Hmmmm….. last night we studied the guide book and app.  We checked several weather apps that all predicted rain in the morning and/or early afternoon. We had a choice to make. Today’s walk had several options from an 18km “up the road” walk (which we had done twice before in pouring rain 13 years ago and in burning heat two years ago) to a 26km trek on a scenic path which would go past an ancient monastery.   Other option sounded less appealing.

We decided together to take the longer scenic route.  We have grown up during this Camino!  That said, I had serious doubts about our choice 3.5km into the walk.  Although we walked in the dark with just a small shared torch up until that point, I could clearly see that we were walking right next to a road but on the other side of the barrier.  How was this road more scenic than the other route.  Was our road prettier than theirs?? But that is when everything changed. We turned off the main road and into the hamlet of San Cristoval do Real. 

The first impression of San Cristoval was that it was an ugly jumble of odd looking houses, squashed together at odd angles along the single lane. The closer I looked though, the more I liked the little place.  The best benefit though, was that at the other side of the village, the lovely forrest trails began and ran all the way to Samos.  The trails were so magical, we expected a leprechaun to jump out on the road to grant us three wishes.  We also realized that we practically had the whole forest to ourselves.  It was so peacefully quiet.  In fact, on the trail today between Triacastela and Aguiada, “we saw one group of 26 Korean pilgrims walking together, one Japanese lady, one cyclist pilgrim (who yelled and motioned us to get out of the way) and one local cyclist who appeared to be pissed off that two pilgrims were on “his” bike trail. 

Other than those pilgrims noted above, we saw several in Samos, the only stop today with food, drinks and toilets.  Poh was there with a new friend Odette and maybe a dozen other pilgrims.  After Aguiada, where the trail meets back up with the shorter option, we saw quite a number of pilgrims during the last 5km into Sarria.  Once in Sarria though, it seemed that the whole city was nothing but pilgrims.  How did that happen?

After arriving in today’s pensión we organized our things, showered and dressed in our Camino evening wear (the same clothes for 27 days straight!), we hurried down the street to the laundromat. That took a bit longer than normal because both Melanie are doing the Camino shuffle – the elderly walk of a pilgrim with a bad ankle, a tight shin tendon, lost toenails, a twisted knee, and / or a number of different ailments that come to light after a few moments of rest and then trying to walk in sandals. 

On the way back with our clean walking clothes,we decided to shuffle in to the the first bar we saw with more food than raciones and pintxos.   As we walked into that bar, we ran into the single pilgrim who passed us today, Japanese Yokiko. We dragged her to our table so she could have someone to talk to. Fr. Ricardo, the Polish Franciscan priest soon joined us.  Not only did we have a lovely dinner with new /newish friends, we laughed a lot and we weren’t even drunk. We finally were able to find out the rest of the joke that starts out, “a Polish priest, A Japanese pilgrim, an American exile and a Singaporean traveler walk into a bar…”.

I’ll leave it there since it’s late. 

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