First Note

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My first public note in this blog.

I have been thinking and about and planning this trip for quit a while; probably as long as I have been thinking about retiring.... Both occasions have arrived and I feel somewhat tense and anxious. I have been prepairing physically very hard for this trip going to the gym in the morning and in the afternoon walking with a backpack most of the days. In the weekends long walks in El Avila (12-15 km). I hope that that I am prepared.

My trip officially starts on Monday the 24th when I will be traveling to Madrid and later (Tuesday) connecting to Pamplona and Roncesvalles where I will spend the night.

I have chosen to stay in Roncevalles and to take a taxi to St Jean Pied de Port early Wednesday morning and walk back to Roncevalles (about 26 km). Since this is my fist and possibly the heaviest day, I will leave my "heavy" backpack in Roncesvalles and will only take a light backpack with water and some other things that I may need.

I dedicate my trip to Santiago de Compostela to my wife, children, daughters in law, granddaughters, brothers and sisters and their families. Additionally I like to dedicate my trip to my "patria adoptada" Venezuela, hoping it may find its Camino as well.

I will be writing in English to facilitate the understanding of possible followers on either side of the Atlantic Ocean.

I have decided not to take a camara with me, but to use my IPhone.

Probably it is worthwhile to write some history for my trip.

I started out thinking about doing El Camino, as indicated above, quite a while ago. It all started after a friend told me about his Camino. When I started to think about it mores seriously, my first plan was to do the minimum required (about 100 km) to make the walk official. That would have been starting in Sarria y walking for 5 days. Thinking about it some more, I came to the conclusion that going to Spain for just a walk of 5 days was not worthwhile. The next starting point I started considering was León (about 300 km), definitely more respectable. How I came from 300 km to do the whole Camino is not entirely clear to me. One way or the other it just came about. Possibly it has to do with conversations I have had with different people who had walked the Camino that made me feel that I could not do less.

Whatever the decision making process, here I am about to leave for Spain and start this adventure.

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