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I have just finished Day 12 of the Camino de Santiago, having walked a total of 265km (ish)… and am having a blessed and awsome experience.  As you know I am raising funds for Healing Hands Network, the charity I work with treating civil victims of war and disaster (www.mycharitypage.com/jayne).

The spirit of comaraderie is fantastic and I am now walking with a lovely bunch of people, mostly French men!!!

Each day we walk 20-30km, over awsome terrain, some flat, some hilly upto 1400m, some with the shade of oak and pine trees, grapes, olive groves, through remote and quite villages (where we wonder where the people are) and some busy cities. 

We have been blessed with sunshine, upto 30 degrees most days, so have tanned faces, arms and calves!  You welcome even 30 seconds of shade.

The path is so well marked with scollop shells, only 1 or 2 we have got a little lost, but always an adventure.  We are now used to carrying our packs (I think mine is about 10kilos) and I have been very lucky with no blisters, pulled muscles or  broken skin around the shoulders.  To start with my muscles around the shoulders were sore, but now they are fine and I am almost recovered from a cold (not so much fun, when walking 30km in 30 degree heat, up hill!!).

We spend the night in albergue´s  (like a youth hostel), some old and quaint with tons of character and some new and clinical and functional.  I prefer the parish ones where you pay by donation and eat a communal meal together in the event, though getting a little bored of pasta, still food is food and the general concensus is that by the time we get to Santiago, I will be eating meat, cheese and drinking beer!!!

As you know, I love to take photos, but have only taken 2 so far, it is just too much like hard work at times to take the camera out of my pack, but I will try and take pictures of the people I travel with…

I am doing some exchange with the massage, the boys will pay for my bed, or a meal, or cider in exchange for back and leg massage.  I even got the lion man to clench his teeth with pain.

We are now in Burgos, a lovely town and might take a rest day tomorrow.  Though we are in a good routine of getting up around 6.30am and heading off by 7am, on the road for sunrise and before the worst of the heat.  It also means we have time to do the km and have a siesta before eating in the evening.

We have a point of reflection each day and most days the conversation turns to matter of spirituality, though of course you can imagine other topics of conversation travelling with 3 french men and 1 spanish!!!!  I think I need some more female company!

Time to sign off and have some sleep, we got a little lost today, so 8 hours of walking and no wind, so burning hot sun.. still we have a bed for the night and laughter to keep us going.

We are following a guide book that suggests the walk could take 33 days or 35 with a couple of rest days, I think we now have 501km to go!!! There is talk of being able to extend the walk to the sea, another 90km or so, we will see!

I hear the weather in the UK is good, so enjoy enjoy

xx

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