54 Days to go

 So was planning on updating this a bit more often just had a crazy busy few weeks.  So will just have a quick update.

So had Calum move into the flat, my best pal of many years.  Possible the worst bad influence you will ever meet in trying to get you to go out and get drunk but i’m fighting him off pretty well so far.

So have kept up walking to work and doing longer walks on the weekends but due to bad posture and leading with my chin when walking with my pack the last few weeks I have been in a lot of pain with back and neck ache.  I have adjusted my posture but still dealing with the pain.

Not much that can be done with this type of injury so just getting on with it will be upping the k’s going forward.

Also run into trouble with my trainers I have only had them 6 weeks and I have already worn them through in the left trainer on the heal. So got a second pair and sent the other back for exchange to minimise downtime but having to wear in my new trainers again.

The dieting month/6 weeks  went well fueled by my fat burners and diet and lost over a stone and half so now relaxing the diet and just let the walking do its bit

Will do another update on latest equipment acquisitions in the net day or two.

Next

Day 22 Triacastela to Ferreiros

 This morning we started walking at half 5 to try and get a jump on other people as today there are two routes one which follows the traditional Camino past a monastery or there is a shorter route some 6.5km shorter. As you can image the shortcut is a popular choice and we would be going through Saria which is the traditional place for pilgrims who are doing the bare minimum and walk 100k to get the certificate for completing the camino.

This is made worse by it being regarded highly in Spain on your CV for younger people.

We made good progress but soon learned there were a lot of ups and downs again in fact we climbed and descended 800m over the day which was the same as the mountain the day before. Further to this we were under the impression it was 34k which turned out was 38k.

Rosario and I were joined today by Francesca another Italian (its always Italians) but she did a year Erasmus in Glasgow Uni so her English is all good. We all made good progress but towards the last 5k myself and Rosario slowed up he has a shin splint and I developed another blister even after patching it up I couldn’t get my legs working again. Francesca to the rescue tho she is actually a walking speed demon and had walked on and managed to reserve us beds with about 10 minutes to spare.

The Camino today is full of what we are now referring to as tourists just doing the last 100k swaggering about in their shiny clean trainers. Not hardened veterans like us Saint Jean lot. The problem is a lot of the tourists will walk 15k or 20k and then take up a valuable bed and the numbers of beds hasn’t exactly gone up in huge numbers.

We are taking on aggressive day plans of longer days like ours mean if we rock up later we risk not having a bed. So the next few days could get tricky.

The albergue tonight is very new very clean and built specifically for its purpose which is very rare on the camino.

Tomorrow were going to try head out early at half 4 and with 34k target. Today we crossed the 100k to go mark and hopefully if we can hit our targets be in Santiago in 3 days and give me some time to relax before heading home.

Next