Today was our second shortest hike of the Camino: 18.7 km or a little over 11 miles. We had another morning walking through the clouds, and we also got some rain again in the latter part of the morning. The first picture is of some of the clouds as they started to roll in. Again, though, just a slight drizzle that stopped after about 45 minutes. But we pulled out the ponchos again because Linda just did laundry yesterday and we didn't want our clothes to get wet.
The second photo is from our hike today. It's a stone walkway that was built to circumvent a stream that was running through the middle of the path we were on. The 2 men who are closest to the camera are from Spain. We met them on the steep hike up to O'Cebreiro 2 days ago. Unfortunately, they couldn't find a place to stay there that night, so they had to hike back 3km to the last town to find beds. We have definitely noticed an increase in the number of pilgrims on the Camino. And from all that we have read, it's only going to get heavier starting in Sarria (where we are staying now). In order to earn a "compostela" in Santiago, one has to walk at least 100 km. Sarria is 110 km from Santiago, so it is a starting point for a lot of people. Actually, tonight as we were walking back to our hotel, we came across what we estimated to be at least 50 teenagers, almost all of them wearing clothes that referenced walking the Camino in 2014. So it looks like they are going to be one of the groups joining us in Sarria. Oh joy, just what we need for our last week on the Camino, a bunch of teenagers :-(.
With the increase in the number of pilgrims, it will also increase some of the pressure for those people who are staying in the albergues to get to the next town and get their beds before all of they fill up (like what happened to our Spanish friends back in O'Cebreiro). And Galicia is not a place where you want to sleep outside. It's been in the low 50's/upper 40's at night, and there is usually a lot of moisture in the air, due to the mountains. Today, after exploring the town of Sarria, we were walking back to our hotel around 4pm and we saw at least 10 different small groups of people just arriving. Three of them stopped us and asked where the albergues were. Our hearts really went out to these people, because they looked so tired and if all of the albergues are filled, the next closest town is another 4.2 km away.
The last picture is of the church steeple in Triacastela (the little white figure is Santiago or Saint James). We attended what I think was the most personable Mass there last night. The priest was very friendly. Every person who came into the church, he told them to come up to the front where everyone else was (there were about 25 of us in total). He also had Janet (a woman from Minnesota who is traveling with a group of friends who we run into frequently, and who's parents are from Argentina) translate the "sermon" for us. The key takeaways I had were: we need to live more in the present, not in the past. We also need to be happier. He commented a couple of times that we all looked like we were attending a funeral. And he also said we need to help each other out more, like Jesus did. At one point, he had us hug those near us versus shaking their hands. And in closing, he had us all hold hands as we said the Lord's Prayer. He also threw in a couple of jokes, to keep things on the light side (at one point, one person's cell phone started ringing, and the priest said it must be God calling). He said he has been serving as the priest there for almost 35 years, and the town of Triascastela only has 900 people, so he really must enjoy serving the pilgrims, because they probably make up the majority of the people in his church on any given day. Bottom line, it was all very heartfelt, and it definitely touched me (at least more than some of the other Masses we have attended, which have tended to be more formal and completely in Spanish).
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