Miles Walked: 21.12/ Steps: 46,252

Todays Selfie

Yes I took the elevator down the 3 floors this morning because I wasn’t quite ready to start walking!! Haha!
I felt pretty good this morning though. I find that once I start walking my blisters don’t hurt so much after the first 5 minutes. I was good to go!

Like normal the streets were empty. Do you see the arrow?

There is a monastery that serves free wine to pilgrims. It is actually one of the things that people get really excited about. To get there you should walk down the road the arrow is pointing to. Sadly I realized after walking 1/4 mile down a steep road that we were on the wrong road. We turned around and walked back up the steep road and realized that someone had placed a Camino arrow going the wrong way. Grrrr! I walked over to the monastery because who wants to miss out on free wine?! Note: A lot of smaller communities will try to direct pilgrims to go through their towns even though it is off the beaten path. This happened to a few people in different places along the Camino and added substantial mileage/time to their trek because it was an unexpected detour.

Next door to the monastery, there was an iron mill. There were so many amazing looking pieces but refrained from buying them because I did not want to carry any of them. They did have $5 shell necklaces that I wish I would have bought in hindsight but I am sure there will be others along the way. There was also a very large stork nest. I don’t know how he got it in his workshop but it was huge!
I did stop and got some wine. It wasn’t the best wine I have had but the novelty of it was good. They had a water spout next to the wine which I tried to get but it was empty!! 😊 The path continued on and was very quiet.

I spent a lot of today alone. It wasn’t a hard hike and it was peaceful. I love having people with me but it was really nice to have some quiet time. I really wanted to be present for the Camino but did listen to some of my 135 bpm dance remix music to get up the hills today. I did the equivalent of 190 flights of stairs.

I met Bill from North Carolina at the perfect time. I was starting to slow down a bit and we started talking. His pace was a bit faster than what I was strolling so I perked up and walked faster to keep up the conversation. He and his wife are empty nesters and have lots of travel in their future! I can talk about travel for hours! Also note the clouds that were brewing in the background.
The clouds were actually gorgeous. I got my poncho out with hopes that I wouldn’t need it if I had it out….but I wasn’t so lucky.

We came across a house with tons of chickens and goats and a bucket of bread for us to feed them. That was the best treat!! I still feel excitement like a 5 year old when it comes to feeding animals. The animals were very excited as well.

A lot of people stop in Los Arcos when they are walking the Camino but because there were no beds I needed to walk to Torres del Rio. I enjoyed all that Los Arcos had to offer. The balconies were beautifully decorated and their church was stunning. I spoke with the senoras who were working at the church and they took me upstairs to see the organ and the different view. It was gorgeous.
Outside they had a map of the world and pins to place your location. No one from Arizona had pinned so I put a big red one on Phoenix!

I loved these sheep! They had a whole field of grass to eat but would rather struggle to get the same grass outside the fence. I guess they are as bad as humans in thinking that the grass is always a greener…

The clouds let loose as soon as I passed Los Arcos. I had 4 more miles to get to my hostel so I put my walking music on and pushed thru.

I got to the hostel, Alburgue La Pata de Oco and was TIRED! It was supposed to be a bit over 17 miles but my Fitbit read over 20 miles. The hostel manager was lovely and not only gave me a bottom bunk but also gave me a spare sheet for a future hostel that might not provide one. I will say I was not impressed by the Alburgue itself. The room was cramped and dark. It slept a lot of people and the plugs were not easy to get to.

After sitting down for a bit and resting, I got up to look around. The outside area was very cute. It even had a swimming pool but it was way to cold to be thinking about swimming. There was a beautiful church across the street from my hostel but it was closed.

We had a communal dinner that was a lot of fun. The first course was typical Catalonian soup but I have no idea what was in it.

Polo made the best paella. It was really good!

There were some Italian men sitting at the end of the table that scarred me for life. Between their toots and obnoxious and loud conversations in our dorm room, I was really annoyed and ready to get away from them.

After dinner we ended with glass of Rosé and said our goodbyes. Tomorrow is a short day but I would love to get on the road semi early.