Day 16 - Carrión de Los Condes to Terradillos de Templarios

During the night I looked out of the window and saw a starry night but when we woke up this morning it was cloudy. We found breakfast in the town and headed out on the road. After about 3 km when it was too late to turn back it started to rain very lightly. Stop and put on rain gear and hope it won't be needed. If we wait too long the outer clothes are already wet so adding rain gear only traps the wet inside.

It didn't get any better an d we had a long walk ahead of us before we would find a village. First along a road without much traffic and then onto an old roman road built 2,000 years ago and still in use today as a pilgrim way. We had to walk 17 km (more than 10 miles) in the rain before we came to a village. But the road was amazing since it was built more than 2,000 years ago through bog land and someone with nothing better to do has estimated that it took 100,000 toms of rock to raise the surface above the winter floods level and every ton had to be transported form somewhere else since there is no rock here.

Since it was raining the whole time not many pictures. I kept my iPhone well protected in my pocket covered by a jacket and poncho most of the time, but here are the ones I took.

See the storks on the roof?
Walking in the rain with a poncho I tend to spend most of the time looking at the ground a few feet ahead of me to avoid puddles, but I also saw other things - snails. Lots of them, all sizes and colors crawling across the path. I don't know why they wanted to venture out with birds and pilgrims all a danger to them. We had previously had encounters with snails. The first was early in the trip. A French pilgrim walking ahead of us would bend down from time to time, pick something up and place it carefully in the grass beside the path. As we caught up to her we saw she was moving snails from the path to the safer area of grass. It reminded me of a talk many years ago. A man was throwing starfish from the beach back into the waves. When asked how he could make a difference by throwing just a few of the thousands stranded on the beach, he said. " it makes a difference to the ones I save". The same lesson can apply to us as we look at the hunger and suffering in the world. Sometimes we are overwhelmed and wonder how we can make a difference in the world. Individually we can't help everyone, but we can make a difference to a few. Every day I get a lesson on the Camino.
The other snail experience was a week or so ago. We came to spot on the path where a local Spanish person was gathering something in the ditch beside the trail. As we passed we looked in her 5 gallon bucket and saw she was collecting snails. She had already collected about a gallon of them. They were very small but she signed to us that they would make a meal. The area is very poor and the people live off what they can find on the land. Another lesson the gifts of God to his people and how we are all dependent on his goodness. Living in the city it is easy to forget how dependent we are on nature and its bounty.
Well that is my learning for today, but the rain continued for about 3 hours until just before we got to the village where we were able to get a hot café con leche and a snack. We hoped the rain was over so we took off our ponchos, jackets, etc. and enjoyed the rest. Then out again for the final 10 km (6 miles) to our stop for the day. However, almost as soon as we got going again the rain started. This time with a strong wind and much heavier. We pressed on and after another 10 km (6 miles) of rather uncomfortable walking in cold windy, rainy weather as the paths got muddy we finally reached our goal for today and settled into the albergue.
We were among the first to get here at about 1:30 and had a choice. €8 for a bunk bed or €10 for a regular bed. I chose a regular bed as did Josef. Werner settled for a bunk. We went to our rooms and were glad to be able to get out of our wet clothes and into hot showers. I was surprised that all that was really wet was from my knees down. Everything in my backpack was still dry.
However, just as the rain had paused while we had coffee and then started again as soon as we were back on the path, it stopped again almost as soon as we arrived. We must be doing something wrong. Anyway, we think the weather today was probably  bad as it can be and we made it through 6 hours of walking in it so we are no longer afraid of the rain even if it is not comfortable.
We went and had a bite to eat and then settled down to write blogs. It is still quite cold outside 11C, 51F but tomorrow is supposed to be better.
Dinner at the albergue after a round of chatting with other pilgrims and dinner at 7:00. Not very good but adequate and a pilgrim does not complain.
To bed at 9:30 and lights out at 10:00 as usual.
Our route today covered 27 km or 17 miles. We have now walked 413 km, 257 miles, more than half way from St Jean to Santiago de Compostella. A MILESTONE in our journey.

Posted with Blogsy