El Camino del Santiago, part 3

Pamplona to Leon, pain and insight ❤ 

Alt lot has happend since Pamplona and I have not been writing as much as I wanted to do from the beginning, cause pain and tiredness has filled so much, but like for so many others on this walk,  I have also had a lot of thoughts and many amazing sights like of mountains and other kinds of landshape.

Between Pamplona and Logrono I got inflammation in my right shinbone, this did, that I had to send my backpack from place to place for a week and a half until I again could be walking like normal. I was about to give up in a little town called Ventosa, cause my very swollen lover leg and ancle and some more blisters than I wanted to have. It was so very painful, that I didn´t known how to go on walking, but I also didn´t known how to get of the camino, in this small city. Next day was the last day that I even tried to have my boots on and by the next hostel stop, I decided to send my backpack in front of me, to a place I knew I could walk to. 

To walk 800 km is not a question about having a backpack on your back or not. To walk this long distance you have to listen to body, mind & soul. If just one of the parts tells you, that now it  is enough, both weight of backpack and wrong shoes, then you have to listen and realise that you have to do something about it. And for me it was to ship my backpack ahead of me and change my boots into sandals.. So happy I had them with me ❤ It is no shame to do the walk without the backpack, it is so much better to listen and realise what will heal your body. And here at the camino, they have maked it so easy to send the backpack with service to your next hostel og maybe 5 km before, then you can pick it up and continue if you want too, or you can stay at that place you sent it too. This is high service to a very low price.

To do this walk will be a challenge for many people, but the biggest challenge for me is not the walk itself, but to sleep over at the different hostels with so many beds in one big room, so every time I come to a big city, I find something more comfortable with my own sleeping- and bathroom. Well it might sound like luxus, and so it feels, but it is still to a lot lower price than in Denmark, cause there I would not have had the money to do like that. I have now been in so many towns, that I can´t remember the names of them, and I can´t not either remember the names of whom I have been speaking to. But from Najera to Santa Domingo I met 3 english friends to whose I came to talk and walk together with. It showed that the two of them just was trying the camino for a day and the third of them was living in Logrono Spain, a big city vi just left a day ago. This third guy had been walking the camino many times, a now he thought it was on time for him to take retired people on the camino, he just had the plans about doing it, cause he really wanted everybody like his friends to have this wonderful experience in their lives. Because of that he also wanted his two friends to be on their own, so he let them go, and continued together with me.

It  was so wonderful to share this camino and my thoughts about life, and about what body, mind and soul want to do, with him a stranger, instead of what other wise camino walkers thinks and mean and it showed, that we had a lot in common. The energy he just gave me was enormeus and amazing. But this was only one day in life and just like I meet and say goodbye to all the other people i meet, so it is passed experience. But he gave me enough energy to continue my  walk, and for that I will be him forever thankful ❤ 

When I reached the town of Burgos, I had been walking 300 km at that I celebrated with a lot of others peregrinos, cause we startet up walking almost at the same time. 300 km er a long walk and that is so tough that I have being doing it 🙂

A couple of days break in Burgos and I continued, this time the Meseta was starting, Meseta is a straight walk during, something like  landshape of a countryroad in Denmark. A path to get a lot of insight and not being so concentrated about where you put your feets. But it was so rainy and koldt and when the rain stopped and we had 20 degrees celsius for a very short time, then rain again.. I am so tired of all that rainy weather.

Burgos – Hornillos del Camino, many kilometers, and then I came to a tiny city where all the holstel beds were sold out.. okay, what did I do now, well I took a taxi to the next city, cause I had already been walking 25 km, so for me it was impossible to even think about walking 11 km more.. So a taxi it was to Hontanas.

Hontanas, I was so happy that this was the place I had to sleep over, for here were the most beautiful small church, and it invited you to sit and have a break, just to think or to do some meditation. the stillness, candlelights and pillows to sit on, was inviting me to do meditation, so I did, was sitting there for an hour, and then there was e mess in the church, a beautiful ceremoni, where a young girl from the caminoen was saying a few words.. I did not understand all of it, for the mess was mostly being done in the spanish language.

From Hontanas I walked a long path on asphalt in total rain, a demanding tour, with a lot of thinking and proper footwear. But I was at the next beautiful hostel early afternoon, and enjoyed being there and be together with two german women, I had been talking to earlier, when ever we meet in every other day. This became a wonderful afternoon with yoga and I had way too much vino tinto 12 % alc., but then you get a good night of sleep with this vino inside of you and a nice dyve on you, instead of a sleeping bag.. life is ❤

Leaving Itero del Vega I thought, that I only would walk for 15 km to Fromista, but when, at 11 am I had already done 15 km and was not even thinking about stopping.. I was so full of good energy, so I walked on for another 11 km through the fields, mud, waterholes right until I reached the best of all albergues in this camino.. The name is Poblacion de Campos – Villementero,   a place in the countryside, way out in the country with tipi`s and mountain cabins to sleep in, if you didn´t wantet to be in a room with 10 other people. This place had a an amazing energy med donkey´s, geeses, hens, cats and dogs.

While I was doing yoga at grass a donkey suddenly came and put he´s big head to my stomack while I was doing the  yogapose “dog with head down”, I got really surprised, cause I had not seen there was an donkey there before, but he really wantet to learn yoga, so I got the owner to take some photos of it.. well it is not easy to train an donkey, I just tell you..

From villementero to Carrion de los Condes and on to Calzadilla de la Cueza, the first 10 km was a long straight road to the next city Carrion de los Condes, and here it startet to rain so much, so I thought I had to buy a new pair of trekking sneakers, what a big mistake to do. First of all, it took a very long time being in that shop and next it showed, that I couldn´t stand and walk in them, so I actually lost a lot of time and a lot of money.. and it was still rainy, and then I had to change into my sandals again and carry the new pair of shoes as well, I felt me being so foolish and it was still rainy and a long straight road with nothing absolutely nothing to look at, and no place to even get a small cup of coffee. I do not know how many times I talked to my angels and to GOD asking them to stop the rain and just send me a little sun. it turned to be the longest  and most hard tourday. I reached my goal at 4 pm and found a bed on a hostel. Everything was now okay, but I couldn´t sleep at the night, so I was up and awake already at 4 am, packed my stuff and was out of the door while it still was dark.. but woooow it was so nice to leave that sleeping area.

I had an amazing day walking, the first hours without rain, reached Morantinos within a thunder rain broke the sky (in this city, they had something like Hobbits home, but it was not, it was vinecellars in the fields). I did not get wet this time, cause I jumped in a small café when the rain came, lucky it was there.

26 km later I reached a city called Sahagun, a city there seemed a lot bigger that it was, it only had 3000 inhabitants and a lot of empty houses, but they at least had a town square, where there was just some life..

Yes the next day, the sun was shiny and my energy was very high, so I decided after the first 20 km , to walk another 11 km, and then I still had a lot of energy there, I walked further 6 km to a town Mansilla de las Mullas.. And due to, I was late, there was no space at the hostel, but then I decided to take a hotel room, I make the tak 10 euros of the price.. Ohhh how lovely it was to have my own room, space and bathroom.. after many days at hostel, this felt like luxus, and I slept like a baby.

And yesterday, Yes there I reached Leon, a big city after 3 hours of walk.. Big citys demands two nights for me, then there is time for washing my clothes, see the Kathedral and time for relax. And from here I did sent my boots and shoes til Santiago by postoffice.

it seems like everybody have got a cold, cause everybody are sneezing and coughfing. The hayfever is upon me, or is it in the reality a cold?.

No more for today, hope you still have fun while reading my posts, so you really want to look at the next episode of “SOAP”

 

I lys og kærlighed, namaste 🙏 ❤

Lilly Acacia