I awoke to an early morning mist which was disappointing considering I had gone to sleep under the stars last night. As I congratulated myself for my fast packing of my back pack I was approached by 3 girls all checking out my huge rucksack, "yeah! You like it big" I thought to myself as I leaned against a table to stop myself falling over. I thought the next few hours would be easy following bums in Lycra however I was horrified by the sudden realisation I no longer possessed a GPS so as I spent the next 25 minutes going through my rucksack I realised I might have been a little to fast to congratulate myself.
Once located the GPS was on and ready to go.
As I climbed through steady brush and trees I cursed my stupidity that had forced me to lose sight of all that lyrca however it was not long before I caught up. The girls were sitting under some pine trees in the shade perusing over a map and looking for alterative routes. One of them spoke English very well and showed me their map and a possible route. I nodded as if I knew what I was lookin at (for the last few days I had just been following red and white blazes and a yellow line on my GPS. "Anyway" I said "I've gotta get going, got kilometers to cover" cock blocking myself, and off I went. After a fair few hours of ascent on easy gradient road inevitable descent started and my good lord what a descent it was.
Jarring steps off limestone rock seemed to dislocate my kneecaps mm by mm, my thigh muscles bouncing around as jelly would when a kid shakes his bowl, my toe caps being hammers against an invisible anvil, this is decent to me. Anyone who knows me knows I prefer to go uphill to downhill any day of the week. Its just pure torture descending 2km at a gradient of 85%. As I reached a small village unfortunately not my destination I gargled like Homer Simpson at the thought of an ice lolly and a glass of cider (purely for medicinal reasons you understand). As I threw on that bag of lead for the final 15 minutes of my journey I saw the girls from earlier come skipping down the hill. As they past me, one said "I want to go swimming in the river, wanna join us.…...." "No thanks!" I said cock blocking myself once more. "Gotta get to my destination, see ya!" and off I went.
Clearing yet another false crest I let out a loud "Joder!" (Spanish for f%(k ) that the whole valley must have heard. My knees were done, my feet were hot and I just wanted to get done.
Two false crests more and a slight descent and I was done, hobbling through the streets of this quaint little hamlet I found a bar, a bar with cold beer and internet, gotta write that blog.
A couple of hours later I emerged from the cool dark bar into bright sunlight, high temperatures and scantily clad girls direct from a river. We sat and talked about many things but very little about walking as the night drew near, some in good English some in Spanish, all with smiles. We were joined in conversation by a lovely tempered white dog named Euski, we laughed and joked as i scratched the ears of my new frind. Just then I noticed a couple approaching the bar, it was David and Helen from yesterday. I was very surprised to see them, the way they had been shifting it yesterday I expected them to be half way up the French Riviera by now. I switched tables and learned more about the lives and escapades of the two people who drove me on yesterday when I was faltering, it turned out they both lead very interesting lives which took me back to my old documentary days. As night fully fell on us Dave and Helen retired to their bnb as I roamed the hamlet looking for camp ground.
As I decided that it might be best to return to the pub and camp there I heard the faint whisper of my name and as Iooked over to a play park/church entrance I saw the girls sitting under an overhang. We ate and talked as i supped a bottle of cider. Looking up at the stars I drifted off into sleep with my new friends a my four legged friend keeping guard.
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