7:15am: ready to get the train to Paris There is a limit to how far you can go by land without it taking days to get to where you want to go - I think, with this stage of the Camino, I have now reached it. Perhaps, if I were younger, I might be able …
Continue reading Camino Stage 6: Day 19 – Bordeaux to Southwell – and reflections
It was my last night in a dormitory of twelve, and I did not sleep well, because I was worrying about being up in time to walk the 35 minutes to Bilbao Intermodal to get my bus to Bordeaux. Anyway, my Fitbit tells me that my sleep style is Hedgehog - that is, I am …
Continue reading Camino Stage 6: Day 18 – Bilbao to Bordeaux
It had rained quite a bit in the night, but I didn't hear it. Though I was in a 12 bed dorm I slept well, and woke about 7.40. I am a bit ambivalent about Spanish cuisine in general, perhaps first of all because I don't really understand what people are eating, and why and …
Outside the Casa Consistorial, Viana, at 07:40 this morning. There is always something bittersweet about coming to the end of another stage of this extended Camino. At one level, I am wanting get home to husband and hearth, to the love and the comforting routines of every day. But at another, every fibre of me …
Continue reading Camino Stage 6: Day 16 – Viana, Logroño and Bilbao
Puente la Reina at 7.10am, reflected in the waters of the Arga river Today has been a classic Camino day; no spectacular heights to scale, a lot of walking on paths (always better than being where cars are), but many small surprises and delights, and practical challenges as well. These mid-September days are very hot …
Continue reading Camino Stage 6: Day 13 – Puente la Reina to Estella
This hardly counted as a walk, to be honest. I gave myself permission to lie in, and so didn't leave the hostel much before eight. I was joined early on by Martin, an ex-prison governor from Milton Keynes, and together we shared a pleasant flat stroll through suburbs which brought us to the hefty and …
Continue reading Camino Stage 6: Day 11 – Villava to Pamplona.
From The Quire 