Day 32 - Summary - Walked - 446.1 km

Total Distance - 533.9 km
By bus - 65.8 km
By taxi - 22 km
By foot - 446.1 km
Average - 16.6 km per day
Walking average - 14.3 km per day

How is my Camino going? Dare I say … fabulous.
Since just after Cáceres I have been able to break the stages into sections that are manageable for me.
I am enjoying my slower pace and spend the afternoon showering, washing, eating, journaling, napping, reading, looking around the town, shopping for snacks, doing some yoga, planning, and after all that generally taking it easy.
I could be walking more kilometres on some days but it can be difficult to break up the route. Sometimes it works out I only walk 10 km even though I could do more.
Accomodation
I have found that the albergues at towns between stages are usually good value for money and offer excellent conditions - often with flannel sheets and towels and last night the gas heater was on. Toasty warm and cosy.
I have been booking one or two days ahead if the place I want to stay hasn’t a lot of beds. But the difficulty I had with accommodation around Zafra hasn’t been repeated.
Fellow Pilgrims
It seems there are not too many people on this Camino at the moment. I know there are people who stopped at Salamanca. I am often solo or with one or two others.
Tonight there is a couple travelling by car and one other peregrino at the albergue.
I have met a few solo women but they are all faster than me so we don’t spend a lot of time together. There are more men than women. There were two Italian men at the albergue last night - one young and one older.
Health
In the last few years I allowed my health to decline and recently I have wanted to go to some sort of health retreat. The Camino is perfect.
The body is getting stronger every day and the back- pack now feels fine even with extra food and water. I am slowly losing some extra pounds, growing some muscle and gently detoxing by walking in the fresh air and eating the simple and healthy Spanish food. And I don’t feel at all deprived.
Weather
I’ve been incredibly blessed with the weather so far. It only seems to rain in the afternoon at the moment. Hoping this pattern continues.
I was just chatting with the young woman from Holland who is here tonight. She said it looks like the weather is quite good further north. 🙏❤️
The days are mild but it is getting cold in the evenings so I think I still might need to get some extra clothes in Zamora. I just couldn’t carry any more when I started and it all seemed too hard to post stuff to Salamanca when I was sorting myself out in Sevilla. I now realise I could have postponed my start date to give myself a little more time to get organised - but I also wanted to just get started. And I was a bit worried about how long it would take me to get to Santiago as I have booked a flight home for 30 November. We live and learn.
Otherwise all is good. I am loving the walking alone under the spacious skies of the meseta.
What’s next
I’m in that mid stage where you think this will go on forever (particularly when it’s raining outside) but I know that soon enough I will be in my last 10 days, then the last 5 then ….. so I am practicing just being in the day I am in.

Photos
Hoping I chose photos that haven’t made the cut so far. I think there might be some double ups but will amend as I notice.Read more