Returning

Last day; last night in Madrid.

The last few days in Madrid have been interesting.  LOTS of walking, wandering, getting lost, getting found.  Maneuvering around with minimal language skills.

As perplexed as I was to be done with the backpacking portion of the Camino, I have an inkling this portion of the journey was important as well.  Don't ask, I can't expand/expound on it yet.

My traveling companion is tired of me and I of her.

But, boy, I'm ready to return to "home".  I think.  I'm curious what reentry will be like.

Lots to process.  Action to take...

Here are just a few images from the last few days.  Thanks for following this blog.

You can't get there from here.

Hello all.

I'm certain the Madrid train station is akin to Dante's 5th circle of hell.

When last I wrote, I was in Lisbon.  A beautiful, busy, busy city.  At times evoking memories of three rung circuses.  And HOT. Unlike Spain, the siesta is not observed in Lisbon or Porto...maybe somewhere else?

I stayed at a hostel which, as it turns out, is right in the thick of thuings.  There are benefits to that, but if I ever go back, I'd look to stay farther out.  Too crazy.

In fact, I left a day earlier than originally planned.  I took a bus from Lisbon to Merida, a five hour ride through lovely countryside.  No major sign announced our entrance to Spain, but there was a noticeable change in the building styles and, of course, language on the sign.

I went to Merida because:

1.  It was directly east of Spain, en route to Madrid; and
2.  I read about the Roman ruins and aqueduct.

Other than that skimpy information, I had no idea what to expect.  Merida is SMALL.  Well, the old center is.  They have created a lovely walking Running path that pretty much circles the town and from which one buses and traipses over ancient Roman ruins.  And it's quiet.

The first afternoon/evening (I arrived during siesta, so l rested as mandated), I was initially dismayed and certain I had made a lame brained decision to go there.  But I soon realized it was just right.

Remember how this is a spiral journey...the learning continues.  This particular learning had to do with trusting my inner self and going with what feels right.  Merida was lovely and QUIET.

And unbeknownst to me it's on the via de la Plata route of the Camino Santiago - Seville to Santiago.  I discovered this.but stumbling on .
some of the tell tale signs, and then running into a number of peregrina   it was nice to run into them.

Just that, waiting for the train, I noticed a peregrina and stuck up conversation with her.  She is from Korea.  This year she did the el norte of the Camino. Last year she did the Frances (the route I did. The most popular route from the French side of the Pyrenees to Santiago.)  Then she rented an apartment in Merida for a couple of months. And is day tripping from there.

She doesn't speak Spanish.

A light bulb went off.

So, in my current approach to travel:  flying by the seat of my pants.  Sort of.  I identified places, booked lodgings and decided travel arrangements would be obvious.  (Discovering my arrogant American self.)

Turns out getting to Merida from Lisbon isn't  too hard...finding the bus and bus stall in Lisbon was.  But getting from Merida to Toledo turned out to be impossible.  Panic.  However, I needed only to take the early train to Madrid, and then another train to Toledo.

Easy.   Right?  Not that day.  No English speaking customer service staff to give directions; computer system running self service ticket machines was down; the hand processing ticket counter was. Byzantine in its operations...no English, no instructions in any v language; this coincided lunch hour and regardless of the fact there were well over 100 people standing awaiting their turn, staff went to lunch leaving two people to carry on.

However, fortunately, the computer system for the automated ticket machines came back up after an hour.  And I even found one with English translation!  Riding that stress wave, baby.

Got to Toledo by 4:30 and climbed the mountain of stairs leading to my room under the eaves (no hyperbole), and took a rest.

TTFN

When a terminus isn't.

Hello again.

I'm sitting in a quiet hostel and trying to be disciplined and write.  So many possible distractions: watching beautiful young girls pose and vamp for the camera, re-checking the backpack, working yet another crossword, checking FB...you know.

So here goes.

When I made plans for waking the Camino I had very little confidence in my ability to walk with that darned pack farther than 5k.  Remember, starting out slow and tapering off.  So with that in mind, 112km was going to take a LONG time.  22.5 days.  As it turned out, even though I WAS walking incredibly slowly, I walked that distance in 8 days.

Suddenly I was left with tons of time and no plans, and no changes could be made to my flight.  So, this is a learning journey, right?  Well, that's how I think of it.  So, since I'm here, perhaps no should go investigate and explore, do research about other places.

It was a quandary which I found hard to sort out. Immediately two people I met along the way, Erin and Trudi,  posed possible options.  Nice, huh?

I wound up heading to Porto with Trudi.  So much pleasure in meeting and making new friends.  Neither of us had been to Portugal.  We bumbled along together and while we were intrigued by how different Portugal is from Spain, we got to learn our common interests and insights.  The world is a small place.

So we showed up in Porto, neither of us know Portuguese.  We needed to learn thank you and a few other phrases and fast.  But first we needed to find lodging.  Sitting at a sidewalk cafe, taking off those heavy packs, sighing as we sat back and enjoyed our cold beverages, with the aid of Wi-Fi (pronounced we-fe) and my smart phone, I set to finding lodging.  Fun task with no knowledge of places.  Our guardian angels were working for us big time.  We booked beds at the Magnolia hostel.  Setting out liking for it was an urban Camino experience...lots of guessing, a little round about, but then we found it.  We'd kind of walked the long way around.

Anyway we found it, and what a gem!  The hostel was in a 300 year old bldg which the owners have been lovingly renovating.  It´s clean, it´s in keeping with the period, it´s simple.  But it´s the staff, John, Rose, and Adriana who are the heart of this, and they are fantastic!  We each had numerous chats with each of them.  We learned lots of interesting things we would not have otherwise learned.  So convivial and fun.

So the learning continues, just as the journey continues.  I have more to share, but I need to stop hogging this computer.  More to come.

TTFN