I was awake and gone from the albergue before anyone else had woken up. I’m a morning person and my Canada walk seems to have got me in the pattern of waking at 5:30, despite that I’m in a different time zone. It’s okay though, because I’m always in a position now to experience the Spanish sunrise. And starting early gives me two or three hours of solitude before I meet up with my traveling companions.
Today, I waited for them in the Basque village of Itziar, where I had just bought food from the tiny grocery. I waited in the shade for a half hour, snacking on fruit and nuts, watching the proprietor of the cafe across the street buy an armful of baguettes, then watching her go through the process of opening the cafe for the day, unlocking the tables and chairs, placing them carefully around the courtyard, and preparing the coffee machine. The village was coming to life. And when my friends, Birte and Vytas, arrived, I was delighted that they wanted to go for a coffee too. We weren’t satisfied with just one coffee, though, so in the next town of Deba four kilometers away, we went for another cafe con leche and pastry at the local bakery. Such civilized hiking.
There was no avoiding the mud today, however. The trails through the woods were entrenched with it from recent rains. And the thorny bushes hugging the trails on both sides made it virtually impossible to bypass the mud, so I carefully stepped in the footprints of those who had passed before me to reduce the amount of mud that seeped into my hiking sandals. It was great fun!
We are stopping for the night in the tiniest of communities called Ermita del Calvario, which seems to consist entirely of the pilgrim’s hostel in which we are staying. When asked if I wanted to have the pilgrim’s meal tonight, I considered that there were no other restaurants within a reasonable walking distance and that I would probably have to dine on raisins and peanuts, so I said yes to the communal meal.
Birte and I finished the 21-kilometer day by 12:30 and chatted with an Israeli father and daughter hiking team for an hour while we waited for the rest of the group to arrive. We are all together again now. Kaitlin says she loves the camaraderie. The discomfort of struggling up and down hills with blisters and fatigue makes it feel like we are all in this together. I concur with Kaitlin. We are in this together.