Life's a Stitch

The afternoon of our 37th day lead us through mossy tree tunnels with the sounds of birds and the water in a brook below the path.

It was a long day. I told C that walking 20k with one painful foot only equals 10k of pain, but my patience was wearing thin when he told me that the guidebook said we had another 4k left instead of the 1k I was expecting. I am sure we are not the only Camino couple subjected to a Brierly induced spat. Reality was on my side and 1k later we descended to Samos, home to a Benedictine monastery.

The monastery tour was lead by one of the ten residing monks, the youngest age 26 and the eldest 88. The complicating factor was the tour was only offered in Spanish and French. The guide monk was a comedian by nature, his jokes somehow lost in the slowness of our translation abilities.

In 1951 there was a fire, a common occurrence in these historical buildings, this one caused by an explosion in the monk's distillery. Artists in the 50's and 60's donated their talent and time to replace historical frescos, substituting some of the saintly figures with Hollywood icons such as Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren:

We retreated back to our better than adequate accommodation, which by the way, cost less than last night's less than adequate room, but hey, this is a pilgrimage requiring sacrifice, not a vacation.

Our last glimpse of the monastery toward sunset: