YES, DOROTHY, THERE IS A YELLOWish BRICKish ROAD

Santiago de Compostela, Spain
June 3, 2007

I think I left off with news of a freak snow storm impeding my progress on the trail. And that I was intending to just throw caution to the wind and walk 202km in 5 days. Well, I was 5 km short of that and ended up in Monte de Gozo right outside last night. I was helping an injured German teenager with bilateral shin tendoNEEtis, right Achilles tendonNEEtis, bilateral knee pain, and right hip pain get to the last alburgue, fondly called "the modern grief" by my guide´s author. Other people have helped me on the way, so I was not at all sorry to give him a hand. It didn´t hurt that he was very appreciative, witty, charming, and quite grown up for all of his 19 years.

The snow storm was up the highest point and the weather got very nice for an afternoon. I then had overcast days for another day with high humidity and put in about 47 km. On the next, I had to climb the steepest portion of the camino, O CEREBRIO, home of the Holy Grail. I had to do that in a rain squall at 7AM. All the pilgrims were huddled in all the densely crowded bars so I went down the mountain in the squall and ended up doing another 45 or so. And that is when I came down with the first blister in 2300km of walking this road over 14 months. It was on my right heel and slowed me down only a little. I popped it after the first day, dressed it, and it pretty much went away.

Kilometers don´t really add up--I should have finished those 202 easily by Saturday but fell short. The way was fantastic when it wasn´t raining. I hit another rain storm at the 100km mark, the same as last year but not nearly as torrential or never-ending. This camino was a breeze in many ways.

So I got up this morning, not having imbibed the large amounts of wine that most people seemed to have. I was probably the first or second pilgrim in the square. I did have to share it with all the drunks coming back from the discos. They were peeing in the corners but I decided they weren´t worth photographing as they wouldn´t be on postcards.

Part of the push was to get to Santiago on Sunday to see the world´s largest incense burner in action--5 men have to swing it across the transcept. Pilgrims are a smelly lot and need to be fumigated and deloused. Well, it turns out that the rope was in need of repair and the butafumenco is out of service for the interim.

I wanted to accomplish 5 things on this camino.

One was to go over the Route de Napoleon which I couldn´t do last year. I did that but in complete fog.

2 was to walk from Villafrance to Ages on the camino. It was fantastic and beautiful.

3 was to see the 4 brothers' haircuts in Sahagun. I saw 3 of the 4. The oldest brother was not around--last year he had dyed quarter sized blonde dots on his head looking quite a bit like a walking fuzzy large golf ball. #2 I actually spotted in a town truck as I was coming into town. His long locks are still luxurious but not so well kept. He looked worn out. I couldn' t imagine how I could have had all those fantasies about HIM. #3 put on a bit of weight, was not attentive like last year and now sported one of those pencil thin carefully trimmed beard things that Latin men seem to love and look so good on. I think he has a love interest. #4 was the epitome of charm. Last year he had shoulder length straight hair with a half inch of bronzed tips This year he lost the tips, still had the shoulder length hair but on the sides it was closely trimmed back to the middle of his ears--I guess some kind of punk thing.

4 was to have lunch in the most upscale restaurant in Molinaseca--where I could not get served last year due to Father´s Day crowds. Got there on a Monday and everything was closed.

5 was the butafumenco and you know the story....

Still all it all it was a blast. And I still have another month in Spain. So the Karaoke Camino is not exactly over. YET!!!!!