I can’t write much today. Last night’s battle with the WiFi cost me two hours of sleep. Also, we got in at a reasonable time today but we have been talking to so many people. I’m starting to type this at 10:00pm so you get to see all my sundowning thoughts.  

First, last night I was shocked that I didn’t see many pilgrims,particularly new pilgrims in Sarria.  They did, however, come out of the woodwork today.  It was a parade of people.  It was hard finding old friends in the crowds. At the first cafe we could get breakfast #1, it took about 15 minutes of queuing to order anything. At a subsequent stop, we waited 30 minutes in the queue to order.  At least there we could make ourselves useful by bussing tables for the frenetic staff.  We got lots of strange looks from a bunch of the pilgrims but the staff were grateful. 

I still can’t believe that we walked this trail in 32 days when we started in San Jean Pied de Port, 67km before Pamplona.  We did not have a clue what we were doing then and our legs just pushed us on. We are older, slightly wiser, and definitely slower now and we will still take 32 days to finish this year, just like last year. 

Among the many new pilgrims, there are a lot of Latinas who we met while walking. There are a surprising number of mother / daughter pairs too.  The most impressive pilgrims we met at breakfast #2. That was a mother / son pair but the boy was only about seven years-old. They must have just started walking today as the boy was quite shy but I did get a fist bump out of him.

I’m dead tired. Peace y’all. Goodnight George, Leo & Stella