Marybel switched her shoes to her runners and inserted the new soles for her heels. She decided to walk with me today. We still used the backpack taxi for her pack and we stuffed her pack with some of my things so my backpack is lighter but not too much lighter. We have been doing that for the last 3 days. It has helped me greatly to have a lighter pack for my trek.

Remember how I said that I may be getting bored at this time on the camino. Well, be careful what you asked for. Indirectly, I had requested for a bit of excitement and I got it. On this day, I walked past a house that had a sign, “Atencion, perro!” I saw a dog chained up and walked calmly past the house. Out of the garage of the house, out came running another dog, a mean blond retriever who came at me with baring fangs. Immediately, I brought up my walking stick and was ready to defend myself. The dog stopped in front of me because of my stick in defence position. Wow, it kept on snarling and growling and looked like it was ready to pounced on me any moment. The thoughts that ran through my head were not pretty. I swung my stick back and forth in a pendulum fashion and quickly walked on backwards, not wanting to turn my back on this dog. Once I noticed it did not follow me, I almost ran on the road to get away from this house quickly.

I met Marybel ahead who stopped to see how I did with the dog as she too encountered the same dog. She said that she growled back at the dog and also quickly walked on. She had no stick but she managed to escape this nasty dog by showing no fear.

Later, she did pick up a makeshift walking stick at a cemetery we passed so that she can defend herself should another such incident arise. With her hooded rain gear and the stick, she looked like Gandalf the wizard from Lord of the Rings. This theme was appropriate this day and I took on the role of the Hobbit due to my Hobbit walking stance and according to Marybel, my big Hobbit shoes. We even shared some dry biscuits on our break on the path. It truly felt like we were on a quest on the camino.

This day’s incident brought back my sense of adventure and broke the cyclical humdrum felt recently. We reached Palas De Rei in the afternoon and stayed at Meson De Benito. It is again $10 for each bed. As we are on the last 100kms of the camino, we find that things here are getting more expensive. Food and lodging will get more expensive as we get closer to Compostela De Santiago. We found out that for tommorrow, we will have to pay $12 per bed at the albergue in Melide. The average now will be $10 – $12, not under $10 like we had been enjoying.

Marybel has also started her own Camino tradition. She found a notebook that had pages with the scallop shell watermark on its center. She writes her prayers on each page, the same ones over and over again. Then she visits every church she comes across and leaves one page at each church. She started this in Sarria and will continue until our final destination. She also prays with her rosary along the way.

I have to confess that I have not been doing well with my rosary. The saying, “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”. Knowing that I am doing this camino for my spiritual objective, I shall be lenient with myself and change the saying to suit, “the road to heavan is paved with good intentions and I shall continue to walk on it in my own way”. Cheesy! But it will do for me.

Peace and love,
Hilda:)