September 14th, 2013

We made it to our first stop on the ¨low road¨, the town of Valcarlos.  If the mountain road offers breathtaking panoramas of the view from above, the low road offered us breathtaking panoramas of the view from below.  The Pyrenees opening up before us was the most beautiful sight imaginable.  Still, the low road isn´t actually all that low.  There were plenty of steep uphill and downhill spots to negotiate.  We met not another pilgrim along the way except for one man (looked about our age), an American who works at the embassy in Madrid who was doing the camino by bike!  When we got to the tiny town of Valcarlos we couldn´t find the albergue so we stopped at the post-office/tourist office and the very nice girl who worked there gave us directions and a number written on a piece of paper.  She told us when we got to the albergue to punch the number into the door.  We did, it opened, there wasn´t a soul in the albergue so we grabbed ourselves a couple of beds then took showers.  This albergue is ultra clean, ultra modern, (the gite at St. Jean was charming but not so modern) and has a washing machine we used to wash our clothes.  Finally a few other pilgrims cam staggling in then the lady who runs the albergue came in to take our money (10 euros per night) and tell us that she´d be back in the morning to fix us breakfast. I´m guessing that the person-to-facility ratio will be much better here! Love to you all! Patti 8)