a person just has to wing it, kind of like what we have to do with life.
Enough of my rambling. I’m done with my atun (tuna) sandwich, ready to hike on a warm sunny day. It seems like I will be able to make it to Santiago, or it’s immediate outskirts, tomorrow.
Buen Camino
