Day 10: Najera to Cirueña. This is the Camino. The best plan is no plan, or at least not caring too much if the plan fails. I planned on getting up early and beating the hot sun today, but instead I slept til 6:30, took an unexplainably long time to get ready bc I slept in my walking clothes, and then we had coffee and croissants on the river in Najera, and then we walked for an hour until it was time for 2nd breakfast (I’ve become a hobbit for real). At that point, we picked up Sumanth from Atlanta, who is one of the students from the Camino class at Vanderbilt that we see each day. He is Pierre’s age, so the boys walked ahead and Marie-France and I continued at our pace, which is more leisurely, which it needs to be bc we need more oxygen for all the storytelling we do. It is great fun and we enjoy walking together. She lost a boot the other day when we stopped so I could change my socks, so today’s mission was to find a waypost to leave the remaining “lost sole,” and we gathered wildflowers along the way for adorning it. We came across this group of pilgrims who were screaming at us to join them in the water, and as tempting as it was, I told M-F that if I were to stop there, I might never leave, and I really needed to get it my albergue to work. We continued on, we found a place for her boot, we had a small ceremony and said “ai revoir,” and then we caught up with the boys at the “top of the hill” and stopped for a snack. Shortly after that, we were in our town, and we got our rooms. I’ve showered and M-F is doing laundry, and I’m working on getting my stuff online for my summer courses. I have no clue what tomorrow will bring. I’m neither looking forward to it nor dreading it as tomorrow seems very far away from right now. Even dinner seems far away. That’s how it is. Everything is very present moment, and I am loving that. No blisters yet, and I’m pretty confident that if I don’t have them yet, I’m good to go. My legs are tired at the end of the day, and my feet are sore from all the old cobblestone, but nothing hurts in the morning. My back is fine, my knees are fine, and my tan from Florida has been given an extension. Life is good. #leftrightleft (at La Rioja, Spain) https://www.instagram.com/p/BxfBpK4D8Gd/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1n6t53c1tbhr3
