Varea

It's the longest day yet, distance wise, and if you don't want to do the whole 27.8km stage, your one option is to stay in Viana, at the 18.4km mark instead. As the following stage is 29km, there's no making up that ~10km tomorrow, it basically means you turn two days into three by walking the first half of one, the second half of one and first half of the other, then the second half of the other. Messy.

I've been a sanctimonious prick when it comes to doling out the platitudes to others - listen to your body, take it easy, etc. So when my left quad started giving me gipp on the approach to Viana you'd think I'd have stopped. No, apparently a pilgrim in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by a bigger force than that.

Cursing that decision almost immediately, I soon rounded a corner and saw Jovan and another pilgrim - he clearly likes company when he walks - and internally groaned as he ditched her taking a photo to come walk with me again. My feet hurt, my legs hurt, my pack felt heavy, and it was all industrial concrete noise.

Once in the albergue, mercifully, very close to the edge of town, I repeated my party trick of selecting the worst possible shower. Best I can compare it to is if you left a juice box at room temperature for a while then stabbed it with a fork and held it over your head. Half dressed and fuming, I turned on the one next to it out of interest and thought about stabbing some more as the water came out strong and hot.

Now, my highly technical towel only really has about three-quarters of a dry in it at the best of times. Perhaps it's made for a much smaller person? I'm not sure where you'd find one. So in choosing to start the shower process again, I was going to have to ask a lot from it. When the time came, the towel looked at me incredulously and suggested I speak to the union. When they didn't show up, the towel threw itself in and slapped about me, wet and cold.

Today's lesson, which the towel has since provided in writing as a formal complaint: test the shower before committing.

I'm now sitting in the kitchen waiting for my hair to dry as I strongly suspect Spain sides with Italy in considering going outside with wet hair the most unhealthy thing you can do, up to and including swallowing fireworks. We'll see if I can stand up after, and go from there.Read more