Ghost Story: Barro to Caldas de Reis

I took a wrong right turn trying to find my off-stage accommodation in Barro. Then I took two more right turns to end up about a quarter mile from where I started. Two brutal uphill miles walking while trying to reach an unresponsive landlord, and I was toast. My total miles today was to 14.5 and the equivalent of 23 floors. I’m past tired. Again.

Now, I’m chilling in a house with some definite “Shining” vibes. I’m pretty sure the young guy I’m renting the room from inherited the place. The deceased parents’ stuff is still everywhere. Think dark, formal, old furniture. Think mahogany paneling and candles. I am completely alone, but I’m pissed about getting lost, so I figure the least this guy can do is let me lose his laundry room. I go looking for a washing machine, and instead find two rooms with musty old beds and dressers partially covered in plastic. I find a chest freezer. A really, really big chest freezer. I think, ‘Jeffrey Dahmer could fit, like, four bodies in there. Whole.’

Back in the room, I count the track and field trophies on the dresser. Thirty five.I count again. Thirty seven. “All work and no play make Jack a dull boy.”

I’m creeping myself out. Just because the downstairs pantry is filled with, like 10 jars of pickled garbanzo and white beans and there is a bloody raw steak on a plate in the fridge (for me?) does not mean crazy people live here. I will just lock myself in my room and wait for the host to arrive around 10. But, there is no lock on the door.

There are times I just have to say, ‘Quit it,’ so I just stop thinking about the little guest notebook and the glowing review of the host’s piano playing. Cause, there is no piano in this house. I assume I will have nightmares here, but instead I dream I am a professional ice skater and Owen Wilson wants to marry me. Benefit of exhaustion. I’m too tired to be scared in my dreams.

I am awakened the next morning by noise in the house. “Hello?…Hello?” I’m thinking it’s either the host, finally, or my baggage transfer service.

Nope. It’s some guy from a construction crew wandering down the hall with a window casing. “We’re just here working today,” his boss tells me.

I hightail it out of there.

Not a great stay, but certainly memorable. But really…who was that steak for?Read more