Alarm clocks not allowed, ear plugs not needed, bathroom time not rushed. Have we died and gone to heaven?, or just decided to take a day off from hiking.
Today was to be a low key recovery day with only simple tasks to be performed. We started by combining breakfast and laundry. When we walked in yesterday, we saw a laundry mat on the trail. We got there about 9, threw in a load, and got breakfast at a sidewalk cafe next door.
While we were eating and trying to decide what else we were going to do today, Eva from Sweden and Cheri from Vancouver area in Canada came to the laundromat. We’ve been walking with them for days. We know Eva pretty well and would consider her trail family. We exchanged blogs and how we are doing the updates. I need to simplify and speed up the process.
They told us they were going to get massages today–something we had been talking about. We had looked into a place last night, but they had taken it one step further and booked 1/2 hour appointments today at the same place. We were afraid we had missed our opportunity. We decided to stop by on our way to the cathederal to see if we could get times. We got 1 hour slots at 2, 4, & 6 this afternoon.
The only other task we have planned today is a cathederal tour. On the way over, we stopped for an Aquarius (Shaun got us hooked yesterday–it’s a Gatorade type of drink but not as sweet). When we got to the entrance, George saw some people he knew, so we stopped to chat a while. I’m sorry I don’t remember everyone’s names, but Faith and her younger sister and brother were hiking with a Croatian guy. They seemed like nice kids (all probably in there mid to late 20’s–isn’t it great to be an old man).
The cathederal is nothing short of amazingly beautiful. It has over 22 chapels in it dedicated to various saints and bishops. So many priceless treasures and relics in one location. It was an audio tour so self paced. After a couple of hours, I was just completely overwhelmed by the volume of history, artists, and saints thrown at us.
I do have to make a somewhat cynical comment here, so if you’re ultra religious or faithful, you might want to skip the rest of this paragraph. The original cathederal was, no doubt, built as a tribute to God, but built to express wealth of the kingdom which built it. The chapels seemed to be built by rich patrons or bishops with the intention of building a shrine/memorial to themselves. So many of the side chapels show Jesus and Mary with the bishop projected on nearly equal footing with them. I’m not saying they aren’t amazingly beautiful, I just question the intentions of the builders.
After the tour, we needed energy to get us through our afternoon massages. What else? Ice cream!
We walked through town back to the massage studio. Pam was up first. George and I placed ourselves in a convenient location for her to find us when she was done–an outside cafe serving beer right across from her exit. We can be extremely selfless at times.
After the last of the massages, we found a pizza place to get some comfort food to last us because tomorrow will be back to pilgrim menus. Oh, and ice cream one last time.
