Day 36: Funny Photos

September 16: It was a little chilly overnight, probably due to the cloud of clouds during the night and the fact that we weren’t under trees to help keep us warm. Karolina seemed a little sluggish and complained that she didn’t sleep well because of the cold, but I have to give her credit—she still wanted to camp out for another night!

 

Karolina finally woke up and started getting ready for a day of hiking, but she didn’t want to get out of her sleeping bag and tried opening a zipper on a gear bag without taking her hands out of her sleeping bag. She made several attempts at this, but she wasn’t having an easy time working her fingers through the tight mummy bag and after a minute or so stopped, sighed, and said, “It’s not easy being a monster.”

 

I couldn’t help but laugh. She did kind of look like some sort of giant worm-like, handless monster in that sleeping bag.

 

We ate breakfast, packed up camp, and headed out. That last part turned out to be somewhat problematic for us. The evening before, we scrambled up a short but steep cliff to get to our perch where we camped, but looking down the slope, it looked positively dangerous to go down the way we came up. It’s a little strange how you can safely climb up a slope that’s not safe to descend. Karolina seemed willing to try going down the cliff anyhow, but I told her I didn’t think it was a good idea and that we would certainly be able to find a safer way back to the trail.

 

We followed the edge of the cliff, hoping it would reconnect to the dirt road below us, but we hit a dead end when we reached a thick tangle of brush.

 

“Now we go down?” Karolina asked.

 

“I still don’t think that’s a good idea,” I replied, looking around for a Plan B. “Let’s go up further.” I said, pointing uphill. Uphill, there was another small cliff, but above that I couldn’t see any trees or vegetation which suggested that the land above the next cliff was farmed. And if it was being farmed, there would be roads that led to it. And it seemed safer to scramble up the small cliff than scrambling down a small cliff.

 

So we doubled down and climbed up the next cliff, and it was indeed an empty field that had been used for farming. We quickly found the exit from it to the adjacent dirt road and hoofed it back to the Camino.

 

The rest of the day was largely uneventful. We stopped a few times for hour-long breaks admiring the scenery. I kept my eyes open for interesting photo ops and we took a couple of fun ones. =)

 

In the last town we passed through for the day, San Juan de Oretega, neither of the two vending machines in town seemed to work. What’s up with that?

 

And we set up camp just beyond the town. I tried to find a place that was a little protected within some trees to help Karolina keep warmer tonight, but it turned out to have a huge quantity of large, black ants. So I moved my campsite further uphill out of the trees—but away from the ants. Karolina decided to stay among the ants.

 

“Don’t worry,” I told her, “the ants tend to go away and stop being such a bother at night.” I always believed this was true, but I had to admit to myself and all of my loyal readers here, I’m not entirely sure that’s true. Maybe when it’s dark, you just can’t see them but they’re as active as ever? =)

 

While writing in my journal for the day, I added the day’s mileage to my running count and concluded that as of this campsite, I had hiked 1000.3 kilometers. Seemed like I should celebrate the accomplishment, but I didn’t. I just read my book for awhile before eventually drifting off to sleep.

 

Karolina poses with a happy sunflower along the trail.

 

It’s hard to believe, but this is the same sunflower when
I tried to pose with it for my own photo!!!! Darned
thing tried to eat my hand off!

 

It was a blustery day and all I could do not to have
the wind blow me away!

Yeah, okay, maybe it wasn’t so windy….

Maybe I just found a bunch of branches trimmed from a forest
laying in a heap on the side of the trail. And maybe I lifted one
of them above my head. And maybe I had Karolina take
my photo. And maybe I edited the photo later 90 degrees
to the left to make it look like I was sideways instead of
standing straight up…. =)

 

Another wind farm. I tried to think of a good Don Quixote
photo op, but none of my ideas panned out. *shrug*

 

I don’t see praying mantises on the trail very often!
But it somehow seems appropriate for a mantis to pray on
a pilgrimage route. =)

 

Stacks of lumber along the trail.

 

I kind of admire these “little plants that think they can!”

 

In the heart of San Juan de Oretega.