The Good Follows The Bad Carrion de Los Condes

We have discovered that the Camino can be experienced in several ways. You can enlist a guide who will map out every stop, make reservations at hotels along the way and have your meals paid for and your backpack or suitcase forwarded to each town. You can bus forward through places you might deem undesirable, like the meseta, a long flat plain that takes about 7days to get through. Or the outskirts of Leon because the guidebook says it is industrial and not pretty.  I realize you may be forced to do things like have your pack forwarded or bus forward for health reasons or time constraints like some of the pilgrims we started out with have had to do. There is a saying here. Everyone has their own Camino.

John and I have chosen and committed to experiencing all of the Camino on our own terms and not on the perspectives of various guide books that will go unnamed.  That said, the meseta has been a peaceful and pleasant surprise filled with oasis towns here and there and we are just glad we have embarked upon it. Yes, it can get flat and hot. Those stories will be told.

Left Fromista early on our own and had a nice walk about 4k to our first coffee stop where they actually had donuts! What a treat! The service varies from surly to downright amazing. The bathrooms may be immaculate and possibly have hand soap and usually never any hand towels.

We walked from here where we would enter the province of Palencia, along a beautiful wooded riverside. Who said the meseta was boring? We stopped at the ancient pilgrim village of Villalcazar  de Sirga for a cervesa and a delicious plate of pickled veggies. Some of the cafe/bars have interesting little treats.  We decided to have a look at the village church here which is an impressive fortress church built by the knights Templar of which John and I are very interested.  Too bad the man taking the euro to see the thing was in such a bad mood. We thanked him and he got a via con dios from John on the way out.

Walked into Carrion de Los Condes with David, an experienced and spiritual man who is walking the Camino with his wife Barbara. It made the last 6k go fast.  Checked into the Hostal Santiago and headed out where we met up with John and Debbie, and Mike from the UK for a beer and Jack Daniels for the boys on a bet they had made over the Americas Cup, that the kiwis lost.

We walked to the store that is closed for siesta until 5 but wanted to make the nun show at the monastery at 6pm. We are starting to know the routines sort of. Ran into lots of other Camino friends and had another drink, barely made the grocery to stock up on supplies for tomorrow, and were late for the nun show which turned out to be a sing along.  All this and John was starting to feel under the weather.

Lesson number two...we must give our bodies priority over the social aspect which is immense.

The sing along was pretty special with the nuns asking for songs to be sung from each country represented there.  When they asked for one from the US, no one responded.  A few more were sung  along with a poem by our young friend, Kyle, when she looked around again.  Something, I don't know what, compelled me to blurt out that I would sing one. I just couldn't let this moment pass me by.  I asked for help from my American compatriots and said this song was written in my home state of Colorado, which it was.  I started singing America the Beautiful and as I did so, I reminded myself so much of my mother who I know would so do a thing like this. And yes, I know every word.  We closed the sing along with Amazing Grace and there was not a dry eye in the house.

Afterwards as we left the albergue with our friends we were led to a small restaurant by a local woman. It was to open at 7 but was locked up tighter than a drum.  We waited and waited and were tempted to leave and find another place.  There was a man and woman who walked up with a bag of groceries and we all entered.  The man took orders from a menu none of us could decipher and he could not translate, so there was a lot of guessing and pointing. It turned out to be the best pilgrims meal of the Camino so far with two jugs of wine with our friends,  Kyle and kiwis John and Debbie.
Back to the hostal Santiago later than I would have liked. I will pay for that tomorrow.