You Are Never Too Pooped To Poop

Bob wrote:

Losing track of the days- we get up before 6¨00 and leave to start
walking well before seven. Had kind of a wild night in Pamplona last
night. Or at least as wild as you can get when you are tired and your
feet hurt. We went to the Hemingway cafe Urina, where he sat all day
drinking while he wrote Sun Also Rises. Saw the streets where the
bulls run and the Plaza DelToro. All very cool, but I can´t help but
feel for the Bulls. Our Spanish friend took us to a non-tourist
pinchos bar to eat. It was incredible – one pincho and one wine for 2
euro.

Today was much cooler and we made the walk another 30km as far as
Puente la Reina.I am holding up pretty well, but Ana is hurting pretty badly. She
carried way too much in her pack (it is probably over 20kg), and her
feet are badly blistered. It does come in handy though, whenever
someone along the way needs something, Ana has it in her pack. Tonight we were
planning to make a salad at the abergue (some have kitchens), and Ana
had a half liter of olive oil. We did without the vinegar, but she
also had a bottle of homemade schnapps for after the meal.

We were fortunate to become walking friends with a man from Spain,
Jose Louise, he saves us a lot of time with directions, getting rooms,
and any other thing where we have to interact with people that speak
English about as well as I speak Spanish. BTW, no one can
understand anything that I attempt to say in Spanish, beyond uno or
dose. I can understand pretty well, but speaking more than one or two
words together is incomprehensible to people from Spain.

Today we climbed some pretty big hills again and some real steep
down-hills. The down-hills are the worst. The country is getting
more dry as we move south. Today reminded me of Pullman Washington.
OK, I put in another Euro for 20 minutes time. Today I decided to
stop taking pictures of incredible medieval churches and shrines
because there are too many. Every little village has a church that is
500 or more years old, and shrines are everywhere along the trail.
More importantly, today I did my first poop along the trail. Thanks
Con for packing the Wet Wipes.

Still meeting a lot of nice people. There are ,however, a couple of
women from the US who want to talk constantly. They are annoying, and
everyone is polite and has taken a turn with them, but after a while
it is necessary to find a reason to speed up or slow down to avoid
them. We walk pretty much with the same people every day, but a few
new people either catch up to us or we catch them during the day.

Among the more unusual people is a young girl from France who started
walking from Leon with her horse. The horse just carries her
pack, and she camps out along the way. Another woman and her 11 month
old daughter, along with the woman’s 16 year old brother are walking together
and camping.

I keep thinking that Julie and Kaya would have a great experience
doing this. There is a woman and her two daughters from Boston
walking and they reminded me of you two. Time up again.