October 22nd, 2013

Yesterday we sloshed through 20.5 kms through on-again-off-again(mostly on again!)  rain from Morgade to the tiny village of Hospital de la Cruz.  In the rain pilgrims just seem to slog along, looking with their backpacks under their over-sized ponchos like giant turtles in ponchos moving down the path,the Great  Giant Camino Turtles.  The other rain style option is Tom´s choice, a black rain suit with a backpack cover , the Camino Rocket Man look.  Before we left the Casa Morgade Tom had a long discussion with Paco, the hospitaliero, on the Spanish Civil War.  Ever since we arrived in Spain Tom has wanted to find some historical information on the War, maybe a museum, or something, but all we´ve been able to find was a phtographic exhibit in the San Marcos monastery on the era when part of the monastery was used by Franco for his notorious prison.  Paco was a young guy, 36 years old, spoke great English, and both of his grandfathers fought in the War but on opposing sides, one for Franco´s Nationalists, the other for the Republicans, so Paco knew a lot about the war that he´d learned from his grandfathers and he was glad to give Tom a history lesson, even pointing out on a wall map of Spain some of the places where battles and even war crimes took place.  Back on the Camino  (in the rain) we passed by villages, all of them with casa rurals offering private rooms for tourist  pilgrims with signs of welcome that said things like, "You deserve a break, emjoy your Camino!" and  "Buen Camino!  Your efforts have earned you a break!"  Now, while the albergues have always been freindly and welcoming, still they never hung out those kinds of signs of congratulatory stroking.  Not many pilgrims of any stripe on the Camino now, though - Paco confirmed that it´s the time of the year that accounts for the lack of pilgrims - and we had the Camino practically to ourselves.  This region continues to remind us  of Ireland (Well, okay, neither of us has been to Ireland, but you know what I mean), narrow paths lined with old, old stone walls crossing over sloping green meadows or through lovely forests.  In fact, one Irish pilgrim came whizzing by us, but he didn´t want to stop and chat so Tom just called after him, "Does this look like Ireland?"  He called back, "Yeah, just like it!" but insuch a tone that we didn´t know whether he was being sincere or sarcastic.  Oh well, it was raining pretty hard.  When we reached Hospital de La Cruz it was 6:20 pm and our boots and feet were soaked,  indicators that it was time to stop.  We had two options, a casa rural called El Labrador, or the xunta.  The municipal algergues in Galicia are called xuntas, and the guidebook  warns that the xuntas of Galaicia, unlike the municipal albergues in Navarra, Burgos, and Castilla Y Leon, the Spanish states we´ve already passed through,   tend to be on the dirty side and not well-maintained, as in "T:P:?  In your dreams!  Consider yourself lucky it there´s a toilet seat!"  (I´m not making this up!).  But worse, we heard rumors from fellow pilgrims of bedbugs - something we´ve not at all encounterted  yet - in the xuntas.  Now, granted, a rumor is just a rumor, but adding it all up we´re feeling a wee bit reluctant (and that´s a wee bit of an understatement) to stay in a xunta.  So we opted for El Laborador where for 25 euros we were given an ugly,  not-the-cleanest, unheated room where the sheets didn´t appear to have been changed any time in the recent past and a bathroom out in the hall where everthing seemed to leak, and a laundry service that returned our clothes soaking wet.  (Okay, maybe not soaking wet,  just wet).  But there were no bedbugs.  Later at dinner in the Casa restaurant (bad feng shui in the dining room)  we saw several pilgrims who were staying at the xunta and had walked to the restaurant for the pilgrim meal.  Tom asked one of them how was the xunta was and the guy made a hand gesture and a rude noise.  So we figured we were better off in El Laborador.  The 9 euro pilgrim meal there received mixed reviews.  Tom and I both started with the soup, a chickenesque liquid that I found inedible but that Tom liked so much he ate up his and mine as well.  I observed the 4 other pilgrims who ordered the soup and saw that 2 finished theirs, one ate half of his, and the other didn´t eat any of his.  So I guess that soup was a matter of taste.  The next course which we both ordered, though, steak and fries, was great, the steak having been fried up with garlic so it was really tasty.  For dessert Tom ordered the flan, which looked home-made, an even better-than ususal flan, and I ordered caramel ice cream, which was actually flan-flavored ice cream, delicious! This morning  we weren´t heart-broken to leave El Laborodor, except that it meant going back out into the rain, from which we´ve just taken a little break in this cafe. After all, our efforts have earned a break, right?  May all your efforts today bring you joy and satisfaction!  Love, Patti 8)