Day 24, Astorga to Foncebadón , Oct 22




When you are feeling sick, you loose things. Sometimes even your mind. I am not that sick. 
Yesterday I lost my anti-chaffing cream for both feet and thighs AND my new and favorite bright flourescent yellow socks! It isn't the colour that made them my favs, although they do look good with my blue with orange trim shoes. Nor is it the fact that they have a right and left sock clearly marked on the toes. It is because I haven't got a blister since wearing them. With such a reputation, I bought a second pair (subtle blue) 2 days ago. Thank goodness. Even so, I like to change socks at least twice a day, and I will have to revert to my Darn Tough second favs. 
Feet are everything on this trip. Everything! So to loose your foot glide cream and your fav socks in one day is bad. Very bad. So last night I was careful to put my bag with my gortex runners under my bed and carefully placed a toe sock and my new fav blue socks on top and went to sleep. There were 4 of us in the room Linda, me, Thomas and a nice quiet good looking Frenchman who was sleeping above me (Mats was down the hall). At 6 the Frenchman was up and packing in the dark hallway. Thomas was soon doing the same thing. Thomas had decided to press on again. So much for being an anchor for him. 

I started to get my act together and gather my things. My blue socks were on the floor but no bag with my gortex shoes! My shoes had been stolen in the middle of the night! 
My gortex shoes

      By the time I discovered this, the Frenchman had gone and so had Thomas. Linda texted Thomas. If he passed the Frenchman he could ask if he had seen anything. Thomas, it turned out hadn't left yet and was down below in the kitchen cooking his porridge. I rushed down and filled him in. He said the Frenchman had dropped something on the floor and had used his headlamp to search under my bed. Weird. And At least if Thomas found the Frenchman, he could find out if he had seen the bag while he poked around under my bed.

Tall, gaunt Matt had this happen to him. He got up one morning to find his boots gone. When the dust had cleared, which happens early in albergue - usually by 8 a.m. One othe pair of shoes were left. Looking exactly like Matt's except half a size bigger. Matt walked with those shoes knowing he had the better deal. He phoned the albergue later and sure enough, the fellow with bigger feet had realized his mistake and the albergue coordinated the exchange from afar.

This, was not the same. 

As I packed I was glad it wasn't my new blue trail runners but when we hit rain, I wanted the gortex ones and we probably wouldn't find a shoe store with suitable Camino shoes for days. If your feet are wet, then your feet are doomed! Wet feet are a main cause of blisters.

But before I finished packing, there was the handsome Frenchman, standing right in front of me handing me my bag of shoes! Apologising in poor English. 'I 'ave ze sam  bag.'
He had left to find a café but none were open so he came back to make coffee in the kitchen below and ran into Thomas who mentioned I had lost my bag with shoes. He didn't say anything to Thomas, just left the kitchen. A few minutes later, having returned my shoes, he came back to the kitchen but once again,  didn't mention anything to Thomas.  

This could be karma. I found the bag a few days before in a laundry room and thought it would be perfect to keep my spare set of shoes dry. Maybe I took his bag! And maybe he didn't have a bag to put his Landry in now.

Leaving Adtorgs just before dawn.

I am now sitting on top of the world in a village of stone ruins. We climbed 300meters today and the view from here is awesome. We can see Astorga far below and away. Mats pointed  it out. 'We came from there'. I pointed to the horizon 'no, we came from all the way past the horizon.'



Time on trail: 9 hrs
Weather: Frost! Bloody cold!
Distance travelled: 25k
Distance to go: 255k  
Food: café con chocolate, croissant, apple, and a humongous dish of Pie lla. 
Lesson learned: you can't assume a person will always be there
Feeling: cold! And like I am living in a village that has been hit by an earthquake. Every second house is surrounded by a pile of rubble.
Aches and pains:  hard to sleep if your feet are one on top of the other. 

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