A Walk and a Float 2025: Day 27

The chance of wet was actualized this morning. Starting at about 6AM, thunderstorms. Thunder. Lightning. Heavy rain.
We had an early 1st breakfast (Jana got some packaged thing that turned out to be hamburger buns impregnated with chocolate) and some instant coffee. By 6:46, the storm cell had passed, and we made a go of it (the others in the hostel were less optimistic and stayed behind). Light sprinkles. Thunder in the distance. We walked out of Samos along the street then on dirt paths next to farmland. We were looking to get a proper 2nd breakfast - the towns we were passing through were small, and had food listings, but nothing seemed to be open.

Finally, after passing through yet a 3rd and 4th town, where a projected breakfast opportunity fell through, Jana determined that we would eat some of our 'reserve' foods as breakfast at the outskirts (about 2 blocks from the outskirts on the other side). Nuts and Aquarius for Jana, and a bag of corn-nuts for me.
Thank goodness she had us stop. Just of few minutes later, the sky opened up and dumped. We quickly moved to a nearby house/shop with an outdoor overhang and waited out the storm (about 20 min).

We kept looking for coffee around the next corner, and the next. And it started to get warm. And there were hills and valleys and hills and valleys. And there is a big difference walking a lot of miles, and walking a lot of miles with wet feet. Some of it is physical discomfort. And some of that physical discomfort works its way up into the head.

Nine miles in, at 10:45, we hit Sarria (the circus-city for Camino). And it was surprisingly DEAD. The morning circus had already left town, and the evening circus (staging for the next day) had not yet started to arrive/assemble. So all the shops were closed. We finally did find a breakfast place - which we greatly appreciated (toast/croissants, coffee and juice).
But we still had another 8 miles, and it was getting hot with 100% humidity, and Jana was already having some end-of-day issues with her feet, and the road out of Sarria has a very protracted climb. We walked another mile up (literally up) into the heart of Sarria, and found a Peregrino Store (souvenir and supply shop for all the Pilgrims starting in Sarria), and the shopkeeper called a cab for Jana for the last 7 miles. [She was (and is) fine - she just did not want to chance any issues, and wanted to be ready to walk the next day]

[aside - Jana's cab caught and passed the tail-end of the circus of pilgrims, a miles long stretch of them. When she arrived at our hostel at about 1PM, there were 75 of them out front getting lunch. I saw none of this - by the time I arrived, they had all moved on and disappeared].

I continued walking up and out of Sarria into the countryside and the sky went from dark grey to blue. And all of the birds and butterflies that had been staying under-cover came out. It was all rolling hills and farmland - like walking through rural Ohio.
A couple of hours later, a breeze picked up, which helped against the heat.

I kept looking for an open bar or restaurant or store, thinking that there had to be *somewhere* to buy a soda, but there was not. The timing of the shops seemed to be centered on the pilgrim waves, and I was squarely between them.

Eventually, I found a shelter with a vending machine and got a Coke, spent a while talking to a man who needed an ear, and then closed out my walk. Arriving at Morgade at about 3:45PM. 17 miles even in 9 hours, including climbs/descents, breaks and events. Definitely not a fast one.

The feet did not like the walk in wet socks. And I am having some other minor internal rebellions. But a shower, a change of clothes, and a good meal have a tendency to fix a lot of woes and shove them into a rearview mirror. I am looking forward to what tomorrow brings.

Tomorrow will be a bit shorter - about 11 miles. A recovery day of sorts. (And it is where there was available housing for us).
We are working to stay between the waves of Pilgrims, but in a couple of days, we will likely become swamped as the spiky daily waves spread out, and booking forces us to be closer to the more popular 'primary' rest-sites. Today, 2200 people showed up at Santiago (I think I remember that yesterday's number [no longer available on the website] was double that). I am guessing that pre-Saria each city might have seen a few hundred pilgrims each day. The >5x delta is Sarria-starters.

Birds started really slow. They don't seem to like the rain, either. And the overcast made visibility awful. Once the sky cleared up, and I ended up post-Sarria, visibility and bird activity improved. 31 total species today, including 2 new ones (one pre- and one post- Sarria).

On to photos!!

Leaving Samos, 6:45 AM:

At the exit of Samos, some pilgrim art, and a mile-marker. In case you cannot read it, 128.512km.

Some goats on each side of an electric fence (on the close side it is a steep drop-off onto the road, so the fence is not *intended* to separate animals)

This is how many of my morning photos look. A Eurasian wren. Mud color on mud in low light.

The descent behind, and a long climb into a patch of light.

We then walked farm roads from empty-village to empty-village. No coffee. But the farmland views were pleasant in the drizzle.

A single color on a giant wall of green:

More dirt paths along a river - some with very impressive trees. And the river below.

A field of wildflowers, with the colors muted somewhat by the overcast:

One critter that didn't seem to mind the damp conditions:

Today was a day for Common Chaffinches. Here is the first one, with some reasonable lighting:

More country roads. With a lot of dense grasses and ferns. This part of the country rains about 50% of all days.

A song-thrush, just before take-off.

A mix of wildflowers:

OK. I get that this photo is awful. It is long distance, even with big zoom. But the sounds from these critters was clear. These were Turtle-Doves, and a first for us. And yes, there were three. And not two. And they were so far away, I couldn't really clip one from the picture.

We passed one cluster of poppies all day. This is the healthiest of the dozen total flowers in the patch.

There is a lot of Camino graffiti and stickers on walls and mile-markers and guard-rails and anything else man-made. It is universally positive messages. Until this one.

Another Song Thrush, this one with some lunch.

Video: This catches a few of the snippets from a Song Thrush repertoire, mimicking a 1980s 5-stage car alarm:

Jana felt this tree was giving her the finger.

Outskirts of Sarria:

A couple of White Storks - first ones we have seen in a few days:

We finally find some food.

At the top of the city, Jana and I (temporarily) part ways. This is on the outskirts of the historic district. Patches of blue have appeared in the South.

Once out of the city, the sun came fully out, and it started to get quite warm. Some of the walk was near streams, which was nice. But walks to streams are always sharply downhill, followed by a long hike uphill. If only they could put some streams at the tops of hills...

And a long upward trek with some amazing old trees (the one below, on the right side at head-height) holding some flowers):

Near a pond/stream, a bunch of dragonflies were zipping by. After numerous attempts, I got one in frame:

Then a long segment on some rural roads. It felt like walking through Ohio.

A second new bird for the day - a European Honey Buzzard.

The last few miles on dirt track, with trees and farmland on both sides.

Another Eurasian Jay (second one I have seen), but the picture is not nearly so nice as the one a couple of days ago.

A Wood Pigeon, complete with a Camino shell on the neck. These are big birds.

Another Common Chaffinch.

Reptiles were active today. This larger Wall Lizard was, appropriately, scaling a stone wall.

And I got one of those dragonflies on a leaf. Much easier to photograph that way. A Beautiful Demoiselle Dragonfly.

Here's the shelter where I bought my vending-machine Coca-Cola, and spent some time talking with a fellow pilgrim.

A Melitaea Phoebe butterfly:

Overheated sheep resting in the grass:

Getting closer....

I narrowly missed a traffic-jam here. A farmer was calling his herd from a pasture on one side of the Camino to the other side. These cattle were not quick, and there were >50 of them. I don't think the farmer liked that I snuck by between him and his herd. Or that I took a picture of his cows after I had passed.