Starting my walk

After a liesurely morning in Lourdes, I took the train to Orthez. On the train, I chatted with two ladies from Australia, on a 6 month tour of Europe; one of them had walked the camimo. I walked 10 km to Maslacq. The hotel which I am in has hiking boots sitting on the porch to dry, and I am seeing other pilgrims. The hotel cost 61 Euros including breakfast and dinner, so very reasonable for a private room with bath. 

I continue to be concerned about the availability of rooms, due this week being between two holiday weekends. But the first place which I called in Navarrenx had a room. So far, so good. 

I walked 22 km today, 14 miles. I did pretty well, walked about the same pace as other walkers, mostly because I took short stops. The trail is mostly on country roads, and the French countryside is pretty, but hilly. I made it to my destination, Navverreaux, a walled city. I went to a pilgrim ceremony at the church. Dinner was in the Gite where I am staying. Three French couples about my age, our young host, and me. I missed most of the conversation, although people were nice. 

My feet feel beat up, so I am unsure how far I should go tomorrow. There are some big gaps between places to stay, which makes it challenging to plan shorter days. 

For Tuesday, I decided to walk 18 km to the village of Aroe. The guy who ran the gite  in Navvereneaux picked the gite, and made the reservation for me. It rained steadily all morning. My leg was hurting, where I injured it skiing. I was walking carefully, to avoid aggravating it. On Monday, I was walking the same speed as most pilgrims, but today I was the slow one. After two hours of steady rain, such that I could not even stop and eat, I got to a covered space with picknic tables, full of pilgrims, as it was the only logical place to stop. But I was glad to be there and take off my pack. 

I asked someone to help me get my poncho straightened, after I put on my pack; he said something profound, which I learned on pilgrimage in 2002. "No one walks alone; this is Camino."

Not long after that, it stopped raining, but the trails were still muddy. I got to the gite about 2 pm.  The gite is nice and new, and I was glad to be there. 

I will probably try to walk about the same distance on Wednesday, and hope for a better day. 

I am now 110 km from Pamplona Spain, where I plan to stop walking. That would make my total distance 160 km.