In the course of our lives, we will lose many who are precious to us. We have both lost all our parents, and many other dear friends and relatives. Two years ago, we lost Diane’s brother and our friend, Don Baker.

Don Baker loved exercising, conversation, controversy, cycle racing, meeting new people, eating new foods, etc. It seems every step we take along this Camino is another reminder of what Don enjoyed.

Don would faithfully watch the tour de france every day during July. Because of injuries, many of the biggest stars of cycling were unable to complete the tour this year. So, they showed up for Spain Vuelta de Espana.  This year, the Vuelta followed the Camino at pretty much the same time-frame that we were hiking. We saw, or met, several of the big boys of cycling. Don would have gone crazy with this.

The Vuelta is now over, and the world championships of cycling is taking place, you guessed it, right in our path over the next few days! We have met or seen many more cyclists and will see a whole bunch more in these next couple days. Again, Don would love this.

Every day we have conversations with people from many different countries. Don always excelled at starting conversations with new people, then finding entertaining controversies that all could join in.  Hey, he was a pirate after all!

The food: No end of exotic foods for Don to have sampled. And they never use “fat free” here!

And, you have to mention all the religious significance. Don would appreciate the sublime and also find an opportunity to find a controversy or two.

And the hiking through so much varied and beautiful countryside. If Don weren’t in heaven, he would be in heaven on this Camino.

We miss you, Don Baker. Be at peace.

Today was the 26 th day of our journey. We are now 368 miles into the walk. Because we had a mountain range to cross, 16 miles to walk, and wanted to spend time at the Cruz de Ferro (more on this in the next blog), we started our walk early, under a very clear sky and 36 degree temperature. It was chilly!

After a couple hours of climbing, we made it to the top and the Cruz de Ferro.

We spent just about an hour there before moving on down the other side. There, we dropped down roughly 3,000′ over the next 8 miles. What made it more challenging was the loose slate that constantly challenged your foothold. We have become convinced that hiking poles are a necessity.

We passed through several charming villages,

and:

before making it to Molinaseca. Here’s the view out our hostal window. Definitely worth the walk!

For over a thousand years, pilgrims have walked the way of St. James. The highest point on this Camino is here at the Cruz de Ferro. Over these centuries, pilgrims would carry a stone, or burden, and lay it at the foot of the cross.

The result is a massive pile of stones from all over the world, all with unique significance to the bearer.  The pilgrim would then offer a prayer something like this:

Lord, may this stone, a symbol of my efforts on this pilgrimage that I lay at the foot of the cross of the Savior, one day weigh the balance in favor of my good deeds when the deeds of my life are judged. Let it be so.

It is beautiful and truly the wish of many of us, pilgrims or not.

While contemplating this, I couldn’t help but remember something that the Savior said, as recorded in Matthew 11:28 -30.  “Come to me all you who are weary and heavy burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble of heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light”.

And what is this yoke and burden that the Savior has asked? To love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul, mind and strength. And the second, to love your neighbor as yourself.

There are stones that each of us choose to carry on our own pilgrimage. For Diane and I, we will choose the Savior’s yoke.

Whatever you choose as your burden and your pilgrimage, “Buen Camino, my friend”

There is rest and peace in Jesus. 

Okay, okay. Each time we get to a new Spanish city we say it is more beautiful than the last. So, we’ll not try to use comparisons versus others, but Ponferrada was way cool!

But first, the numbers. Today was a 20 miler bringing our 26 day total to 388 miles.  We’ve pretty much walked from Danville to Huntington Beach. Wow!

With a 20 miler in front of us, we wanted to start early, but not spend hours walking in the dark. We left at 8:00, which in these latitudes is still night.

Within 45 minutes, we were on the outskirts of Ponferrada.

Ponferrada has a Knights Templar castle that is fully restored.  Notice the parapets. They look almost Disney-esque.

For us cycling junkies, the world championship of cycling is taking place this week in Ponferrada. This morning, it was the women’s road racing championship. The photo below looks like they are casually riding, but in fact they were moving so fast that I wasn’t sure I captured them in the photo before they were gone!

On leaving Ponferrada, the climate and vegetation once again changed and it looked and felt like we were hiking through Calistoga in the wine county.

We are now literally at the foot of the Cordillera mountain range and will be climbing significantly tomorrow. In addition, the next convenient stop is almost 19 miles down the road. As we look at the guide book, everything after this is much easier, and we only have a week more of hiking before Santiago. Hard to imagine that you can be saddened by not having to hike 15 or so miles every day, but we have loved this journey and will miss it when it is over.

Now for laundry and shower …

We must be getting trail dementia. Yesterday was the 27th day (not the 26th day), so today is the 28th day of walking. We completed 18 miles (shorter than we thought) to bring our grand total to 406 miles. We are now in a beautiful mountain village in the province of Galicia, named O’Cebreiro.

Once again, the morning broke very clear and very cold. Just to add to the fun, there was an even colder wind coming down the narrow canyon that we were walking up.  A bit chilly is a good description.

We followed a stream, or river, for 14 miles of the walk.

In the last 5 miles or so, the elevation went from gradual climb to grinding climb! The views, however, we’re worth it.

Also, we crossed into the final province in Spain of our journey, Galicia.

Galicia is the verdant province, which means RAIN. Sure enough, our last day in Castilla y Leon was sunny and bright, and tomorrow (our first full day in Galicia) is forecast to rain. Yes, Bill will have his rain gear handy.

Hasta Manana.

When last we left our readers, we had just arrived in O’Cebreiro in the Galicia region of Spain. True to form, within 2 hours of being there, it poured down rain! But the lodge we were staying in was warm and dry, so life was good.

O’Cebreiro has the oldest functioning church on the Camino, dating back to the 9th century.

In fact, 800 years ago this year,  St. Francis of Asisi did the Camino and visited this church. Here’s a guy born of a very wealthy family who gives it all up to work with the poor.  Very cool.

We started this morning as soon as there was enough light and the fog had lifted. I took some shots of the fog, but they didn’t come out. However, once the fog lifted, it remained in the valleys and made a great picture.

Interestingly, those flowers that seem to grow out of pavement along the Meseta have a cousin in Galicia. Here’s a photo of the local version.

Tomorrow we will hike to Sarria.  Sarria is noteworthy because it is the last point that a pilgrim can start a Camino and still get credit for it. As a result, the numbers of Pilgrims will increase dramatically. We’ve already seen an increase since Leon.  That’s okay. We don’t own the Camino. It’s just something you have to get used to.

We now have 13 more miles in the bank, 418 down and about 85 to go.

Now for chores …

With another 11 miles in the bank today, we are within 65 miles of Santiago. Who’d have thought that we would think of the equivalent of walking from Danville to Lodi as “close”.

It rained most of last night, but that gave way to a light fog for most of our morning hike.

The fog filled the valley as we walked.

One thing that has amazed us as we’ve walked through Spain is the variety of flowers growing wild. I tried to capture several of them … we’ll see.

Thanks for indulging or stroll through the flowers of Spanish Galicia.

Chores now call …

One month ago, we began this journey in St. Jean Pied de Port.  31 days, 433 miles, and countless friendships later, we are in Portomarin.

The day broke foggy again, but beautiful.  You could feel the excitement of the many new Peregrinos who were joining the Camino at the latest point possible to still be an “official” Peregrino.

As veterans, it fell on us to provide the official “look” and “swagger” of road proven Peregrinos. And hey, we know how to follow the Camino, right?

About a mile into the walk, we crossed a railroad track that I figure will make a good picture. Here it is:

After I snapped the photo, Diane went off to the right because there was a place she could sit to adjust her shoes. I hurried to join her. We continued up that dirt path until it joined a major road, which we followed for another quarter mile before really wondering , “where are the trail signs”, and “where are all the Peregrinos? “. We turned around to retrace our steps and found several neophyte Peregrinos following us!  Oops! Bill alerted the group that this didn’t look right, and after 1/2 mile backtrack (right back to the railroad tracks), he found the left turn IMMEDIATELY following the picture, above.  We had missed it and led several newbie Peregrinos astray. Oh well. They had to learn the hard way that,  “everyone must walk their own Camino”. In other words, don’t trust that guy ahead who seems to know what he’s doing!

Aside from adding another mile to an already 15 mile walk, things went very well. We met several of our old Peregrino friends, like:

Axel: The kind, meticulous planning German from Berlin,

Belgian guy: we’ve seen him for 250 miles, talked to him scores of times and still don’t know his name.

Matje: Great guy from Serbia who once chased us down for a kilometer because he thought we dropped a 10€ note. He was right, we did, but his honesty and kindness won us as friends for a long, long time.  He is also an avid cycling fan (and racer), so we’ve had much professional cycling conversations!

Don and his New Orleans family. Great people.

Don and Marlis, whom we hadn’t seen since our very first day of the Camino.

Galan, who is doing the Camino on crutches.

And literally scores of others. It was truly a hike of conversations, from beginning to end!

Oh, and did I mention this guy who greeted us as we arrived at Portomarin?

Just another day on the Camino. Now for chores …

I’ve debated long about whether to do this post, but decided is valuable to anyone considering the Camino.

So, what happens when you’ve really got to go?

There are many options, including:

1. Being blessed with a great bladder.  Not an option for most.

2. A convenient public restroom. It can happen, usually at restaurants. Typically the lines are very long, and/or it’s a long way until you get to that oasis of a restaurant (remember, you’re walking).

3. A convenient detour off the trail. It’s amazing how few of these exist, that provide good shelter and don’t require you walking another several hundred yards for that privacy.

4. The most common solution? a 1 minute lead on the next hiker and a nice bush, tree, etc.!

And that’s about all the options available!

Now in Sarria, another several hundred additional Peregrinos joined the quest, making that “1 minute” requirement challenging. Thus, a really foggy day helped!

And these are the challenges we Peregrinos face on a daily basis. Yet … we continue.