30 April to Azofra

That is the longest 5km I have ever walked. It should not have been difficult – the weather was a perfect walking temperature, the path was easy underfoot, after an initial climb it was largely downhill or flat, and I had had a very leisurely start to the day, not getting up off my mattress until close to 8am and chatting with Krzysztof from Poland, who is on a five month cycling adventure for an hour before finally setting off.
But I struggled and took a seat on almost every park bench on the way out of town and most of the aqueducts thereafter. I had to force myself to take photos – getting the camera out took too much effort.

Its not like there was nothing interesting. I had heard the distinctive clapping sound of storks before I saw them, one settling onto a nest high on the red cliff and two soaring right above me, so close you could hear their whooshing and see their wing feathers.

Once over the hill there were snowcapped mountains seemingly moving as I inched my way along, slower than the many centipedes scurrying along the road.

I knew I was not quite myself when I observed myself thinking “I don’t even care about those poppies.”
Admittedly, my pack was heavy. I had bought so much food yesterday. What was I thinking getting butter and a glass jar of jam to go with a loaf of rye bread that I will have to carry for days? Why did I need to replace the muesli so quickly? Why did I insist on getting a block of semicurado cheese? And couldn’t I have waited to buy more salami later?
My pack was also heavy because I had a whole lot of WET washing. I hadnt planned it that way, but then I hadnt planned to roll over at 11pm, after the four guys playing a cross between tennis and squash in the fronton had gone home and left us to go to sleep….

….yes, I had rolled over and thought, “I am going to throw up.”I immediately thought I couldnt possibly – it had been days since I was with the Gastro-Lady. But as quickly as I thought that, I realised I was indeed going to and now came the struggle to extricate myself quietly from my sleeping bag so as not to disturb the others. Somehow I managed to get the silk sleeping bag liner caught in one of my slides and in the pitch dark did not notice I was dragging it behind me. What I did notice was the fact that I was not yet at the door to get out of the hall, I was just in line with the Italian couple and I really did not want to throw up over them – it would be TMI to tell you what happened next, but I will just let you know the Italianos continued to sleep blissfully unaware of the drama playing out in the changing rooms…..and I ended up needing to mop the floor and wall, and wash most of what I was wearing and aforementioned sleeping bag liner. After an hour in bed I had already got up to put on my thermals and socks and jacket, so now that most of them were hanging up in the changing rooms I knew I was going to feel the 4 degrees that was forecast. Sure enough my feet were still blocks of ice in the morning.
After the violent expulsion and CleanUpMission, I sat on a bench in the changing room feeling pretty sorry for myself, wondering if it was all over. I am glad to report it was, but I didnt know that at that point.
Having no other symptoms, no fever, no chills, no aches, no diarrhoea, no repeat vomiting after the first ten minutes, I can only assume it was something I ate. Was it the chorizo that I carried for a day without refrigeration? Was it the water I filled my bottle with from a fountain? Was it too much milk? Was it the hummus? Should I have washed the tomatoes instead of just wiping them?
Hard to tell. But I emptied my bottle and went back to the supermarket to buy some bottled water in the morning. When I was decanting the water into my bottle a one-toothed Grandma came up to me and asked if I was alone. She urged me not to walk alone, telling me I didnt understand and should wait on the bridge for another girl to walk with. I assured her there were plenty of pilgrims…that is to say, that is what I told her, but I don’t think she was assured!

And there were plenty of pilgrims today. The last one was the Polish guy, who will never know how helpful it was that he jumped off his bike and walked along with me for the last kilometre into town.