Camino Pilgrim

I slept in an old church building last night in Sahagún. The attic floor was remade into a house for pilgrims. Sleeping in a bed under the roof felt great. I was totally refreshed in the morning. I had earlier disabled my alarm so I could actually sleep as much as I needed. I was one of the last people to leave in the morning, but it was totally worth it.

I started off slowly and kept having small meals every two hours. Also, I gave myself a few minutes to rest my legs and have a sip of water every half an hour. I was slower than usual on purpose. I used the extra time to really dig deep into audiobooks. I got many new points of view to look at life. I even did some meditation in the shade. My journey here on Camino started to get clearer.

Working away from the office over a longer period of time has its obstacles, but it helps to understand the really important things to focus on for growth. A new path has opened its way to me in my head. It’s asking me to learn more and deeper into certain areas of my profession in order to achieve my goals. I believe this kind of insight would have come much more slowly if I were in the office and only focused on daily tasks.

The journey today was longer than any day before in distance. The local government has planted maple trees as seen in the picture, for kilometers upon end beside the road on the left-hand side. This helps pilgrims really enjoy the experience of travelling in sunlight, even on the hottest of days. Really appreciate this a lot. In addition, they had stone benches every half kilometer to sit and cool down weary feet from the walking.

There were several lovely small villages along the way. Sadly, they were all on the first half of the journey and I did not feel that tired or hot to visit them. The village I was originally planning to stay at was Reliegos. Once I got there, I saw how horrible the options look like in real life. The municipal albergue smelled of mold and the nice place next door cost twice as much with the reception worker looking at you as if you were trying to rob the house.

I just decided at that moment to push a few kilometers more and stay in a lovely historic village with lots of restaurants. Once I finally arrived in Mansilla de la Mulas, I found out that all the restaurants had their chefs on siesta break and I would have to wait several hours before getting any warm food. Thankfully, I had stocked up my supplies yesterday, found an open supermarket and now am feasting in my room like a hungry beggar. At least now I will have the strength to carry on tomorrow.

The city of León awaits exploration in the morning.