So, I´m back in the rhythm. I arrived in Santander on Friday evening, and decided to go to the albergue to see if there was perhaps an open bed. Turns out, the albergue was not even half full. The hospitalera says there is no rationale, the crowds surge and fall with no apparent reason. They were full 4 of the last 7 days, and less than half full the other three. Anyway, after a nice look around Santander on Saturday morning, I headed out.
I was HOPING to be able to cut 8 kms off my 20 km walk by scooting across the train tracks over the river as I did the last time I walked. But the last time I walked, Dana and I were with a German with a good guide, and my guidebook didn´t tell me how to find the short cut. So I wound up adding the 8 kms to go downriver to a bridge, cross it, and then come back up river. Very frustrating. On the way I went through a little subdivision where the public works guys had used yellow arrows to indicate where the water pipes were going, so I got totally lost. When I found a young mom with a couple of kids, I asked the way. Her 3 year old boy looked up at me and said ¿Eres abuela? And for the first time I was able to say YES!!! I showed him Oliver´s picture and we all agreed he was just as cute as Eduardo´s little sister in the stroller.
I ended my first walking day on Saturday with a room in an inn along the way. After looking for La Joyuca del Pas, and finding nothing (and no one who could help me), I gave up and went into a nice posada, a 17th century family home rehabilitated by father and son.
There I met a couple of other peregrinos, and I walked with a German/French/Scottish woman yesterday. The views were pretty nice:
Our first stop was to visit the beautiful church in Santillana del Mar. Santillana is now a pretty touristy precious place, but the church is unbelieveable.
The walk was all on pavement, to the monastery in Cobreces, with its 15 bed basic albergue (basic means beds, hot water, and toilets but not much else). There we were joined by about 9 or 10 others, Spaniards and Flemish, the usual. There are about 15 priests in a monastery that looks to have about 100 rooms. The 80+ priest who checked us in told us he cleans the albergue every day. Knowing that helped to lower our expectations.
It turned out that it took us about 25 minutes to pay our 5€ fee at the albergue. The priest let us in to the albergue office, where we both took out our money to pay. I had a 5€ bill, Geraldine had a 20€ bill, and the priest had a 10€ bill. I gave him my 5, Geraldine gave him her 20, and she waited for him to give her the 15 change. He gave it to her, then thought something was wrong. So we all took back our original bills and went through this process about ten times. He couldn´t figure it out. Finally, I decided to give Geraldine my 5€ and told the priest that she was going to pay for both of us. Then when she gave the priest her 20, he readily gave her back his 10 (since I emphasized that she was paying for both of us), and we were paid up.
Though my feet were killing me, an extra 1 km walk took us to a beautiful beach, and the only place in town serving food. The views were much better than the food, a huge sandy cove beach with rocky crags on both sides. I am not complaining about the food, though, since it was my only real meal of the day.
For some reason, though I was really tired, I didn´t sleep much at all, the good hours were the ones I don´t remember hearing the bells chime, but for most of the night I was tossing and turning. No bedbugs, not too much snoring, so I´m not sure what the problem was.
Today I have walked a little less than half of my planned route. Comillas is also a touristy town, but not overly prettified.
I hope to be in San Vicente de la Barquera by 3 this afternoon.
The hospitalero there is an expert on the turn-off camino I plan to take tomorrow. I will have to be on good behavior, because the last time we stayed in this albergue, he was very rude to us. I think he was insulted that we didn´t want to eat a communal meal, and once we declined, he decided we were rude Americans -- I remember lots of talk about hegemonía and other anti-US rhetoric. I will be careful this afternoon because I need his expert advice on the Camino through the Picos de Europa.
Not sure when I will find another computer, but all is well and the weather is absolutely beautiful. I hope it holds for the mountains tomorrow!
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