Today was a perfect Camino day, and a true lesson for us that on the Camino some of our obstacles might be a blessing. Several obstacles that have come our way have resulted in us staying somewhere or even enjoying something that we would have missed otherwise.
We woke from sleeping on the ground, Karsh style, and I think I shared it was my best nights sleep so far.
We are constantly having to recheck that we didn't leave anything behind. This takes a lot of effort. As we were packing up I noticed we were down one umbrella, I knew I had held two yesterday evening as Aynsleigh had another bloody nose and I grabbed her umbrella so she could juggle a napkin. Since we were going back into town having gone back tracked out to camp we hit the four places we had stopped. The tourist office, the gite ( pilgrim hostel) where we cooked with our Scottish friends, the small grocery store and the pharmacy. We asked all and I almost didn't go back to the pharmacy doubting it would be there. I asked the lady who had helped me yesterday and she thought I was asking if she sold umbrellas, then it clicked and she pointed to an umbrella holder at the door and there it was, our silver hiking umbrella!!!!
About two hours out we filled our water, saw what was left of a castle and this previous cat sleeping in a gorgeous wooden wheelbarrow...
Look closer...
Its nose was filled with gooky yellow snot. The kids begged me to help it as it seemed lethargic. Normally I would not think twice about this but feared picking it up and it scratching us and infection. The kids would not take no for an answer so we cleaned the cat up and it showed so much appreciation as we took a wet rag and washed it up. It was in La Clauze, Annie from Oz is about two weeks behind us... If you see this kitty will you clean its nose? The appreciation will be worth it!
Loved this home...
Sheep and one donkey on parade...
Coming around a bin we heard a noise, this fella was asking for love...
The grass was worn down infront of his barbed wire so I am pretty certain others were called to love on him often.
Tristan helping me with my umbrella...
With one hour left to walk this beauty looked as if placed there to cheer us on...
If you are wondering why there are few pictures of Reichen and Karsh they are typically about ten minutes to thirty infront of us. That might change after today as we arrived to our destination which used to be a Templar hospital and Reichen was nowhere to be found. Karsh was there and said they seperated about an hour before when one had to go into the woods for business. Might be a lot of extra info but it is part of a pilgrimage finding where to go to the bathroom between towns. I felt Reichen probably went ahead, set up his hammock and was sound asleep, but when we kept walking with no sign of him I started to worry. About forty five minutes later he was coming towards us and was as relieved to see us as we were him. He was not expecting our destination to be as small as it was so kept walking. Needing water he kept on and then turned around to join us. All turned out great when he encouraged us to walk 3.5 kilometers further to Holy Water that came out of a fountain. This was so wonderful and a perfect place for us to rest our feet. As we were about to set up our hammocks a man with a light appeared... It was Maxine a French police officer who we have passed, or been passed by many times. He urged us to go about five minutes further to the actual church of La Roche, a patron saint to pilgrims. So glad we followed, in the dark there were some men setting up an alter outside of the church for mass in the morning and pointed us to a free refuge to sleep. It could hold a compact car without opening its doors... The six of us set up our sleeping bags on the wooden floor ( ouch) and drifted off to sleep. I had little battery to take pictures but hope this captures some of it...this is Holy Water from the center ( white) spicit...
In the morning at the door of our refuge was a sack of trail mix with a note from Maxine, some " trail magic", who was probably three hours ahead by now. We decided to stay for mass and the priest welcomed us and it was a perfect way to start the day!
Dog on the blog, a big Barnacle!
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