One step at a time….

Day 2 of the Camino Frances….actually day one of walking!

If I had written this story at 4pm when I arrived in Roncesvalles (Spain) from St Jean pied de Port (the start of my 800km trek), it may have been vastly different….now I have hot showered and filled my tummy (with the only thing that made sense on the menu) a hamburger…I am finally, warm, dry, breathing and not hungry! All I can say is you never get what you signed up for!! So my story begins…

Breakfast at my hotel did not start until 7.30am, and I was ready to go at 7am with an hour before the rain came in to get up the first hill at least, I forewent breakfast knowing I had a pastry, two apricots, nuts and a chocolate bar to snack on before the only eating place on this leg (8 kms away and all uphill)

This guy was watching the idiots clim out of his town, as he probably does every morning. I have to say there were a few of us getting an early start!

Then these guys settling in under a tree for the day, smart move in light of what rolled in around 9am!

The photos I have are from this morning only as after the rain came in …. My phone was buried deep inside the five layers of clothing I had put on this morning – in hope of keeping some warmth going on!

So we just kept going up and up and….

Up more as the sealed road ended and the real tramping deal kicked in….this was about the time the rain came in…and there was another two hours of Up before reaching the Orisson refuge…

The only building in this town…supplying hot drinks (first coffee of the day at 10.20am) soup, sandwiches and hearty food for cold drowned trampers! I took a loo stop here(the only one of the day weather I needed it or not)….they had one loo!

For a moment, while I was waiting for the loo…the rain stopped and it was clear enough to see where we were in the Pyrenees. When I arrived there I was engulfed in rain and cloud so had no idea where I was!

I was only 8kms in to the days 24.5kms…and as I left here…still going up….one foot after the other….this is where the predicted weather rolled in! The next three hours were going up, in howling 100knot winds (almost blowing my walking poles out of my hands!) the fingerless gloves, now wet in the driving hail (which was pricking my face skin) and rain, meant the ends of my fingers were numb with the cold! Luckily inside a thick black sack, in my now wet backpack, were Mums possum gloves! Which saved the day, or at least my fingers from getting frostbite!

I battled on to the sound of flapping ponchos, on other people…a waste if time today as they were almost launching the wearers into the clouds (and everything underneath was wet anyway!) I was just wet, without the threat of becoming Mary Poppins!

We peaked at 1450metres above sea level – at which point I saw the most exciting thing of the day…couldn’t retrieve my camera quickly enough…so I’ll have to paint a word picture….

Just as I was about to hit the 14km mark and nearing the peak of my climb…to my right a flock of Latxa black faced sheep, native to the Spanish Pyrenees, was wandering beside the track…down into a valley….then from above,on the left, a herd of wild Pyrenees horses came thundering down the last ascent, within 50 meters of where I was standing…circling and bucking around for a bit, then ran off down the side of the mountain! There were about 6-8 wonderful looking beasts, obviously trying to keep warm like the rest of us!

The last climb, or so I thought, stopping at the only other refreshment place on this day, a tatty old food truck, selling hot (sachet) drinks, cold boiled eggs and bananas….the food of athletes?? I grabbed a hot coffee…it was terrible but it was hot!!!

So a couple more 1km ups, then the terrain plateaued out for about 5kms followed by a steep 5km decent into Roncevalles…my destination for the day! I was starting to feel the knees by this stage!

Leaving this morning at 7am arriving at 4pm! A nine hour day…possibly due to my fitness level, but definitely weather restricted tentative walking…with at times zero visibility, lots of mud slides, and the super chill factor coupled with soggy clothing!

Nothing a very hot, long shower, full set of dry woolies, a cold beer and food…

The beef burger, which was delicious. I am now lying flat relaxing before another early start. Breakfast here at this hotel is 7am, so I will definitely grab a bite before I head off into another mountainous wet day! (Longer distance but less altitude!)