Friendly Friday

Happy Friday everyone!  It's raining and dull here...which actually makes me happy because a) I've been able to take my little green car out for a spin-it doesn't have snow tires, so it's been sitting idle most of the winter and b) the snow is melting and warm spring weather is coming (I'm really popular with the skiing set around the office)!  Unfortunately my mid-week post about fountains and the like didn't materialize--I've been laid low by a nasty flu bug, and am just now becoming coherent again, through the aid of many cups of liquids, hours of napping and Advil Cold and Sinus..

So in honour of spring weather, good friends, and excellent cold and flu medication (thanks Trudy!), I present to you more friendly faces of the Camino.  We're almost into Santiago proper, folks!  I've even included a rainy-day picture, to prove that it wasn't all sunshine and roses*.

Here we are, wandering our hostel to the only restaurant in Cow Town* with Lindsey, SuperDad and our Eastern European friend Anicka (I think I have probably massacred the spelling of her name--that's one thing that is difficult on the Camino--you learn people's names by hearing them, but you never see them written down).  When I say Cow Town, I'm serious--it was a town of about 10 houses, 1 hostel, one restaurant and a hundred cows.  Cows wandering through the streets at all hours of the day.  Usually led by one resident of the town (village? ).  Unless they looped the same 25 cows through hour after hour...which I believe I suggested to Jana as a possibility.  The place was so small that you can see our hostel behind us (where the people are sitting outside) which was the first building in town, and we're almost in front of the restaurant (which was the last).  *Actual town name Fonfria, which I'm sure is Galician for Town of Many Cows and Few People.



Entering Cow Town--see?  Cows.  Everywhere.



This is an incredibly unflattering picture of myself and Ayeleen (our New York friend and partner in crime).  But...it does give you a glimpse of the typical pilgrim food break.  Everyone sits together with friends they've met along the way, compares battle wounds (I think we're actually comparing dirt marks from the trail here, actually...) and ingests enough food and beverages to be able to his the trail again. 

This is Barefoot Man on the right!  Aka Marco! He and his son Daniel live in Spain, and were doing just the last hundred kms or so...but he was doing it barefoot!  You can't quite see that in this picture, but you'll have to trust me.  He's done the full Camino barefoot twice, and sections of it barefoot as well.  He's also written a barefoot Camino-themed book if which you should check out.  Also, these are the horseback pilgrims.  They'd ride wildly through town, occasionally stopping to snap a few pictures before moving on.  Very cool.



And here's a slightly more civilized version of us pilgrims, complete with Pilgrim
Casual-wear...ie, the clothes you wear after you've hiked for the day so that you don't have to wear the same clothes for 24 hours, and can hand-wash a few things.  Don't we clean up nicely?  This is Ayeleen, Jana and myself, with an Icelandic friend who's name I've remembered only as "the Icelandic version of Kate".  Yep...the one name I should actually remember, and it's gone gone gone.



This is our extended Pilgrim family, and our last supper together before entering Santiago.  We're in Arcos de los Pinas, and having a ball. Who could ask for anything more?

And finally...See?  Rain!  This was in Santiago, and we were all highly amused by the pilgrims with umbrellas sitting in groups under the larger umbrellas. * To be fair to the Camino, though, we had lots of roses, and only about two days of rain in 34.

And that's it for now, lovelies!  I'll be back next Friday for sure, with faces from Santiago and beyond.  I'm also hoping for a mid-week posting of fountains and all things cool.  Happy weekend!

-K-