Day 18 - back on the road

We left Leon this morning and continued west thru the meseta.  It was a hard day for some reason. The weather was great and the road was fine, but I developed various aches and pains that occupied my thoughts and took away from the journey.

 Meditating at the start of the day.

It took about 2 1/2 hours to get out of the metro area. Just after we started I developed a pain in my left shin.  The first dose of Tylenol didn’t have any effect, so I took more.  When that passed my anckles started hurting.  Both.  Just really sore and bothersome.

At about 9:30 we stopped for an espresso, a coke, and a chocolate croissant; then we pressed on. 2 mi later we entered a small town where a man had set up a rest stop for pilgrims in his front yard.  Everything free. Leave a donation if you want. Juice, snacks, coffee, etc.  He had a stamp for our credentials., and a map of the world where you put a dot from where you were from.  He even had a tent in the front yard with a bathroom inside.  He invited us to take off our backpacks and rest for awhile. We thanked him and moved on.  The next town was only 3 mi away and our plan was to stop for eggs there.

While my anckles were still aching my back started hurting, like a pinched nerve. I just couldn’t move in a way to get comfortable. I was relieved when we got to town.  We stopped at the cafe. There were 2 pilgrims sittting at chairs but the doors were locked. The cafe was closed.  There were 2 cafes in town.  Both closed.  Now I didn’t like the town.

Walking thru canola fields.

A woman came down the street to explain that it was Wed, so the cafes were closed.  Now I didn’t like Wednesday’s, either. The ankles and the back still hurt, I didn’t get my eggs, and I kinda coulda used a bathroom.  We pushed on to the next village.  It was only 3 more miles.


Half way there there was a rest area.  There were shade trees and benches.  It was a welcome break and I got to stretch my back.  The next town was in sight and I was ready for some lunch.  As we entered town there was a sign listing services.  Cafes were on the list.  Things were looking good, and my ankles were feeling better.  We came, we saw, we went. There were no cafes or any other stores.  Actually on the way out of town there was a farm implement place that had walking sticks and hats for sale, but that was about it.  They didn’t have eggs or bathrooms.  Now I didn’t like this town and I especially didn’t like the sign leading into the town, and my back hurt.  The next town was 7 mi. So we went.

Most of the day we were walking on the side of country roads.  They were paved, so it was nice and there was very little traffic. The traffic that did come by was John Deere tractors which was neat, but we had to step off the road to let them pass.  I didn’t like that. Every tractors driver waved to us as they went by.

They grow fields of rocks here.

We were moving fast now.  We passed Ohio, Austria, Poland, and our Cheesehead friends, a couple from Superior (yes, we finally found fellow cheeseheads).  We could see the next town in the distance, just off to the right; or so we thought.  When we got close to the road leading into town our arrows told us to keep going straight on a new path cut into the brush.  It was nice there was a new trail, but there was no village in sight, and the new path was riddled with rocks such that it was impossible to set a foot down on a flat surface.  I cursed the rocks, and the trail, and the town we passed that should have been our destination. In the middle of all this I noticed my back stopped hurting.  Nothing actually hurt anymore.  The sun was hot, I was still hungry, but nothing hurt.  That was nice.

Still in the meseta, but you can see the mountains of Leon in the background.  

We are heading that way.

We had another 45 min to town, so I had time to think about my curious state of mind.  I had everything I had wanted. I was walking across Spain with my best friend on an amazing pilgrimage.  Why was I angry at so many things?  My petty inconveniences had nothing to do with the Camino, they were the Camino.  There was nothing to fix.  There was nothing wrong with the villages, or the roads, or the cafes, or the tractors.  They were there every day doing their thing just as they were supposed to be doing. There was nothing to change.  I chose to do this, just as millions of others had for the past 1,200 yrs. It’s  not Disney World.  No one had asked me what they could do to make things better, and I have yet to see a suggestion box. This is all there is.

We arrived in Villavante about 4pm.  Villlavante is a very small farming village like the ones we passed thru earlier.  We stopped at the first place open for a cold drink and to use the restroom.  It was the first albergue we found.  We decided to stay there.  Good thing because it was the only one in town. We booked dinner there, too. Good thing because it was the only place in town for that, too.  We showered, did laundry and walked around town.  The walk took 5 min, the highlight being the water tower. On the way we stopped in at the only other bar in town.  There was not another person there.  We got a frozen popsicle.  It didn’t have an expiration date, but it could have been there from the Middle Ages.  It was great.

Dinner was terrific.  We sat with two women, a cook from the Netherlands and a librarian from
London.  Wonderful evening, wonderful people, great way to end the day.  Looking forward to another adventure tomorrow.