Life's a Stitch

We spent the morning chasing rainbows:

This storm defied Accuweather, re-energizing itself again and again, dumping buckets of rain on our sorry peregrino heads. I've succeeded in keeping dry and happy from the waist down, but I have to work on the upper half. Stopping for lunch, even my bra was drenched. My poncho seems to behave like a wet tent, forming droplets of water on the inside.

Wonder what pilgrims look like in the rain? Multicoloured hunchbacks:

We parked ourselves at a bar for a lunch long enough to dry out the poncho. Two beers, two glasses of wine, a non alcohol cider, a diet coke and a sautéed pork loin and pimento sandwich big enough for two cost 12e ($18 Cdn). We're constantly saying "can you imagine how much that would cost in Canada?"

Arriving at our "pension" Casa Fernandez in Vega de Valcarce, we're finding that 30e buys a less than adequate accommodation meaning one bathroom for nine rooms. There appear to be four spares two floors down, outside the bunk room. I've noted that in case of emergency. One thing going for it are the amazingly comfortable memory foam mattresses.

Vega del Valcarce is an idyllic mountain town, but the European Union brought progress to Spain in the form of new superhighways. C says he wants to be nowhere near these structures during an earthquake.

Tomorrow we're faced with what is known as the hardest day on the Camino, the 700 meter climb up O'Cebriero. There is a general nervousness amongst the pilgrims, like a group of mothers-to-be awaiting their turn at induced labour. I'm opting for the c-section. C as in caballo (horse). Seriously, I'm choosing a wee bit of apprehension over a lot of pain. In reality it will be substituting one pain for another. The last time I was on a horse was a couple of years ago and as I remember, it involved an entirely different muscle set than used in hiking. Bring on the Voltarin cream!