Day 20
You put on your pack every morning and walk in generally a straight line, followIn yellow arrows the whole way. Doesn’t seem so complicated, right? Right! The walking part is not complicated. Your brain has to turn on, however, when you stop walking.
This is a mental challenge I had not anticipated: adjusting every single night to a completely new albergue/dorm/hostel/pension/refugio/hotel/guesthouse. After a long day on the trail, each night you have to learn how to turn on a new European shower faucet, where the landlady wants you to put your shoes, how to get ancient doors open/closed/locked/unlocked, where to hang laundry, how to trick the motion sensor lights into stay on, where the best WiFi corner is, and the best plan to get out the next morning in the pitch dark. (Do they lock you in? They might - be sure to ask!) Does landlady want you to pay now or when you leave? Are there any weird rules you should know about? (There are, usually listed on a nicely printed sheet of crisp A4, scotch taped to the wall, that has been added to in several different pen colors as the list grows.) Where are the most likely spots you will bump your head, trip over a 200-year-old half-step, or knock over something with your backpack? Eyeball these hazards from a distance if possible. Before all that, the first step is checking the bed for bedbugs. If the bed fails that test, you won’t have to bother with anything else because you will already be on your way to a new establishment!
I have stayed in all kinds of places so far. My favorites are the little family-owned ones where I get to watch the grandpa play with his grandson in the backyard (the guesthouse in Caladilla de los Hermanillos had a playhouse jus like Joey and I had when were kids), or pet the family dog. Twice the dog has been named Javi, both times the dog has been very fat. (Pilgrims feeding them?) The little kids are the best though, mainly because I have the same vocabulary as they do, and I understand what they say and what the adults say to them. The grandpa in Nájera really needed to get the grandkid (age: “knee-level”, maybe 2? 3?) into the car to take him home for siesta but the grandkid kept running circles around the car, yelling and laughing. “NOOOOOOO! I don’t want to sleep! NOOOOooooooooo!” Pause. “Can dog come?”
If pilgrims have been walking this same route for a thousand years or so, it stands to reason that some of the same village families, generation to generation, have been helping pilgrims along the way the whole time. That little guy who doesn’t like naps might have his own guesthouse one day! Maybe “no naps” will be one of his weird rules. :)