I woke to find the room was a mess, my bag turned out, stuff everywhere. I had been unable to unpack with any orderliness, as I had been feeling so poorly. Of course after yesterdays early exit, I had no intention of repeating the same, and I was running out of fresh underwear ! But the queasiness was not yet over, so I hung quietly in my descision to leave in a hurry. The brandy had helped, considerably. If I was sick, at least I couldn`t remember it ! The walk, a mamoth 20km`s was enough to scare me, but only because of my fragility. The previous week or so ago, I had been doing crippling 40km hikes. Oh yes, I do remember well that stupidity. Finally at around 9 am, I had fought to rise, pack and consider a coffee.
The Puerta del Sol, over which I had watched the sun setting last evening, was now in full swing, a huge local bar with patios full of people. I dared to to take coffee and orange juice, though the combination seemed somehow wrong, this morning. I mingled for a while, watching with keen interest the proffessionalism of the two bar staff. They seemed to intuit what the customers wanted. I saw no-one waiting for anything more than a brief moment. Smiling and cordial, they set the atmosphere for a relaxed breakfast, though no food passed my lips. I really hated being sick, especially with 20 km`s to walk.
Once out on the road, I soon found a rhythm even if it was slow. Fleece on, to avoid the chill, though the skies were relatively clear and the temperatures climbing. I twas a particularly lovely stretch along the riverside, between walls and fences of different forms. A s I mounted one of the early hills, I could see the town of Fuente de Cantos, out on the horizon. It looked so big, and so far away. I remember looking down over the city of Burgos, in a similar way last May. And, thinking as now, ´Yeah, I`ll do that in a couple of hours`. It took me, more like four. This terrain though hilly, did have a very open plan aspect. I rested on the hill for a while, realising that no-one, except me, cared if I stayed or walked, and so I stayed. Watching nature and letting my eyes and ears, readjust to her secret messages, the bugs and birds telling me strange things. An incredible feeling it is, not to have to go anywhere, or ring anyone. I walked on later and came to a river, that had quite a wide aspect in places, particularly where we needed to cross. There was not much in the way of crossing points for people (who wished to keep their feet dry) the cattle obviously didn`t have a worry over this. So I set my pack down, and set about rectifying this problem. Of course the pilgrims who passed this way ahead of me, had not found it to be a problem, no-one was camped out here awaiting my rescue. Even so, I had decided to try to construct something pilgrim friendly, for those to follow, so they could enjoy quick passage across the river.
I had a thought. The Camino is very much like this, about learning to build bridges. Between people, and nations. Whilst of course I realised a large percentage of pilgrims had some kind of religious viewpoint, mainly Catholic, the rest of us came for the wonderful peace and unity being laid down between peoples, who often found it difficult to communicate with one language. Being able to speak a relative amount of Spanish, gave me an advantage, but seemingly, everyone, even people from afar afield as Japan and Korea, found a way to get understood, despite few words of Spanish. Of course English, my native tongue, was the second most spoken language on the camino, but at times even that couldn`t beat, good old fashioned hand gestures.
I have made known before, just what I would wish for the world of ´Mankind`. That the leaders, of the first world, come on the Camino frances, so they can themselves feel the spirit of unity and brotherhood seen here. We can do with much more feeling of brotherhood in our world at this time. So many attempts have been made. It has been such a long time since Bandaid, and still we haven`t brought about a workable solution to the poverty of the biggest part of the planet. All credit to Sir Bob Geldhof, Sir Bono, and Midge Ure and all the associated artist who helped in that venture, bringing shame of the situation to the worlds attention. Bad form, from the leaders of the world and the finacial institutions for not doing everything within their powers to put an end, once and for all to poverty. We don`t have to believe their words, when they say its not possible to end poverty, we know it is ! The planet, (Mother nature) produces enough food for more than the population now alive, and that is if we all ate like greedy people. The only real problem is, that we don`t share that food with each other. WHY ? So some big fat boss can have more of the huge profits, when keeping the prices artificially high. And then there is the tradgedy, that we would rather destroy this food, than give it away. Diabolical logic and reason, from a society that says we are civil. Shame on all of us who support such unfairness!!!
But with my bridge (stepping stones) built, I felt as though I had begun my quest to do something positve in the world. I set off, pleased with my ingenuity. After another hour or so I passed a newly built villa, called ´Villa Camino de Santiago`. It looked like it should have been an Albergue, there was apool and lots of comfortable outdoor seating areas, in which to relax. It was locked of course, so not open for business, if in fact it was an accomodation and not just a lovely home. There were two signs at the gate, mounted on the wall. One pointed backwards towards Sevilla, at 114 km`s. The other, the less attractive one, pointed towards Santiago de Compostela at 889 km`s, still to go. A thoughtful touch !!! And a reminder of course, of just what a long way it was ´til the destination.
I hadn`t seen a soul all day, and finally a tandem bicycle arrived just as I was approaching one of the many reserve gates. The lady on the rear of the bike, opened the gate to pass through, and I closed it behind us. Teamwork. I recognised immediately that they were not from the locality, but from somewhere in the U.S.A. The couple, Scott and his wife Barbara, were from Massachusetts. They were taking in the scenery, planning to do the journey over about a month. I enjoyed the chance to chat with someone in my own language, even if our meeting was brief. We swapped blog addresses, and said our goodbyes, I watched them cycle away.
As they sey of, I thought that they had made an error, they went on the track to the right. But they were already a long way off, so pointless shouting them. The cubes, with green tiles went to the left. I set off in that direction noticint the footprints of many others ahead of me. Soon I noticed that there were no longer any yellow arrows along this route. OOPS ! But sure enough the prints of pilgrims were on the track. What ? I knew that I was possibly the last person to have left Monestario this morning, so not expecting anyone to be following me today, so assumed that these were the prints of the spanish group and the Austrian girl. Eventually I concluded that an error had been made, so I cut diagonally across country to where I imagined I should have been by now. I found a gate in the corner of the reserve, and the familiar yellow arrows. Phew !!!
Saved, I breathed a sigh of relief. Later that evening, whilst eating in a restaurant with the Spanish group, they admitted that they had also made the same error, though they had gone all the way back to the previous signs, and added about 5 km`s to their day. I said to them, " No wonder that I got lost, I was following your footprints in the sand" !!!
By the time I found the Albergue, I was feeling less sick and nauseous. I needed a rest though, and this accomodation was one of the best I`ve seen so far, ever. It was super luxury for pilgrims. Like being at a 5 star hotel. set in the grounds of some old monastery the old buildings had been rejuvenated to a very high standard, and helped travellers such as myself to unwind from the stresses of walking, getting lost and the heat.
So the day ended with my health being restored, and my determination to build more bridges, over the days and weeks to come.
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