A very difficult day. The wind is worse, it's very cold and it's raining. Add to that the passengers have grown some new friends. But there is good news ...I have met some interesting people!

A very difficult day but first Belorado. The walk is boring to say the least but it keeps your interest because of the endless line of very large triucks coming directly at you all day. Much of the day is on the road as they come racing past you with little room to spare. Add to this the final destination is just not a place anyone would travel to and you and you have a day worth forgetting. 

I check into the Hotel Jacobeo and soon thereafter I am on my way to the only restaurant in town. I am worn out from the fourteen miles into a very strong wind that is in my face all day and never relents. The good news is I order the chicken stew and it is very good. The bad news is I go back to the hotel. 

The room is warm so I leave the window open. My room is in the front of the hotel which is thirty feet from the raceway and it's trucks nonstop all night long. I can't wait to leave. I am back on the Camino at 8:30. The wind is significantly stronger and yes it's a head wind and it will remain that way all day and it will get stronger. It will take me eight hours to reach St. Juan.

I got an email from Pat this morning warning me about the forecast. He is correct. As I leave the hotel it's cold not chilly,  it's cold. It now turns out that the"go to vote wool shirt"  I bought in Santo Domingo for six Euro is rapidly becoming my best Camino investment thus far. I am wearing shorts. Not a good decision.

I stop at Villambistia which is about three and a half miles into today's fifteen mile journey. The sky is lookng worse, the wind is picking up and it's just plain cold. I stop for coffee but more importantly to make a wardrobe adjustment. It's starting to rain. Just spinkles but it gets your attention with more than nearly twelve miles to go.  

I have a coffee and take out my rain jacket and rain cover for my backpack. It's also time to get everytnig else in the bag like my cell phone which I normally have in my pocket to take photos. There will be very few photos and all will be before this stop. 

I reach Villafranca Montes De Oca which is about half way to St. juan de Ortega. I'm freezing. I stop for another coffee and someting to eat. The cafe is packed and for good reason. Lots of the Donkey folks are trying to get taxis to wherever because it's really starting to rain and immediately ahead of us is a very, very long uphill challenge complete with all of the Spanish potatoes. There are two taxis there when I arrive and there are far to many willing customers. The cafe calls for reinforcements. I find a place to stand and have a muffin. One guy asks me if I'm going on? I simply say yes and he then asks me if I know what is directly ahead. I'm not sure where he is from and I just shake my head yes.

I am out the door and the conditions are really nasty. The climb is very difficult. I stop many times and just try to get through the wind. I finally reach the top and a short distance from there I catch up to a women who is walking alone. We walk and chat for the short flat part of the trail and she tells me that she is from Denver and that she went to the Hospital at the end of the second day because of blisters. They were so bad that the Doctor told her to take a taxi to Pamplona and stay in a hotel for at least three days if she planned on going on. He also told her that at the end of the three days to take a taxi ahead to Najera and to avoid the hill climb out of Pamplona to the turbines . She has been back on the Camino for one day. She started on August 30th and this is her forth day of walking. Not a good day to get back on the Camino.

So I reach San Juan and there is little doubt that the passengers have new blisters. I'm not really to happy. Pat and John will remember that everything operates out of one very small cafe/ bar and that there are only eight rooms in the town. The wifi is outside in a seperate little hut and you pay with coins to get on line. If you read my first blog you might remember the Weather Girl ... This is where I first met her.

So I'm standing at the  bar and I'm dripping wet like everyone else and there is a young guy trying to get the inn keepers attention. When he finally does he orders two boccidillo's. Strange I think he's alone and I'm right. They deliver two enormously mostly bread things and yes they are both for him.  I ask him where he is from? Interesting person number one.

He tells me that he is from Poland and that he started his Camino more than 700 miles ago! He is going to the ocean so that means a distance of more than one thousand miles. Add to that that he is walking nearly thirty miles a day which at least twice what I'm doing and throw in that he's carrying his own tent etc and I have now found my first interesting person. He also tells me that he has lived in London for the past nine years but after doing research on the Camino he quits his job and goes back to Poland and then onto the Camino.

I asked him what he did in London and he simply said computers . Going on I ask him what he will do after the Camino and he says he does not care as long as it allows him to stay close to home .. No more wondering to other places because of work. I ask him how old he is and he tells me forty three. He looks like he is twenty nine and could walk to Califonia. 

His reason for the Camino? He wants to get back to being closer to God. He tells me that his work in London left him empty and away from the things that were not important and that he was not going to allow that to happen again no matter the money. Wow! A Camino pilgrim in the flesh. He also speaks six languages. 

Finally a small table is open and we sit. I need to because my feet are killing me. In short order a women and her husband ask if they can join us and it turns out that she is from Scotalnd and she also is trying to reconnect. She also says that she is trying to "drag him with her to a better place" . He says nothing. Out of no where she looks at me and says your on a journey for others! I tell her what I'm doing and she simply again turns to her husband and says you need to walk with Jim tomorrow? We all laugh but I think she is serious. With that they have to go. There is no place to stay and they walk back out Into the storm. Robert from Poland says he needs to move on to find a place to settle and with that they are all gone. Katherine says to me "we will see you in Santiago and he will be a changed man" . I don't even know his name.

My feet are killing me and tomorrow the wether forecast is much worse. Heavy rain and winds at 28 mph! I really don't know what to say. Tomorrow to Burgos a walk of sixteen miles if it's worse weather than today I just don't know.

Good night and Buen Camino.