Daily routine and day off

The daily routine is up at 6am make coffee, hot water for tea and Bridget & I have upped the traditional breakfast of bread, chorizo, cheese to include yogurt, oatmeal with blueberries, cream cheese along with artisan bread and orange juice that we purchased at the local store. The “donativo” or donations for breakfast have soared and surprised the 4 priests. Night before they took in 100€ vs typical of 30€. We clean from 8:30 to 10am and have a 1 hour to get out before welcoming pilgrims at noon and show them to their rooms. At 5, there is optional sharing or reasons for doing the Camino and experience in which some heartfelt feelings come out and Father Daniel talks about the Camino experience. At 6:30 is Mass in the cathedral next store with Pilgrims blessing followed by dinner at 8pm in which Bridget and I again have added our stamp to with peach cobbler, caprise salad, sautéed mushrooms as well as smoked salmon appetizers. We close the doors at 10pm and hopefully everything settles for the night. Pilgrims start heading out around 6 am the next morning, but we find some have a hard time leaving before the 8:30am required our time. We had one guy who we let stay until 11am the other day. Some are physically hurting but an equal number are just emotionally drained. Many give thanks for the experience and many want hugs as they leave. Talking with the pilgrims at sharing and the communal dinners are the best. Many countries are represented with a fair number of Spanish, Americans, Koreans, Germans, Italians and a handful of others such as Perú, New Zealand.

We got our “day off” yesterday which means we left after breakfast and took the train to Leòn about 45min away. There was some kind of  Big Holiday yesterday with people dressed in groups wearing colored t shirts and moving from bar to bar. Very festive and loud. We toured the amazing cathedral there, in my mind better than Notre Damme.

Things progress with 8 more days. Sometimes seems like it too much, but we seem to be falling into the experience and enjoy the appreciation of the Pilgrims.

Whirlwind

Wow, just finished our second day as “Hospitaleros” or volunteers at the Monetary Santa Cruz in Sahagún Spain which is almost exactly halfway for those doing the traditional way of the Camino De Santiago. At this point many pilgrims are suffering injuries to feet and knees but also grateful for the experience but also not quite sure they can go on. There are daily coffee clatches where their experience is shared and Pilgrims Mass and blessings along with communal dinner nightly. The work is hard here up at 6:30am and bed at 10:30pm which an hour or two squeezed in to get outside after pushing out the pilgrims at 8:30am and cleaning until 10:30an with a noon opening. Also a possibility to walk for 1/2hr around 3pm where there is a lull in people come by in. There are around 40 beds here mostly in rooms of two and four. We are exhausted after our second day with 12 more to go, but the experience of hearing the stories of people doing it form many different countries is the payoff for the work.

We wish you all well back home and good thoughts for you.

D&B

It had to happen...

Yesterday the jet lag, riding up a steep 12% grade and wanting windows open or closed with noise open and hot room closed caught up with us. There was talk and a bit of this and that, but happy to report all is well after “accidentally” locking Bridget in the room. Today we rode to Sagagun where will will start our volunteer work Tuesday for two weeks. We had a good ride today stopping along the way for coffee, lunch and a chat with Mark from Wisconsin doing the Camino with his brother and come for 10 days every year and expecting to finish next year. We met and chatted with a French couple who snapped pix of us this morning. Thinking of all of you back home with blessings to all of you.

D&B

 

Day One on the Camino

Today was our first day riding on the Camino from Burgos to Castrojeriz which was about 24 miles away. Things rolled along quickly for the first half and then a hill climb in the middle slowed us down. We also slowed to talk with pilgrims as we passed and said “Buen Camino” meeting pilgrims from Germany, Czech, Peru and then John from Canada. John it seems is s retired postman and is doing the Camino for a second time saying he just can’t stop walking carrying a bag. John said he found out about the Camino when his wife did it, came home and said she was divorcing him. John came over to do it and find out what the Camino was all about. John apparently re-married and Bridget asked if he met his new wife on the Camino in which he replied “no I met her in a pool”. He said it was good because he saw what he saw what he was getting up front. Bridge and I laughed for the next few miles. We are in a nice boutique hotel in Castrojeriz after our day.

Burgos

Today Bridge and I traveled from Bilbao, home of the Frank Gehry museum to Burgos which is about 80 miles South and on the Caminó about 1/3rd the way to Santiago. It’s a big city and more about that later but we had troubles figuring out how to get there. It a bit over an hour by car which we don’t have, so we checked out busses, trains, taxis and Uber. One-by-one there fell through. Taxi was like $300 (no), busses took like 3.5hrs and didn’t leave until afternoon, we went to the train station and found a train that left at 9:40am but was 9am when we asked and our hotel was 10 min each way and we hadn’t packed. Lesser of all was a brisk walk to the hotel and wobbly run with our roller bags on cobblestone streets back to the station which we made by about 7 minutes before it left. The ride was nice along rivers and valleys then we made a 25 minute stop in which the conductor told us we could get off. We took a short walk out of the station to a coffeehouse nearby and I had a tea that I spilled all over my had and burned. We thought it was getting late so we rushed back to the station and found our train missing. Yikes!!! It was still 5 min before it should have left and we got that pit-In-your stomach panic as our bags were on the train. We saw another train on a different track and ran to that platform and was told it went to Burgos, but we went in and not the same car we had been in and no bags. Bridge went running to a different platform and I was desperately asking for info. It seems that they moved our car off ad were adding more cars, so a couple minutes later out car got hooked up with our bags in it. The adventure has not only started, but gave us a run for calm, being present and letting go run for our money. Long day but got really nice when we got here. Bikes were delivered and easy to assemble with just pedals to attach and handlebars to tighten. Bridge and I did laundry and went for a short 15min ride on the Camino to check out the bikes.. Weather is wonderful, about 75 degrees and went for a nice dinner tonight. Bridget shopped for a bit and I went around town taking pictures.

Burgos cathedral

Train car being added

Happy to be back on the train