We are actually about 65KM from Santiago now.   We have two long days (Saturday & Sunday) then a relatively short day (about 12 miles) on Monday to reach our final destination.  Unfortunately our weather is finally breaking and we have a measurable probability of rain increasing through Monday.  It would take an absolute miracle, based on the current forecasts to miss all of the rain.  I’m praying for an absolute miracle.

We are so close now we can taste it.  3 days  left is less than 10% of the original trip.  We started out with 760km; an unfathomable distance at the time and now we are so close I ache to be there.  Still, I was pretty much done walking by the time I got to our beautiful 2 star pension with beds so small my feet will hang off of the end and I am sure I will be ready to stop by the afternoons of Sunday and Monday.  However, when I wake up Monday morning it’s going to be full on until I reach my 5 star hotel in Santiago.  There I have two nights before I fly to Barcelona to another 5 star hotel and then I fly to San Francisco to meet up with Tim.

Even though the light at the end of the tunnel is definitely there, it’s still to soon to get anxious.  One thing you learn when you walk for 31 days is patience.  Something that is just a few kilometers away is hours away; that changes your whole equation about what “close” is.  Fortunately after walking for 31 days we are as fit as we can get so minus the aches and pains of being on our feet so long we are ready for what comes.

Yesterday we left Sarria which is the starting point of 85% of the Pilgrims that do the Camino.  Starting this late in the season is slow so even though there were new “Pilgrims” on the trail this morning it wasn’t crazy busy like it can get in the summer.  And since this was Day 2 for them, after the first two hills they were dropping like flies.  By this afternoon I was virtually alone for hours.  Coming into Palas de Rei, our host town for the evening, I hadn’t seen anybody for at least two hours when I had stopped at our Picnic arranged by the Guides.

I AM anxious to get back.  The list of “things” I miss could go on for pages.  First and foremost, I never want to be away from my Partner this long ever again.  A few days, a week, but never again will I voluntarily leave for over 40 days.  He will be working when we meet up in San Jose but I know the area where the hotel is located and there will be lots for me to do while he’s doing his job.  On Monday morning we will be on our own again so we have a day or two in the Bay Area before we head back to San Diego.  He’s driving up on Saturday so we will be coming home in his Cayenne with Bailey, our dog, in tow.

I hope to make more Posts before this is all over and I should have a big block of time in Santiago IF I have good internet.  Once again I have been forced to tether my computer to my cell phone to write this entry.  I will post one picture but I can’t post any videos because it would take too long.  This is Halloween night and the guides are taking us somewhere “spooky”.  I just want to eat a hamburger and go to bed but that his not in the cards.

THANK YOU so much for keeping up with me and writing comments.  This has been HARD but it would have been so much harder without those bread crumbs from home.  I’m sorry that I made that the only way to reach me but in order to have this work, I couldn’t be writing emails and making phone calls on top of trying to do this Blog.  Tim and I have chatted fairly regularly but neither of us are “phone talk” people.  We did have a really nice chat I think last night (it all blurs together); something that I wish we could have done more often, but he has held the torch for me for a long time and I will be forever grateful to him for that.  I’m not sure what I would say if he told me he wanted to go to Spain and spend 34 days walking across the country with a group of strangers.  Uh, does “HELL NO” sound like me?

Happy Halloween and I hope to write more.

Joe Jeter   October 31, 2o14

 

100KM