Palas de Rei

July 23

We walked a bit over 15 miles today, so we now have 43.6 miles to go.

We wanted to get an earlier start this morning because we knew we had a lot of climbing today and it was going to get hot later. Morning is not my most favorite time of day, and 5:30 am is really not my thing. But, we did finally get going in the dark with headlamps. Sunrise is not until after 7:00 here.

Both Alan and I do well climbing up and over the hills in the morning in the cool air when our legs and bodies are fresh. But, as the hours add up and the day goes on, we slow down...sometimes a lot. Today was one of those days. Everything on my body felt great, except my sore groin muscle bothered me more as the day wore on. Alan’s back was also bothering him, I was semi-limping, and then some grumpiness set in which meant walking at a distance from each other was the best thing to do by the end of the day 😂😂.

The first thing we did when we got to Palas de Rei was go to the farmacia to get some ibuprofen. We had run out a couple of days ago. Then...stop at the supermercado to get something cold to drink and a few snacks, check in to our room, shower, wash clothes, eat some snacks, take ibuprofen, rest, eat lunch, visit with friends, rest again, then finally meet our friends for dinner. This routine is pretty much what we do each day after we are done hiking. It’s a rough life 😂😂.

Tonight’s dinner was the last dinner with Paul and Mirabelle until we see them in Santiago. It was a really nice dinner...special time.They will go further than Paku and us tomorrow. They said they will greet us when we arrive in Santiago 💕🙂. We had the waiter take a picture of the 5 of us to commemorate the moment.Read more