Day 3: And then there were 3
I know my writing style, but I also know that making walking 10 miles a day interesting is only so possible. So, humor may drop off, but only because the scenery is so beautiful and nothing crazy is happening.
After a less than amazing night of 3 hours of sleep, it was time to start my second day of walking. Today a man I have never met, but talked to a few times via texts was meeting us. Part of my journey to being in Spain and walking the Camino involves Kevin and his wider circle of influence. To be frank, well, I’m Chris, but I’ll be frank for a moment here, I personally can only afford to either fly to and from Spain, or walk the Camino. Not both. At that’s a bit of a problem if one is required for the other. Obviously something happened. Or, maybe not obvious. I could be stealing photos from the internet…. So something happened. Kevin had a friend volunteer to donate tickets to me. It is an amazing gift opening an amazing opportunity to me. But, that friend readers, by all coincidences, is showing up today to walk for a week.
I get to walk with both Kevin and the donor that made my trip even possible. Its awesome. Ron is a fascinating individual who we will dive into later in these blogs. But suffice to say, selfless, loving, energetic, fit, and loving life. Compared to Kevin and I, this dude could hike circles around us. How did he put it…? I’ll have to paraphrase because I forgot, which sucks because it was a great line. “I made different athletic decisions that you guys.” Reader, Kevin and I hike at between 2.5 and 3 miles an hour. Ron answered one of the questions on a later day indicating that 3mph was his slowest hiking speed with a heavy pack and many hills. Dude is a beast. BUT he’s so humble. There is no bragging, there is no making you feel like you are less than him. The guy is awesome.
So, that’s the prep for how day 3 is starting. Ron is in Leon and going to show up outside at our albergue at 8am. So I’m up, packed, and had the small breakfast served. Outside to a cacophony of caws from across the street. Literally 300 crows living in the trees over there. 300. I do what I can to make sure not to displease them since they remember faces, and tell their friends.
Look that murder
Ron shows up at 8am sharp in a Taxi, there was a good possibility that he was going to show up having walked what I did yesterday ready to walk our stage today. But he showed up and off we were into our day.
A cheery group
Today the trail runs beside a 2 lane road. Highway maybe. Not heavy traffic and we are separated from it by a yard or 2 so its fine. Spain also only lets red cars drive on the left side.
Pretty sure that means that red cars have to use the left lane
They also have signs warning that Pilgrims and the Camino are nearby and the dude they drew is walking so fancy like. Dude is full on strutting. Makes me laugh every time.
So fancy!
Hiking through farmlands, irrigation canals, poppies, sheep, and wonderful party cloudy sunshine. We stopped for lunch at an Albergue along the way and then found a bridge for water over a canal of water. Pretty sure some farmer was bored and wanted to create this confusing civil project.
I don’t get it either.
Down the road we hit the town of Hospital de Orbigo. No Hospital in sight so they may need to change the name of the town. In the middle of town we find an amazing old Roman bridge over the river Orbigo. The bridge was very photogenic and I spent about an hour shooting it and around it.
Then it was through town and off to more rocky farmland. I was walking alone for my first time, Kevin and Ron were mysteriously bored with my photo taking and had moved on earlier. Rocky fields, waving grains, clouding over skies, babbling creeks, and huge lilac trees were what I found in those last few miles. Nothing overly interesting to talk about. Just calm and peaceful land.
I did get stuck in a rainstorm 2km out of town. Just in time to walk up another 100ft tall hill that I had to stop a few times to get up. Readers, I can walk 12km just fine, and I think I can walk up hills just fine. But after doing 10 miles this hill was a jerk and came out nowhere to ambush me. Well, technically anything could have ambushed me because the rainstorm was blowing wind and rain against my face and pulling my hat bill down infant of my eyes so I couldn’t see anything. Blind leading the blind, but there was no leading. Just Blind. The hill thankfully turned me 90* to the wind so I could see the hill. This did not make it easier. Stopped quite a few times to catch my breath on the way up. This had me concerned about the actual real hills that were coming up a few days from now. But that was future Chris problems.
See! Its a hill. A real hill. Ok fine, a bump.
Current Chris was cold and wet and headed into our destination for the evening Santabanez de Valdeiglesias. I quiet little town with nothing open. We had done 11.4 miles today. The rain stopped as I walked into the Albergue to be greeted by a kitten and a wonderful lady who spoke a bit of English. Kelvin, Ron, and I had a 3 person room and the Albergue had a lovely courtyard with a balcony overlooking it. We grabbed a bottle of wine and some cheese and spent the rest of the afternoon talking and enjoying the cats.
Not wet nor tired at all
Cat!
Lovely sunshine, wine, cheese, and conversation
Dinner was a pilgrims menu and communal meal of a mixed salad, lentils with meatballs, and ice cream. I slept well that night. Day 4 starts with cows and not for breakfast.
