I wrote yesterday’s blog before dinner. I didn’t change it after getting up to go to dinner or when dinner was over.  All I did was add the photos and publish it.  What I could have added is that my left knee was shot. Going down to dinner, I could not bend my knee without pain.  After dinner, it was in great pain whether it was bent, straight or tied in a knot. I went to bed hoping that rest would fix it but at 2:00am, I was still laying wide awake, in agony, and thinking of how to tell Melanie in the morning that my Camino was over.  I took 600mg of Camino Candy (Ibuprofen) and tried to get to sleep.  I think I did get a somewhat restful sleep but only from 3-6:15am. I then got out of bed and tried to move the knee and it wasn’t good but I decided to dress and see how it was after walking a bit.  I just wished that we didn’t have to go down a flight of steps then immediately climb a steep hill.  I guess it was good though so I could test out the knee.

As you can tell from our mileage today, my knee held up.  It seemed the more we walked, the better it got.  Another 600mg of Camino candy likely help and that may be my breakfast for the next ten days but we walked a bit up a mountain and now I just have to worry about how it will be going down the other side and the other mountains and hills the next few days.

About the walk today, another issue was that our albergue was on the edge of town which made it a shorter walk yesterday and a 1km longer today.  It did give us the opportunity to walk through the old town before almost anyone was awake yet.  We even found a decent breakfast #1 near the far side of the town.  Once outside of town, we basically followed close to two quiet roads through the towns of Valdeviejas, Murias de Rechivaldo, Santa Catalina de Somoza, El Ganso, and Rabenal Del Camino.  None of those names are made up.  How did Madrid get a normal name?

Near Valdeviejas, we stopped at a small chapel. I only prayed for one thing there – for my knee to hold up.  It worked.  After Valdeviejas, all the trails were very nice dirt and stone trails, mostly wide enough for two people walking side by side.  It was also far enough from the road that you barely noticed cars passing (sadly, we definitely did notice bicyclists passing by us on the trail, sometimes inches away, sometimes with no warning, sometimes with no “thank you” or “buen Camino”, sometimes with no common sense at all).

We stopped in a lovely bar in Santa Catalina for breakfast #2 and that is also where we ran into the Eastern European woman who Melanie met after dinner in Azofra. At that dinner, she was despondent that she had eating every meal alone.  Now she was happy that she had a Camino family who took her in.  She walks with them sometimes but regularly eats with them. She really looked happy today. 

Our lunch in Rabinal was a shared bacon and tomato bocadillo which was out of this world.  Melanie and I have a Camino rule that when we are looking for a cafe / bar, we always go to the second one. The first one is always too crowded and the owner in the second will appreciate our business more. In Rabanal the second bar looked packed too so we passed that too.  The third one was closed. The next business was just a shop selling cold drinks. Uh oh, I didn’t want to backtrack for food,down the hill that the city is built on.  The next, and last, place was literally a whole in the wall. We had to walk down a meter-wide alley between two buildings to get to the outdoor cafe. As noted, they served the best sandwich I’ve had in Spain. 

Other people we know included Susi and iPoh. We had a large communal pilgrim dinner and ate with Brin and Alexa.  We met French Patrick and his wife there too.  Actually we met several other people but too far down the table to talk to.

One other person of note who we saw but did not speak with other than the usual “buen Camino” was Fr. (or Br.) Patrick who is walking the Camino in his long brown robe.  His story is that he is from Lockerbie, Scotland.  His childhood home was one of only three houses there that were not hit by falling debris in the 1988 Pan Am Flight 103 bombing. 

A final note… I’ll be pray at the Cruz de Ferro tomorrow a,d the spiritual home of the Camino at O Cebreiro in a few days.  If you want me to have a chat with him about you special intentions, drop me a reply that just says “please say a prayer for my intentions.”

Peace y’all. Goodnight George, Leo and Stella. We love you all.

A traditional prayer said at the Cruz de Ferro is: “Lord, may this stone, a symbol of my efforts on the pilgrimage, that I lay at the foot of the Cross of the Savior, weigh the balance in favor of my good deeds when the deeds of all my life are judged. Let it be so, Amen”.