Listening

Logrono to Ventanos (Friday, June 4th)
I leave Logrono with Carmel and Alex and walk all day with them. I enjoy their company and we walk comfortably together. It is a day that we, Carmel and I, get to know a lot about each other, spending time listening to one another´s stories, asking questions sometimes. Alex, who at 18 is both very mature and yet probably the youngest person on our section of the Camino right now, drops back sometimes. When I´m not around, he´s good company for his mother, but he leaves space for us. He also is a good conversationalist when he wants to be, but he´s just as happy to let us talk sometimes. He is the one of them who wanted to come as a result of a story that his mother, Carmel, told him a number of years ago. A few years ago, he decided that this is how he wanted to celebrate graduating from high school, and he knew he wanted to go with his mother. They get along well and are a neat team.

Leaving Logrono, we walk along a beautiful park-like setting, which is a far cry from the industrial area we walked through for a little ways coming in. That was both stark and hot, and it smelled like we were being sprayed with paint, or dipped in vats of chemicals, for several kilometers. But this morning is lovely. Lots of people are out exercising. The walkway is wide and extends for several kilometers out into the countryside, with trees on at least one side, and sometimes both. The path arrives at a lake where there are fish of some sort (bass would be my SWAG) that are huge. We cross over a little wooden bridge where the fish are swarming. Each fish would feed a family of six with no problem. They look to be at least 16¨long and 10¨or more in circumfrence, and there are dozens of them. I suspect they are hanging around the bridge where the ducks are because they know that there are people with fishing poles elsewhere! I tried to take a picture of them, but not sure it will show the fish.

At one point, soon after the park outside of Logrono, we are walking on a hillside up above and along a multilane highway. There is a chainlink fence separating us from the traffic and all along the chainlink fence, pilgrims have fashioned and attached all sorts of crosses. Some are made of wild flowers that have since dried, others of twigs, others of pine needles, some of things that pilgrims had with them and have left. It is a walkway of hundreds, perhaps thousands of crosses.

We come to the town of Navarette first and then it is 8 more kilometers to Ventanos. Once again, it is Mystic Seaport. I swear that the village of Ventanos is like a child´s pull toy, on wheels and somewhere, someone is pulling the string, moving it ever so slowly just out of our reach, because we can see the church on the hill for some time and it never ever gets any smaller.

While we are walking, we notice a large, dark, ominous cloud suddenly appear on the horizon behind us. We will not find out until we reach Santo Domingo the next day that an explosion has occured at a factory in Logrono that has killed one person. The cloud goes up, eerily similar to a mushroom cloud in shape, dark, dark gray in the center and fluffy white on top, rising very high into the sky. We can see it miles away, even over the hills.

Even once we reach the turnoff for Ventanos, it takes forever to reach the village, but we finally do. And despite the seeming length of time it has taken to reach it, we are a half hour early for the albergue to open. We noticed that other pilgrims ahead of us in reaching Ventanos decided to keep on going to the next village. This is enough for us this day, so we drink our fill from the fountain next to the door, take off our packs and collapse in the shade across the street, knowing it will be hard to stand back up again. Finally, the door opens and (remember Frau Blucher from Young Frankenstein?) a German woman opens the door and asks ¨Do you want to come in or would you rather stay outside?¨ Not a tough question! It is a nice, neat place, with a lovely courtyard out back, and a little supply store in the front hall. Once again, all walking sticks and boots (bota) are left by the front door. Wonderful tiled bathrooms (separate men and women which not all the alburgues have had). There are only 8 beds in the room where we end up - Carmella, Alex, Tamlyn me and four German and Austrian women. NO SNORERS! And they have wifi!

We get settled, do laundry and then go explore Ventanos. It is a village built on a hillside, rather sleepy and not much to it. We wander around the local church (which has a great view - remember how far away we could see it!) , cross through the 'busy' little village square, and find more beautiful roses. After that, we're hot and ready for a cold beer at the only little bar/cafe on the hill. Later, we go to dinner at the only restaurant and have paella marina (sp?) which is paella with mussels and clams, squid (calamari) and shrimp or something that more resembles crawfish. It has a really good flavor. Better than what I had earlier in the trip with the not quite identifiable meat object in it. A nice evening in a nice place. Only, despite the cleanliness, I think this is where I get the only bedbug bite I will get on this trip!