Keith stayed in Calzadilla de la Cueza yesterday (hitting a major milestone – 100 km walked!) and after a good night’s sleep trekked his way to Sahagun today. Before leaving Calzadilla de la Cueza he had breakfast at his hotel (hostal not hostel) and they played the same music tape that they’d played the night before. He said that “no one should have to listen to “We Are the World” twice in the same year. The hostal in Calzadea de la Cueza didn’t take reservations on the internet so Keith had to call them the morning of the day he was going to arrive make a reservation. No one at the hostal spoke English and it was tough conveying a name to them. He was aiming for the Spanish version of Paul (Paulo) since “Keith” just wasn’t happening, but by the time it was all done it had morphed to “Pablo.” So when he got there he asked for his room and the guy was like, “Ah! Pablo!!!”

The hostal is set up like some of the bars in old Western movies where the bar and hotel desk are in the opposite ends of the main room and the stair case goes up and winds around where the room doors face over the bar and stuff. It meant it was a little noisy from people down in the bar in the evening, but his earplugs worked pretty well and it got real quiet after about 11 when apparently everybody got kicked out. Earlier in the evening an Irish guy bought Keith a beer. He was some type of statistician and he said that he was going to write an alternate guide to the Camino called, “My feckin’ Camino!” There was also an older Canadian couple that were biking the Camino. One of their bikes had a flat and another Irish guy was trying to help fix it. He was a funny, classic Irishman comic character—and while he was working on it he prayed out loud invoking, “Jesus Christ and all the flippin’ saints!” Sadly this didn’t get the tire fixed. Later he had dinner with the Canadian couple and they said they planned to get a ride into the next city to see if they can get it fixed or replaced since it’s a rental.

For those keeping track the pack was ok again today—it seems like he’s found a consistent solution to that problem which is good because after he takes a train to Sarria tomorrow from Sahagun he’s going to have a few days with LOTS-o-hills and the pack needs to be cooperative since the hills alone will be enough of a challenge.

I realized that there was a picture from Sept. 16th of the view from Alto Mostelares that I completely forgot to include earlier in the blog and since it’s such a beautiful view I thought I should go ahead and share it in this post:

More on Sahagun and the next phase of his journey soon! Same bat time…same bat channel!