La senora de la puerta

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Desayuno

In discussing the trip before we left, Wal had made much of the practice of departing early, walking an hour or so, and stopping at the first town for desayuno (breakfast). I expressed my doubts about this at the time, but was assured this was a good pattern. So when I found that Wal and Martin were drinking their vending machine coffee, I must say I was just a little surprized.

We did stop at the first town, where a bar was doing a roaring trade serving desayuno to a mix of some locals and a hoard of peligrino. So there was some truth in what Wal had said, after all.

Departing ways

Shortly after we left the town, Martin and Wal pushed ahead of me, and I had mixed company for the rest of the day, and generally a pleasant experience.

Stopped (need to check where) for coffee and a danish of some sort. Then back on the road in rain gear. Some people seemed to stay constantly in their rain gear, but I just got too sweaty, and kept fogging up my glasses. Not a great way to see the trail or anything else for that matter.

Track turned pretty boggy in the hilly sections, and here I first met la senora de la puerta. A couple of Spanish women and I were coming down towards a gate, and when I chose the small gate, one of them opened the large gate and it came swinging around towards me. It looked for a moment as though it would crash into me, and there were apologies.

In any case, we kept passing and re-passing each other throughout the rest of the day, and it was a small pleasure to know that they weren´t too far behind, or too far in front. So I now think of them as ´la senora de la puerta y su companero´.

Zubiri

Somewhere during the morning, it had become stuck in my mind that we were going to stop at Zubiri, so when we got there, I went into the village and found a spot in the municipal alburge. As luck would have it, they had run out of room in the two converted schoolrooms, and I had first choice in what had been the school gym or similar. Only mattresses, and even then they ran out and people who had brought their own mats used those.

Two NZ women I had met yesterday were also in the gym, and we arranged to go to dinner together. Ended up passing the place with the pilgrim´s special, and walked on to the far end of town and had a very nice meal there instead.

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Photos

Roncesvalles to Zubriri
Pyrenees view

Comments

[Daniel]

Hi Dad, thanks for the great blog - I'm following along and wishing you well.

[Angeles]

La puerta, la cancela, ... la peregrina de la puerta.
Hola...toc, tocccc ¿se puede?... Si, soy la señora de la puerta. Quise escribirte unas palabras, en directo desde el Camino, más exactamente desde Estella y se me cortó... (se me cerró la puerta. Ahhh, no! La ventana ;-)) Siempre me han gustado los diarios de peregrinos, y ahora más todavía si formo parte de tu Camino. Escribir tus sensaciones y experiencias vividas tan cerca me parece algo estupendo. Ahora ya escribo desde casa, aunque mi Caminito diario sigue, éste ya terminó. Ha sido un placer compartir contigo peregrino australiano (qué lejosssss! y qué cerca a la vez...), conocerte, caminar y comunicarnos con el mejor idioma peregrino, la sonrisa. Te seguiré en tu diario, ánimo y... siempre BUEN CAMINO peregringo!!! Angeles (la señora-peregrina de la puerta ;-))