Completeing the Camino de Santiago a second time

At the starting point of our 2008 Camino

We first have to mention that we did finish the Camino de Santiago! We know we dropped off the blog at some point in the journey but we did make it over the Pyrenees Mountains from St. Jean Pied-de Port to Roncesvalles in Spain. Leslie did get attacked by bed bugs in the Basque area just before getting to St. Jean Pied-de Port. This necessitated visiting the doctor to get the strong cortisone, anti-allergy and antibiotic pills for Leslie, although David had just the standard reaction to bedbug bites and needed no special treatment. It also required washing and drying all our clothes and gear in the hottest water and the hottest dryers so that we would not be a carrier of bed bugs onwards.   




In front of the Catherdral

After crossing the Pyrenees, which was a hard but exhilarating day, we enjoyed taking the bus to within 100km of Santiago. We stopped in our favorite towns along the way and as the bus passed sections of the “Way” we were amazed and how we could recall the trail and what happened each day.  One thing we noticed there were more Americans on the trail in Spain – all having seen the Charlie Sheen movie “The Way” – but Americans were still a small minority compared to French, Swiss, Germans, Dutch, and the many Spanish on the last sections. We walked the last 100km staying at the same places that we had in 2008. Leslie got sick (fever and chills) the night before the last 20 km of up and down terrain, so we took a taxi to our hotel in Santiago, where she was able to rest and recover. We had allowed a few extra days in Santiago to relish the accomplishment before traveling back to the USA. Leslie pulled herself together and on our last day we took a taxi back to our last point on the trail and walked the remaining 20km so we could honestly earn and collect our Compostella credential.

Sheep climb walls to eat high leaves

>
>

Prehistoric dolmen on trail

>
>

Sheep waiting for me to give them the appropriate go command

>
>
>

Sheep and buron for shepherd

>
>
>

Sept. 19 Figeac to Cajarc

 We wanted to take a taxi to up the hill above Figeac by cab 8km to Faycelles and walk about 24 km to Cajarc. We walked back to a cafe on a small plaza and asked him to call a taxi to come get us at this plaza. The taxi arrived just as we finished our coffee and we were pleased because the driver could speak some English. The town of Faycelles was very cute and had a church with a Pelerin stamp and offered self-serve hot coffee, tea and biscuits. We did not realize at the time that there would be no food or coffee places open the whole rest of the day!

Cross at Faycelles overlooking Lot valley

We started with lovely vistas over the valley Lot. The town we reached at noon that was supposed to have two restaurants we found disappointing, since both were closed and there was no other source of food anywhere along the way.  We arrive exhausted  and with no water only to find our 3 star hotel with tv about half kilometer out of town. We did a laundry and  hung it out on our balcony. We meet more formally the two Australian women walking with us at dinner. They had used a tour company to do all the planning of stops, booking of accommodations and moving of their luggage from Le Puy to Moissac.

We had an odd maitre de/ chef in this basically empty hotel but we welcomed luxury compared to night before. One of the ladies had gotten bronchitis shortly after arriving and so was taken the baggage service from place to place till she was well enough to walk.

Moss covered stone walls along track

Ute storage shed in the fields