25 May to León

I love the cities, this one especially. But not everyone does. Last night lots of people were saying they were going to walk through as fast as they could today, and if they could take a bus from one side to the other, all the better.

I got my first glimpse of the cathedral pretty early – about 8:30, having already chewed through over 10km, as I was chatting with family, who were having a pizza party for the baby, who turned 18 last week. In that moment I’d have quite liked to be home.

But I’m here, marking another milestone. I have been thinking of this camino in terms of cathedrals – Pamplona, Burgos, León, Astorga, Santiago. Here I am at the middle one. This is where we intended to start our first camino, the one with all eight kids and Grandpa back in 2012. After a week seeing the sights in Paris we had taken an overnight bus from there to León, and when we got here we didn’t immediately see a yellow arrow as we had been promised and we couldn’t even see the cathedral towers, so we booked the next bus to Astorga, figuring it would be easier to start somewhere smaller. It was! Then when four children and I walked this way in 2014, we turned right at León to head up the San Salvador. The next time we were here we were repeating that same route. So León to Astorga is unfinished business. Astorga is not only a cathedral city, but also marks the end of the meseta, and so I’ll have a special post to celebrate that. GraphGuy has been busy at work behind the scenes for that – you’re in for another treat.

This wall ^^ looked a little empty this morning…in comparison to 2014:

Wandering around the city was lacking a little something too…companionship.

Before 1pm everything was quiet, but then it came alive.

Every alley and plaza packed with people playing and drinking and chatting and singing and smoking…

You’ll notice the sun has come out again. Up to 25 degrees today, and a positively balmy 8 first thing this morning. Looking promising:

7pm Vespers with the nuns from the convent. My week at the monastery back at the beginning served me well. This time we were invited to sit in the choir stalls.

Now that must take the prize for the most boring blogpost ever!! Can’t be creative every day, it seems.

PS the other day (23rd) I wrote that the long days had not been problematic. The very next day when I woke, the right Achilles was still sore. It remained so even after an hour of walking and just got worse as the day wore on. Still under 3/10, but I had become accustomed to not noticing it for most of the day. No improvement today. My curiosity aroused, I did a bit of number-crunching to see if that might explain something.
Last week, with the two rest days in Burgos and two travelling days I only walked 72km (considerably less than the previous week’s 108). A bit of a rest was probably in order, and what I forgot about was that if you stop for a week (or do less), you don’t just pick up where you left off – you use the latest number as your new starting point. So 10% on top of 72 brings me near enough to 80. Interestingly, on the 23rd I hit 83.2. It appears that was the sweet spot, and if nothing else, it is useful to understand that you really can rehab-by-numbers. By the time I have finished tomorrow (even though I will walk absolutely as little as possible whilst still making forwards progress), I will have added about another 35. I’m not expecting it to feel any better tomorrow!
So I’ve had a squizz at the upcoming week and have even booked a couple of places to make sure I can dial back to under 100km for the week. Then the hills appear and I will reduce the numbers even further. Increase incline, decrease distance.