Day forty two - Monday November 29

Departed: Ponferrada 8:15am
Arrived: Vega de Valcarce 4:45pm
Total hours: 8.5
Total kms: 43
Accumulated kms: 1358.3
Weather: Sunny and cold

Another beautiful walk today. Most of the way was alongside a freeway, but it was one of those futuristic type freeways on stilts, so it was kind of above me. Next to me on the right was a smaller road that not many cars drove along, and beside me on the left was a fast flowing river. The path wound around and around through the valley of some very large and closely packed mountains, and most of the day felt quite dark, despite the sun being out and the sky clear. As the trucks tore past overhead it sounded exactly like thunder, so for most of the day I got to walk with the sensation I was in the middle of a dark thunderstorm without actually getting wet. If that's not the definition of awesome, I don't know what is.

I must confess, I got lost again today. But it wasn't my fault! Once again, some enterprising bar owners have covered a side road in official looking yellow arrows in order to lure naive walkers such as myself off the true path and 2kms out of the way to their cow poke little town to go to a bar that isn't even open in winter. I even had a feeling something was amiss, but stupidly neglected to check the map. It turned out to be a nice little detour, but on a day when I was already walking 41km the extra distance was very much felt later on.

I'm right now near the bottom of the final mountain to climb, which I'm hoping to go up and over in one hit tomorrow (it's down in the guide book as a two day walk, but I'm pretty sure I can do it in one). Early tonight it began snowing outside here, and I'll be climbing another 750m or so tomorrow. Filipe and I went into a farmacia (pharmacy) to ask about the weather earlier.

Me: Do you know what the weather is like tomorrow (he spoke a little English)
Him: Oh yes - bad. Very, very bad.
Filipe (in Spanish): Can we still walk up the mountain?
Him: something in Spanish
Filipe (to me): Um yes. He says it's still possible. But the weather is very, very bad.

The snow has stopped now and it's just raining lightly. I for one have high hopes as always, that good old blind optimism of mine working out for me once again. I figure it's not as high as the mountain we crossed the other day, and the night before was snowing much more than tonight, so I think I'll have no troubles.

Speaking of troubles, we're not sure what happened to our new Canadian friend Blake who was going to keep up with us. He quit smoking yesterday, and told us he'd meet us here tonight. Problems are 1) I think today was a much longer distance than he's been walking so far and 2) It's almost certain he would also have gone the wrong way because he didn't have any kind of map whatsoever. I think he probably had enough about 10km back and stayed at one of the albergues I passed, and possibly went on the hunt for a comforting packet of cigarettes. But I hope not. He seems like a tough kid, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see him turn up here at 10pm, covered in snow and soaked through with a big grin on his face.

One other thing I thought of today. This has happened to me quite a few times, enough times to get me thinking about it. Often I've been walking along a road for close to an hour without seeing any cars traveling in either direction. Then, the road will narrow, the footpath will disappear, I'll step onto the road to keep walking and suddenly there's a tractor going one way and a bus coming the other, and all three of us come together at the same time, at the same point, in the most narrow section of road, and all of us have to slow down and manouevre about ourselves. After this, I won't see any more cars for close to an hour again. This has happened at least five or six times on the whole walk, maybe more. What does this mean? Do the lives of myself and the people in the other vehicles have some weird connection that requires us to meet in such odd circumstances? It's very strange. There might be a book in that somewhere.

The castle of Ponferrada.

Snow in the evening.

Day forty one - Sunday November 28

Departed: Rabanal del Camino 8am
Arrived: Ponferrada 3:30pm
Total hours: 7.5
Total kms: 32.5
Accumlated kms: 1315.3
Weather: Sunny and perfect

Today I climbed to the highest altitude of the entire Camino, 1515m above sea level. As I started from fairly high up though, it really didn't feel like as high as I was in the Pyrenees. It definitely felt colder though. Although the snow storm didn't really happen, it did snow a little bit over night and so I got to walk through slippery white stuff all day, which was awesome. I slipped a lot, and bit the snow dust twice, once in a really comical, near backflip kind of slip. I'm glad I have a padded pack, otherwise I might have snapped my spine with that one.

The walk today was, I think, the most beautiful of all days so far. The snow on the ground, the mountains surrounding me, the quiet, the sun, the cold air, it was just amazing. Even falling over into the snow was fun.

I passed the famous and revered emonument known as the Iron Cross, which turned out to be essentially a telegraph pole with a cross stuck into the top of it. At the base was a minor mountain of stones, and the story goes like this: you take a stone or rock from where you live to represent your sins or regrets or something like that, carry it across the country with you, deposit it at the base of the Iron Cross, and all is forgiven. I didn't bring a stone, and as my Swiss friends mentioned a few weeks ago, it's probably because I have no sins or regrets, which I'm very happy with. I believe you're also supposed to pick up a stone and carry it the rest of the way, so as to carry someone else's sins. I wouldn't expect anyone to carry my sins so I wasn't about to carry anyone else's for them. In the end I took a photo and that was about the end of the business transaction between the Iron Cross and myself.

Yesterday I met a Canadian called Blake, who has decided to try to keep pace with Filipe and I (he's also agreed to the rules of walking alone and meeting up at night in the albergue). We had a long conversation over dinner, and he told me I was the first Australian he's met (and he's met many, he's been working for a while in a hostel in Italy) who wasn't a "complete arsehole". It's good to see my countrymen are doing us proud abroad.

I'm finding it a little hard to believe that, in theory, I only have nine more days of walking to go, and then I'm finished. Incredible. There's still the issue of getting across the final mountain, but we can see most of the mountains around us from here and they don't look as snowy as the one we crossed today, so I have high hopes that Tuesday will see me up and over it without any issues at all. Then it's a few more days to Santiago, three more to Finisterre, and then I'm off to Barcelona to visit Lucy and then home in time for Christmas. I love it when a plan works out.

Snow in the morning.

The legendary Iron Cross.

Day forty - Saturday November 27

Departed: Hospital de Órbigo 8am
Arrived: Rabanal del Camino 4pm
Total hours: 8
Total kms: 37
Accumulated kms: 1282.8
Weather: Sunny and cold

Well, the big snow storm that our hospitalero promised didn't hit, and it was sun, sun, sun all day. You wouldn't know it from the temperatures, but that's what I had. There's still talk of snow for either tonight, tomorrow or Monday, but with any luck it will miss us. I'm nearly at the top of the mountain now, I think there's about another 350m to climb first thing in the morning, then right down to a low altitude, and nothing to worry about snow-wise for about another three days or so. At that time I'm supposed to walk up another mountain to a town called O Cebreiro, but I've heard that that's already under snow. Whatever, there's a cheat way around that one so no big deal if it is.

Today was a much nicer walk than I've had lately, further away from the highways and roads. A lot of it was through scrubby bush with snow capped mountains so close I could almost touch them. Well, not that close, but they looked nice.

Filipe and I walked together for the first bit, and up in the hills before we reached Astorga, we came across a big old barnhouse with a little stall set up in front. The stall was full of juice, coffee, fruit, nuts, cookies, jams and other things - all organic and offered for a small donation! The guy who runs it, David, came out to have a chat and was such an amazing guy. He left Barcelona a year and a half ago to come and do this, and has never looked back. He gets a lot of joy from offering things up to people, he also lets people sleep there for free if they need to. He looked so healthy and happy, it was a nice little injection of inspiration along the way.

This computer is set up outside at the albergue I'm staying at, and my fingers feel like they're about to snap off in the cold, so I think I'll leave it there. With more luck I'll get across the rest of the mountain without any troubles tomorrow, and the computers at the next albergue will be set up right in front of a working heater. Oh, dreams are wonderful things...

Day thirty nine - Friday November 26

Departed: León 8:15am
Arrived: Hospital de Órbigo 3:00pm
Total hours: 6.75
Total kms: 33
Accumulated kms: 1245.8
Weather: Sunny and warm

Another flat highway walk today. Nothing much of interest to report walking-wise, I put one foot in front of the other and watched the snow-covered mountains that I have to cross get bigger and bigger.

At one point I noticed a guy driving past me cross himself. I thought this was odd as I don't feel that I look particularly evil or anything. Perhaps it's time I shaved. The weirder thing was, a little later I came across two mice on the path, either fighting or mating or wrestling, I wasn´t sure which. As I came up they both started running off. One made it, the other rolled over and started kicking his little paws like a dying actor in a bad b-grade film, and died at my feet. Maybe that guy crossed himself for a reason, perhaps I have become Satan. It's not outside the realms of possibility.

What else happened today? A couple of big flat bed trucks drove past me carrying tanks and guns that were so big that even Cher would have trouble straddling one in a video clip, and possibly even more disturbing was news that heavy snow is expected in Astorga in the next few days, and that's where I'm walking through tomorrow. If it snows heavily, the police or military will stop pilgrims from walking through. I'm hoping that by the time the snow falls, I'll be through Astorga and down the other side of a large mountain and out of danger from weather or authorities. Fingers crossed my next entry has good news!

Day thirty eight - Thursday November 25

Departed: El Burgos Ranero 7:45am
Arrived: León 3:30pm
Total hours: 7.75
Total kms: 39
Accumulated kms: 1212.8
Weather: Sunny and cold

The day began with a 13km walk alongside a road. This time I refused the comforts of the iPod and decided to meditate it out, which worked out quite well. The second half of the day was more walking along roads, but punctuated by little towns, most of which refused to offer up any panenderias, but one of which happily did so and that's where I bought a couple of neopolitas (pastry with chocolate inside). These panenderia hunts are becoming a daily mission, and not always a successful one unfortunately.

So now I'm in León, a big city and I believe the last big city I hit before Santiago. I managed to find an organic food store here and stocked up on dinner products for the rest of the walk. God knows how I'm going to carry the damn things, but at least I'll be eating reasonably well.

There's no kitchen here in the albergue, and as we wandered around the city Filipe and I decided to eat in tonight, so we went to the supermarket, bought some cheese and lettuce and stuff, and will make sandwiches (or bocadillos if you prefer the Spanish). He's gone to mass and will be bringing bread (or pan) back with him as they were baking some more fresh when we stopped there. I just heard a guy asking where the kitchen was and I realised I forgot to label our food that I left in the fridge, so I should probably go and save it before he eats it. That was about it for today anyway, nothing too exciting happened!

Day thirty seven - Wednesday November 24

Departed: Ledigos 8:15am
Arrived: El Burgo Ranero 3:15pm
Total hours: 7
Total kms: 37.5
Accumulated kms: 1173.8
Weather: Sunny and warm

Today was a day of adventure. Filipe and I set off a little late, the ice-cold room we stayed in a sufficient antidote to getting up early. As usual, Filipe quickly scampered ahead. Not long after this I got to a turn in the road and could see Filipe scurrying quickly along, head down, in the wrong direction across a field. I yelled out and whistled until I was almost hoarse, but it seemed he had a lesson to learn and didn't hear me. I gave up when he slipped out of sight under a freeway, and walked on. I figured he was a smart kid and would work it out. He caught me up about an hour or so later, looking very sheepish.

A little bit later, Filipe having already motored ahead, I came to a decision between a path marked by white arrows and a graffittied "Camino Frances", and a path marked by yellow arrows and an official metallic cocquille shell sign. Yellow arrows have marked the way since Roncevalles, and I haven't seen any white arrows at all, so I followed the yellow brick road. I ended up on an alternative route that I estimate from the map took me about 3km further. It was a nicer walk though, instead of shadowing the freeway for three hours I was led through countryside that felt like Australian outback - all red dirt roads and dried, dead grass.

We thought we would be the only two in the albergue tonight, but then a group of seven came in about 7pm. Two of them were Italian and on a honeymoon - how romantic. As this albergue has speakers and an iPod connection, I played them Mike Patton's album of Italian pop songs accompanied by the Italian Symphony Orchestra. It was so nice to see their reactions to songs that don't really mean anything to me aside from sounding good. They were singing along and explaining where the songs came from and who originally sung them. Unfortunately they just left as she is feeling quite sick (not from the music, some ongoing concern), and they are moving to a hotel with heating. I am headed for the warmth of my sleeping bag yet again.

A hobbit house!

Day thirty six - Tuesday November 23

Departed: Población de Campos 8:00am
Arrived: Ledigos 4:15pm
Total hours: 8.25
Total kms: 38
Accumulated kms: 1136.3
Weather: Foggy all morning, sunny and warm all afternoon

I am really enjoying this weather at the moment! The mornings are cold but myserious and exciting to walk through, the afternoons are sunny and warm and beautiful. I hope it holds up for the rest of the trip, although this may be wishful thinking as I've been told the region of Galicia is one of the wettest you will find anywhere. I spoke with someone who walked the Camino a few years back and it rained heavily on her for ten days straight - her entire stretch through there. Oh well, I'll enjoy it as long as it lasts anyway.
Today was an exercise in strength of mind - three hours of the walk was along a straight, empty road through the middle of flat, empty plains. I lasted two hours and finally took out the iPod before something inside me snapped. Or perhaps it did, I found myself singing Rainbow Connection at the top of my lungs because I could quite easily see that there was absolutely nobody around for at least 5km in every direction.

I should make an update on last night - the water came back about five minutes after I finished writing the journal entry, and the hot shower was fantastic. Then, we went to the hotel that the albergue was run by to ask for directions to the supermarket. The woman there came outside to point out the road, and saw a guy getting out of a car at a house further up - he turned out to be the owner of the supermarket who, on account of no one going in to buy anything, had decided to close up early for the day. She spoke with him and he agreed to go back and open up just for us. I knew it was a good move going to that place, everything worked out well!

Tonight it's just Filipe and I in the albergue here; another guy got here just before us, but he was looking for a large group of pilgrims and when he discovered they weren't here he kept going. If it's the group we're thinking of they're at least a day ahead of him from what other albergue people have told us, but it's good to have hopes and dreams.

The manager here just brought us in free soup, and Filipe happily ate mine as it was full of ham. And if I'm not mistaken, the heaters should be kicking in any minute now. Yep, life on the Camino is pretty good at the moment, and as of right now I should have, all things going well, exactly two weeks until I reach the edge of the world. It's very exciting and I can't wait to see the ocean.

Day thirty five - Monday November 22

Departed: Hontanas 8:00am
Arrived: Población de Campos 4:00pm
Total hours: 8
Total kms: 36
Accumulated kms: 1098.3
Weather: Foggy all morning, sunny and beautiful all afternoon

The fog was stunning this morning as we left Hontanas. It was so thick that I couldn't see more than ten or twenty metres in front of me at times. Walking through the fields in this shroud was quite an experience, and the fog didn't lift until almost midday.

At one point I caught up to Filipe and another pilgrim, stranded at a fork in the road with no signs. Filipe had already been down each path for about 200m and not seen any markings on either of them. None of us had very detailed maps, and finally I suggested taking the path that had more footprints than just Filipe's in the mud. Fortunately this turned out, after about five minutes or so of walking, to be the right path.

Tonight Filipe and I are staying in a town called Población de Campos, and right now we're the only ones here. Just as we got in, something terrible happened somewhere, and the entire town now has no water, so we are without showers. Aside from that - and the fact there are no heaters and it's starting to get really cold - it's a really nice place, especially as it only cost us 3 euros each. We're going to head off to the supermarket soon to get some water to cook with and some more food then for me it will be into my super warm sleeping bag to get comfortable.

Day thirty four - Sunday November 21

Departed: Burgos 7:45am
Arrived: Hontanas 2:45pm
Total hours: 7
Total kms: 31
Accumulated kms: 1062.3
Weather: Overcast

We were keen to have some kind of traditional Spanish breakfast at a bar in Burgos this morning (read: chocolate y churros, fried batter dipped in chocolate), as there was no kitchen in the albergue, but being a Sunday the restaurants and bars near us were all closed, so munching some nuts and cheese I headed off into a spectacularly dull walk.

A few times now I've likened the distance I'm walking to the distance between Sydney and Adelaide, and today was one of those days where it actually felt like that was exactly where I was walking. Flat, open, dried-out plains stretching in every direction and with very little to stimulate the mind.

But I put it to good use and meditated as much as I could, for which these surrounds are particularly conducive to. I also met a Swede called Bo today, a very interesting character. He plans to retire in three years and move to one of the poorest regions he can find in Europe for six months of the year (for the remainder he will stay in Sweden). He is thinking of Portugal as he has lived there and likes it, but is also open to the idea of Romania. He wants to go somewhere that is so poor, government has little control over the daily lives of people, and he can farm his own food and alcohol and live off his little patch of land unhindered by anyone. He's a very interesting guy who has lived in Sweden, Spain, France, Portugal, Germany, Iceland, maybe Russia and other places, and speaks at least four languages that I've counted fluently. He and another Swede called Jonas, unconnected, and Filipe are the only ones here at the albergue tonight. Apparently there was an Australian girl in Burgos last night with us, but I didn't meet her (it was a huge place with numerous floors). She has apparently stayed there an extra day so I'll be unlikely to meet her now with the miles I'm putting in each day.

They turned the heating off here tonight to save money, but Filipe found the fuse box and turned it back on. It's getting colder and colder and I'm thinking I may even need to buy some extra clothes. I'll stick it out as long as I can though, I only have a couple more weeks to go, and I can still probably wear a couple more things than I am!

Hontanas, buried in the ground in the middle of long, flat plains.

Day thirty three - Saturday November 20

Departed: Belorado 7:45am
Arrived: Burgos 6:00pm
Total hour: 10.25
Total kms: 51.5
Accumulated kms: 1031.3
Weather: Overcast and windy windy windy

That's right, today I walked over 50km! I'm quite proud of myself, even if I was a little delirious toward the end. Last night in Belorado Filipe and I were trying to work out what to do - we knew of a place that was open at the 27km mark, and possibilities at around the 30km and 35km marks. We decided to just walk to the first one and make our decision.

We walked separately as we have been doing of late, and just before we got there he had caught Agnes up, the French girl I was keeping pace with in France for a while, and I caught them up. We stopped at the open albergue and discussed our options. If the possibilities were closed, we would have a long walk to Burgos. We decided to take it.

Needless to say, neither of the possibilities were open. In fact, we didn't even see the second one at all. We made good on our deal and walked all the way into Burgos, a total of 51.5km. We were feeling very pleased with ourselves, and expected to be greeted like heroes. Instead, we were greeted by two guys who stayed in Belorado last night.

Now, they left after us. They were eating breakfast when we headed out, the contents of the bags all over their beds. We walked at a pace of over 5kph, including up two small mountains, and didn't see anyone overtake us. After some quizzing by Filipe in Spanish we discovered they caught two buses to get here before us. We were happy again, until we met two other guys who were also in Belorado, and walked as well. They were the two Spanish guys who have walked from Norway. They plan to walk another 50km again tomorrow. This definitely deflated our heroic status.

I've just put clothes in the dryer and the woman from the albergue has just come and told me she's turning all the lights out in ten minutes. At least I think that's what she said...

I should mention here the rules of Real Pilgrims. I started this a week or two ago, and we've added some new ones (the last two) today:
1. Real Pilgrims don't take shortcuts.
2. Real Pilgrims don't ever go back.
3. Real Pilgrims don't catch the bus.
4. Real Pilgrims don't take elevators (we have to walk up six flights of stairs to our beds here).

I mainly made up the last one to be a bit obnoxious and see if Filipe would go along with it, because he's really keen to be a Real Pilgrim. He has. Even with sore legs he's now refusing to take the elevator. It's pretty funny, even if it is a bit mean.

The other exciting landmark of today is that I passed the 1000km mark! I've left it until now to mention it because there are at least five other people I've met who have already walked much, much farther than that, but it's exciting for me at any rate. I think I have less than 500km to go to get to Santiago now, and a little under 100km to Finisterre. Only a couple more weeks and I'm done!

This was taken at night and I couldn't get the photo any less blurry, but it's the famous cathedral in Burgos.

Day thirty two - Friday November 19

Departed:Azofra 7:45am
Arrived: Belorado 3:45pm
Total hours: 8
Total kms: 38.2
Accumulated kms: 979.8
Weather: Overcast

Yesterday the landscape felt Texan to me, today it was positively apocalyptic. It was similar in some ways to France, with the large broken fields and muddy tracks, but these fields were filled with grey and blackened remnants of plant life, and spread out as far as the eye could see. It almost looked like desert, or like someone had dropped a large and efficient bomb on the country. Most of the path ran beside a busy highway as well, so it made for a dull and ugly time. I chose to listen to music for the first half of the day, and walk and chat with Filipe for the second after I caught him up at lunch.

There are a bunch of new people in the albergue tonight, including two guys from Santiago de Compostela who started in Norway and have been filming their walk. I think they've done around 5000km so far. They're also caning it, they went over the mountains the same day I did, and took a day and a half off in Pamplona, and I've now caught them up. Amazing.

We have no idea where we're going tomorrow, it seems that quite a few places are closed and there's a big space of around 15km or so with no towns at all, so we may have to settle for a short walk. That will throw out plans for the next few days out a bit too as there are similar long patches with no towns, but that's the nature of the Camino - never expect anything to work out as you plan!

Peak hour in the country.