Heading out of Cacabellos or “Pretty Poopville”, it looked like I was going to get buckets of rain. But I wasn't going to worry about it. Hence, I was the last to leave, again, and loved it... had FOUR showers to myself!! Because I had a great wifi connection, I wrote a bit stretched as I waited for the pictures to download.
The day turned out to be beautiful and cool, so not much sweat to deal with. This cherry tree reminded me of biking through a cherry orchard inNE France and getting the living bejesus scared out of us. The farmers put a machine that fires what sounds like a shotgun and it must have been 15 feet from the side of the road. After I changed my britches...
The road today was mostly paved or along a road or for awhile a nice trail through beautiful farm land. It looked like Ecuador, which was ironic since I had just met two Pilgrims from Ecuador. They are now living in Madrid. When asked why they moved to Madrid they said that they moved in 2000, when the Ecuadorian money was massively devalued so they move to Spain because they had a better economy....whoops!!!
The farmers around here have many different kinds of fruit trees and mostly grapes. It’s a special grape called a mencia grape. I plan on checking it out tonight. The area is also famous for sweet red peppers that are roasted and then peeled by hand. For dessert I’ll have a special pear and a special apple from the area. I like how this farmer planted a rose bush at the end of one of his rows of grapes. Maybe for the love of his life... he’d think of her every time he saw the roses! Quien sabes? (who knows?)
The Camino rolls through some pretty desolate towns, but I like this house. It has a lot of promise - power, four walls, a staircase, a roof... okay it has some liabilities too - the four walls probably need to come down, the staircase is a lawsuit in waiting, and the roof has to be replaced... but oh the location!!!
This is a view of Cacabelos from the trail. The name does not do the town justice. I read the minutes from the last town hall meeting and two other names were rejected, “FeoPeepeetown” (ugly peepee) and “StinkySweatville”. Go figure!
The trail followed the road, which normally is kind of poopy...hey...maybe that’s where they got the name... but it also followed the river, which I scoured over and over for a fisherman, but to no avail. I wanted to pay someone to be my guide and go trout fishing. I did see one fish and he seemed to want someone to take him out of that cold water!
I passed this graveyard and it reminded me of the one in our hometown in Italy. All people are interred above ground behind marble or granite slabs. Ain’t nobody going nowhere!!
When I am rolling my backpack, I get lots of stares and some seem to be demeaning, however, most people are either envious or incredulous. They like the flexibility of either rolling it or caring it. Here were some bikers who had a ton of equipment. There was even a tandem bike. I’d like to take a tandem, but I would be restricted to staying on the roads, which would be okay with me.
I saw this house and thought of a caption for it:
overheard on the walkie-talkie -"Hey Juan, call off the search party. I think I found where the meteor landed!” or....
"Well THAT explains why we ain't seen the ol' widow at church lately!"
I intended on going 26k today, however after about 12K I had some ideas for two things: the plan to help principals to be more successful and the other is for a restaurant called the “AbitofCamino”. More on that later. I also wanted to see about finding a guide for the river. I stopped in a tiny town and found a Casa Rural for 25E and it looked like it was right out of Switzerland so I called it a day at about 2:00.
As it turned out, I can’t fish because they have closed the fishing season until the fall. Hmmmm....I don’t think I’m going to be fishing ...legally, anytime soon. I have been writing like a banshee, however, and enjoying every minute. The only fly in the ointment is that the wifi doesn’t work and that means I have to go to Ruta Nova bar to write on their wifi. Oh well, I’m going to get to kill several birds with one stone: work on the blog, email, drink some Mencias wine, eat some red peppers and finish the night off with pears and apples. Things could be a lot worse! :)
From my table in the garden. Kinda makes you wanna write, doesn't it!
Flexibility is the ability to go with the flow, not bend the flow.... SWB (ouch, I just made that up!)
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