Day 11 - Calahorra to Alfaro, 26km, 6 hours, 27 April

How can I possibly go on?

it is with great regret and sadness that I announce the demise of my iPad. It passed away peacefully in its sleep last night. For funeral services will be held after I throw it through the Apple Store window. In lieu of flowers please make donations at the following website: iSadiNeediPadFund.com.

The best laid schemes of mice and men often go awry. Apologies to anyone following my blog as it now very difficult or impossible to add photos (edited to note that I think I figured it out but I can't see how they look). I will try to post some to my Facebook page and provide a link here, if possible edited to note: nevermind). I will also remember to make the photos public so everyone has access to them. Sorry for the hassle.

When we woke up this morning we had planned for an early start. But something we ate last night stopped us from doing that. I won't go into any detail but suffice it to say that we spent a little longer in the bathroom this morning. So far we've had no further incidents, thankfully.

One other thing healthwise is that I finally got a decent nights sleep because I didn't cough much. Sadly for Melanie though, I think I passed her the cough as she spent the night coughing. She manages to do this more quietly than I ever could.

After some toast for breakfast we were off about 9:15am. Most of the track today was again fairly flat and more than half of it on blacktop back roads. The rest was on fairly compact dirt roads. As has been the case for a while we also continued fairly closely to the rail line. Also again today, we were walking through farms vineyards and pear tree orchards. Fortunately today though, the skies were a lovely blue with many white puffy clouds. It was a beautiful sunny day for walking and the wind was often at our backs.

One thing of special note today was that we met five other pilgrims. Just as we were leaving Calahorra town, we saw four hikers that looked like pilgrims. They were a bit ahead of us and walking faster so we could not catch them but they were going on the same trails that we were. Finally after following them for 4 km, they took a different trail and we figured they were just day walkers. About an hour later, two of the four caught up to us from behind. It turns out that they are German pilgrims walking as far as Zaragoza. they explained that they were taking some shortcuts as they did not have as much time as we did. I am not so sure their shortcuts really are shorter.

We also came across another Pilgrim who was walking the Camino de Santiago del Ebro. I understand that with the 50 students we ran into last week we are extremely lucky and possibly setting a pilgrim-spotting world record on this route.

About half way through the trail today, we passed through the small town of Rincon de Soto. We stopped for a nice snack and then a sandwich in the town but we missed by a day there version of the running of the bulls. That may be a good or a bad thing. Unfortunately in that town we also made a rookie mistake and forgot to fill up our water bottles. We ended up with enough water but we won't make that mistake again.

One thing I should note here is our average walking speed. When we are on flat blacktop roads and compact dirt tracks we usually move at about 5 km/h. Where the tracks are fairly rocky, we move around 4 km/h. In the mountains on the ascents and descents, we were closer to 3 km/h and sometimes as slow as 2km /h per hour. That said Melanie and I do not walk at the exact same speed. In the mountains I move faster up-and-down. On the rocky paths we move about the same speed. Unfortunately for me, on the blacktop roads and dirt tracks, Melanie moves much faster than I do and I have to jog to stay up with her. I don't know whether I should wish for more mountains or not.

Finally today, I ask for your prayers for Denise and her family. Denise is a fellow pilgrim from America on the Camino de Santiago French route and has gone missing near Astorga almost four weeks ago.  The entire pilgrim community is greatly concerned and hoping for a happy result soon.

Peace y'all.