The good news was that once we reached\u00a0Le\u00f3n<\/a>, we had to switch from hiking to bicycling.\u00a0(We were running out of time.)\u00a0<\/em> The bad news?\u00a0 That change just led to “a different kind of hell.”\u00a0(From Dorothy Parker’s famous quote,\u00a0\u201cWhat fresh hell is this?\u201d\u00a0 In our case, it only meant a change in where we got sore…)<\/em><\/p>\n Just the day before – October 3 – we\u00a0hiked from\u00a0Reliegos<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0Puente\u00a0Villarente<\/a>\u00a0– shown above right – some 7.5 miles shy of\u00a0Le\u00f3n<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0(See also the blurb on the hike from\u00a0El\u00a0Burgos Raneros to Mansilla de\u00a0las Mulas<\/a>.)\u00a0 <\/em>I know because I wrote in my journal, “We hiked 7.5 miles today.”\u00a0 So again, we got to the\u00a0PENSION BLANCA<\/a>\u00a0in Le\u00f3n<\/a>\u00a0early in the afternoon, and started relaxing.<\/p>\n The other good news was that we were finally done with the\u00a0Meseta<\/a>\u00a0part of the hike.\u00a0 Which brings up the\u00a0picture at the top of the page. [“Now defunct<\/a>.”]<\/em>\u00a0The caption:\u00a0 “Tom heading back to the Camino. Which gives an idea of the landscape we’ve been hiking through.” That hiking-through was on the\u00a0Meseta Central plateau<\/a>\u00a0part of Spain – and it’s dry, dusty and hot. In fact, it’s the part that\u00a0some<\/em><\/strong> people recommend Camino pilgrims skip<\/a>.\u00a0 (If they want to be all “wussified.”)<\/em><\/p>\n Anyway, by October 4th we’d already hiked from\u00a0Pamplona<\/a>\u00a0for 20 days, and ended up in Le\u00f3n<\/a>.\u00a0 We’d hiked 250 miles.\u00a0 <\/i>And aside from taking a day off\u00a0in\u00a0Le\u00f3n<\/a>, we got our rented 15-speed mountain bikes.\u00a0 With them we covered the remaining 200 miles to\u00a0Santiago de Compostela<\/a>\u00a0in seven days.\u00a0 Even though neither of us had ridden a bike in 40 or so years…<\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n Before leaving for Spain – and the 450-mile hike-and-bike – I wrote about this pilgrimage<\/a>-adventure in\u00a0Training for the Camino<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Going back \u201cwhence we came<\/a>.”\u00a0 (We started hiking from Pamplona on September 13 and got to\u00a0Santiago<\/a>\u00a0October 12, 2017.)<\/em>\u00a0 Once I got back I did \u201cHola! Buen Camino!\u201d \u2013 Revisited<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0\u201cBuen Camino!\u201d \u2013 The Good Parts<\/a>.\u00a0 (The latter because my brother thought “Camino \u2013 Revisited<\/a>” was too negative.)\u00a0 \u00a0<\/em>From the latter post I said this:<\/p>\n This is also a good time to mention that dinners on the Camino were universally delicious.\u00a0 Most of the albergues featured a three-course special, including a salad, main course and choice of desserts.\u00a0 Which may explain why \u2013 even though people said I looked thinner when I got back home \u2013 I actually weighed the same 160 pounds as when I left.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Also about this time – leading up to the Leon stayover – there was a\u00a0mass shooting in Las Vegas<\/a>.\u00a0 Bill O’Reilly posted that that\u00a0latest mass murder was “the price of freedom.”\u00a0 I posted in response, “No Bill, putting up with dumbasses like you is the price of freedom.”<\/p>\n So much for a pilgrimage making you all\u00a0kumbaya<\/a>\u00a0and hug-your-neighbor.\u00a0 But we digress…<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n I plan to fly into\u00a0Lisbon<\/a>, mostly because I’ve never been there but always wanted to visit.\u00a0 The three of us will meet up in\u00a0Porto<\/a>; “gorgeous Porto with its colorful riverfront and home of Port wine.”\u00a0 From there it’s a mere 161 miles to\u00a0Santiago de Compostela<\/a>, on a more-leisurely pace of ten miles a day, for 16 days or hiking.\u00a0 (Who says you can’t\u00a0can’t\u00a0teach old dogs<\/a>?)<\/em><\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n Meanwhile, back in Leon, last year.\u00a0 On October 5, on the day off, I found a McDonald’s restaurant, for a “little taste of home.”\u00a0 And<\/em> <\/strong>we practice-rode our rental 15-speed bikes.\u00a0 I “didn’t fall down, and shifted gears without<\/em> <\/strong>the chain coming off.”\u00a0 But from there it wasn’t all smooth sailing.\u00a0 On the ride out of Leon October 6, “my right handlebar took out \u2013 smashed the heck out of \u2013 the side-view mirror of some poor slob\u2019s nice new car.”\u00a0 In a\u00a0second mishap:<\/p>\n I literally \u201cran my ass into a ditch\u2026\u201d\u00a0 We were zooming downhill one afternoon.\u00a0 I tried to adjust my left pant-leg, and the next thing I knew I was laying in a ditch, bleeding like a stuck pig.\u00a0 And not just\u00a0any<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0ditch.\u00a0\u00a0A nice deep ditch covered with thorns and brambles on the sides and bottom.\u00a0 The \u201cstuck pig\u201d part came when my\u00a0Ray-Bans<\/a>\u00a0gashed the bridge of my nose, causing it to bleed profusely\u2026<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Which can<\/em> <\/strong>be what a\u00a0pilgrimage<\/a>\u00a0is all about.<\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n So anyway, this time last year we were just coming off the dry, dusty\u00a0Meseta<\/a>\u00a0part of the\u00a0Camino Frances<\/a>, in our case from\u00a0Pamplona<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0Santiago de Compostela<\/a>.\u00a0 And who knows, maybe this time next year we’ll be finishing up our hike from Porto to Santiago.\u00a0 Or somewhere in the middle, or maybe just starting out.\u00a0 Which leads to this thought:<\/p>\n I’m sure the\u00a0Portuguese Camino<\/a>\u00a0will have its own challenges, it’s own way of helping me “find myself.”\u00a0 But considering we’ll be starting in\u00a0Porto<\/a>, at least the start<\/em> <\/strong>should be happy…<\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n A\u00a0Rabelo boat<\/a>, used to transport barrels of port<\/a>\u00a0down the River\u00a0Douro<\/a>,” to Porto<\/a>\u00a0. . .<\/em><\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n The original post included an upper image with the caption, “My brother exploring some ‘ruinas’ on the\u00a0Camino\u00a0de Santiago<\/a>, this time last year (10\/4).” But for some reason this “platform for publishing” substitutes an actual image with a block stating – for example “image may contain sky, outdoor, nature,” which does me no good and is quite aggravating. When that happens I usually delete the useless “info box,” and note – as here – what used to be there…<\/span><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n So here’s what I wrote in the notes in the original post: “The\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/em>upper image is my photo, taken with a ‘tablet’ rather than a camera.\u00a0 A word of advice:\u00a0 Take a real camera.\u00a0 It adds very little weight, while the tablet seemed to take forever to set up, meaning you really had to think ahead to get a decent picture.” And for more on the platform, see\u00a0WordPress.com – Wikipedia<\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Re “Now defunct.” See\u00a0Is it now-defunct or now defunct? – Columbia Journalism Review<\/a>. Which is an article I discovered while fixing the image screw-ups noted above. With this note:<\/em><\/p>\n The phrase \u201cnow defunct\u201d is another journalism mannerism, a phrase not often spoken aloud. But we love it: It allows us to tell readers that this thing of which we are about to speak is no longer around.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Which leads to another photo that was in the original but is no more. I wrote of the image: “<\/em>The image to the right of the paragraph beginning ‘This time last year’ is also my photo of the bridge for which Puente Villarente is named. ‘Puente’ means bridge and ‘Puente Villarente’ is four miles northwest of the ‘<\/em>Mansilla de Las Mulas’ mentioned in\u00a0El\u00a0Burgos Raneros to Mansilla de\u00a0las Mulas<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>See also\u00a0Camino Day 24:\u00a0Puente\u00a0Villarente\u00a0to Le\u00f3n 12km<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n So, in correcting the “defunct image” mishap I actually learned something new, about the term “now defunct.” Which why I like blogging, even if only for my own amusement. Meanwhile, the rest of the notes “hereinafter<\/a>” are as they appeared in the original.<\/em><\/p>\n Re:\u00a0 \u201cDifferent kind of hell.\u201d\u00a0 The allusion – as noted – is to\u00a0Dorothy Parker<\/a><\/em>\u2018s famously saying \u2013 whenever the door rang in her apartment \u2013 \u201cWhat fresh hell is this?\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s also the title of Parker\u2019s 1989 biography by\u00a0![](\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/b\/b9\/Jakobsweg_-_Pilger_1568_-_Hurden_IMG_5664.JPG\/800px-Jakobsweg_-_Pilger_1568_-_Hurden_IMG_5664.JPG\")
So the Meseta part of the hike presented its own “fresh hell,” its own set of fresh challenges.\u00a0 But hey, that’s what a real<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0pilgrimage<\/a>\u00a0is all about.\u00a0 \u00a0A \u201cjourney<\/a>\u00a0or search of\u00a0moral<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0spiritual<\/a>\u00a0significance,\u201d as shown at left.\u00a0 Or in other words, “Finding yourself.”<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/nicswanderlust.files.wordpress.com\/2012\/05\/p1250918_thumb.jpg?w=497&h=333\")
The point is that this time last year we were just finishing the dry, dusty\u00a0Spanish Meseta<\/a>\u00a0part of our Camino hike.\u00a0 But next year we plan something different.\u00a0 We’ll go back for another hike, but this time on the\u00a0Portuguese Camino<\/a>, “a fantastic route for pilgrims looking for a more rural experience on the Camino de Santiago.”\u00a0\u00a0And the “we” will include me, my brother and his wife.\u00a0 Which means I’ll have to get my own lodging.\u00a0 (So it’s time to start saving my pennies.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n
![](\"http:\/\/i.telegraph.co.uk\/multimedia\/archive\/03328\/Jane-Lucas-05_3328966b.jpg\")
See\u00a0\u201cBuen Camino!\u201d \u2013 Revisited<\/a>.\u00a0 The point is:\u00a0 We covered the remaining 200 miles to\u00a0Santiago de Compostela<\/a>\u00a0in seven days, but not without some adventure<\/a>.\u00a0 (As illustrated at left, “An exciting experience that is typically a bold, sometimes\u00a0risky<\/a>, undertaking.”)\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/a\/a6\/Rabelo_Douro_en%E2%80%93Porto.jpg\")
<\/p>\n