the camino will provide

aplenty.

i started the day early today, because i was up anyway. leaving lovely estella and it’s association albergue behind.

for the first time in days i find myself walking alone for a stretch. past the fuente del vino at monasterio irache.

no wine at this hour form the fountain, i think. i swear, i didn’t try!

this time i take the other option to los arcos. when faced with the choice of shorter and less incline versus longer plus a little mountain to climb, what would you do?

with challenge comes reward today. in mutliple forms.

for one, it was such a pleasant walk today with significantly less rain than forecast. up through the hills i walk towards the little aldea ázqueta. here the camino provides one of those stories only the camino writes. you walk up to the village, turn a corner and just as you think ‘a coffee would be nice about now’ there is this little cafe. a cord spun from building to building, carrying the flags of different countries. the lights shine from the inside out and illuminate the patio.

as i enter, the host pushes a button on the jukebox and i am greeted by pink floyd. a fellow pilgrim from the países bajos arrives more or less with me, we get talking (forgot to ask your name, but you have the web address!). i tell her why i’m carrying 35 stamps. she smiles.

then we both read rené’s story, hung up framed on the wall. it is a love story, love of the camino and love to a woman in the village. he hiked through here in 2023 and ended up leaving his work as a university lecturer to live here with helena and open this nice little cafe (and disco).

he used to lecture economics - so, those who know me know why this story makes me smile a lot. the cafe’s name is l’antorcha café bar.

i move on and climb up to the small town of villamayor de monjardin. i bump into a woman i have met a number of times where we greeted friendly, but didn’t get to talk. today we do.

we walk together all the way to los arcos, about 10km, where i also meet her friend. at the very end we swap names.

we talk about how societies differ across the globe, about large-family backgrounds, how they might lead you to pursue independent lives, what to pass on to children, changes of perspective on life while one goes through it, about what humans carry in their backpacks of life. buen camino anette and jaz! hope you made it through the thunderstorm alright.

in los arcos i manage to check into the lovely albergue just before a thunderstorm breaks loose with heavy rain.

together with other probably five other pilgrims from france (antoine), south africa, taiwan and switzerland (paul) we put on a communal lavadora y secadora. glad to report that we managed to sort out the undies afterwards. still sorting out socks.

i get to meet the friendly taiwanese ladies again, that i have met before on and off from bayonne to sjpdp, and almost every leg of the walk so far. hello to anny (check out her food truck on insta @metoo_bagel_), giovanna (who worked in vienna for some time - how leiwand is that?) and sabrina.

one last conversation with jamie from the west coast, about lots of things. languages, how the camin provides and ultimately what else i spent the day thinking about.

i spent some time today listening to the swedish band vulkan again. i plan to write about their music more at some stage. but enough for today. off to find some food soon, i’m being told to stop by my stomach.