11 May to Hontanas

Today

Although the landscape barely changed, plenty was happening in the sky. These pictures are all before 10, and I imagine the celestial drama kept unfolding, because at 3pm I was jolted awake by a raucous thunderclap, which was quickly accompanied by the sound of raindrops drumming on the skylight and then dripping in beside my bunk.

Yes, I was asleep in the afternoon. My toothache is now entirely bearable, but my body was telling me I am still fighting infection. So I slept. I even considered not blogging, because my brain was under-functioning. As I had walked I had been thinking about what to write, but couldn’t complete a train of thought.

I’ll show you what I mean.

I really need to commend my kids for when we walked. I just assumed of course they would handwash their clothes at the end of the day and help with the cooking. Occasionally they asked to use a washing machine and I let them choose – spend the money on washing machine or ice creams. The ice creams always won. On this Camino I have met four children walking with parents. As I watched the father of an 18 year old pack his son’s bag in the morning, I realised maybe it was unusual that my kids had done a great job of caring for their gear from six years of age.

Brain jump:

As I watched a mother doing times tables with her child yesterday I thought my kids owe ME some thanks for NOT doing that to them!

Brain jump:

I know there’s a person behind me, and our shadows are so long at the moment I wonder if I’ll see the shadow before I hear the footsteps crunching on the stones.

Brain jump:

As I climbed the hill today, I remembered last time being surprised that we were still climbing – it was meant to be flat after Burgos! And I remembered my surprise when we crested the hill – in my part of the world, when you get to the top of a hill, you then start going down the other side. Here at the top was a wide wide wide expanse of flat fields as far as the eye could see. How could there be such a massive space at the top of a hill?!

Brain jump:

I didn’t write last night about the priest sprinkling us with water after the pilgrim blessing. And what was it about anyway? Must Google that when I have wifi.

Brain jump:

I really need to keep drinking. Let’s see if you are flexible enough to get the bottle out of your pack’s side pocket without taking it off. Well done, you!

Brain jump:

If the person behind me catches up and wants to talk, which strategy will I use to make sure they overtake me? Stop to re-tie my shoe lace? Stop to take photos? Stop to draw? Any of those would work with an urging not to wait for me! Of course, my eldest daughter would be saying, “Just tell them you want to walk alone. And you don’t even need to give a reason.”!!

Brain jump:

Why don’t you put your bottle in your bumbag instead of carrying it? This might be a better solution than continuing with the hydration tube that is broken and keeps popping off. At least you got a refund for it! But I’d really prefer to have a working one!

Brain jump:

We are obviously going round a slight bend because my shadow is moving from beside me, spread across the wheat and onto the path in front of me.

Brain jump:

I could just post one picture of the big flat and invite people to read the post on their phone so that they can turn through 360 degrees and that’s what I’m seeing.

Brain jump:

Those windmills that were ahead of me two hours ago are now beside me.

Brain jump:

Youngest son observed one long day on the Via de la Plata, “Mum, I know when you are tired.”

“You do? What gives it away?”

“You stop using your poles properly and just drag them along the ground.”

He was right, and it kept happening today, despite this stretch (and yesterday’s, both of which we did on one day in 2014) being described as “the easiest day yet” back then.

And then ever so abruptly you get to the edge of the big wide flat, and there’s Hontanas.

(Actually, if I’m to be entirely accurate, in the middle of the big wide flat, there was another down-and-up too, but I’m being selective and not taking you on every step)

I plonked myself down in front of the Albergue to wait three hours until opening time. I had no energy to even walk the dozen paces to the church – I had just walked to the end of the village to get a chocolate pastry like we had enjoyed last time, but the bakery was gone. Grandpa was messaging from home and suggested I get my journal out and do a sketch, so I took his advice and then dragged a sad lunch out of my pack – very crunchy three day old bread! Thankfully I still had some butter, but now that it is warming up I won’t be replacing it when it’s gone. There was still some delicious blueberry jam that I had decanted out of its heavy glass jar and into the plastic garlic mayonnaise container when the mayo was finished. Scrounging round in my food bag, I also found a hunk of dry cheese, so I sliced that up too.

As I was typing this up I overheard a woman about my age talking to her boyfriend. I decided this has been such a piecemeal account, that the conversation would fit right in.

“Oh my feet are so sore. It doesn’t matter how far you walk, twenty or thirty kilometres, the last four kill your feet. But my main problem is I’ve run out of fags. Can’t get any til tomorrow after 10km. Gonna have to manage aren’t I, Luv? We’re going to a pilgrim mass at 6. Nah, the two girls I’m walking with aren’t Christian, but one just lost her mum and wants to go and light a candle, so I said I’ll go. That’ll be interesting, hope I don’t burst into flames when I walk in the door. Yeah I’m really missing you and just want to be home. Every part of you hurts and then you have to get up and do it again tomorrow. I’m never doing this again. I’m telling you now. Never. It was 27 yesterday, try walking in that! Oh, can you pop out and take some photos of the Northern Lights for me? It’s meant to be even better tonight than last night. I’m so gutted I’m here and not in London. We never see them there. What do you mean you’re sat on the sofa with a beer?”

(Full disclosure: what is written here is accurate, but there are a few sentences missing, because I couldn’t keep up! There wasn’t a lot of responding on boyfriend’s end)

Then there was a fireworks conversation….for context, over twenty people had come in asking for a bed, and even more had asked for dinner just in the last hour or so before dinner would be served, and in spite of the COMPLETO sign being up.

Then an Italian man and French woman arrived, DEMANDING a bed because they had walked over 40km from Burgos and they should be able to stop at a municipal hostel because they are for everyone and he has 50% disability and a heart condition and will die if he sleeps outside. The woman burst into tears when they were told there are no beds, and the man started shouting loudly. He then switched to halting English that confirmed I had understood him well. He had Spanish at his command too, but would not listen to the hospitalero, who was trying to cook the communal dinner while explaining he had no beds. The Italian kept arguing his case for fifteen minutes, and then got on the phone to the police. I couldn’t help thinking if he knew he was so fragile he might have stopped in one of the previous villages instead of making his problem the fault of the hospitalero.

The church bells started chiming so I went off to mass – highlight was a flute being played beautifully. (Brain jump: this church is actively trying to share the Good News of Jesus with pilgrims – they offer free foot massages, pilgrim prayers, a danced blessing which was actually very moving, and they keep the church open so it can be used – plus it has contemporary artwork as well as the ancient artifacts and they have a comfy reading book with Bibles in at least a dozen languages) When I returned for the communal dinner, the commotion that had ensued was the hot topic. It was unclear what had eventuated. Indeed the police had come, the guy had kept ranting, and somehow he was still here and the hospitalera was kindly feeding him. She’s an angel.