Category: 2017 GR10

This was supposed to be a day of rest for us, but it somehow turned into a day of stress early on. That was caused by me having a time deadline. We had to get our stuff shipped from the post office in St Jean before noon or we would end up staying in town until Monday morning to get our stuff shipped to Richard.

We ate a late breakfast with another couple from America that was staying in the same B&B. The post office is only open from 9-12 on Saturday mornings. We didn’t head that way until 9:15. Pam, Brad Butler, and pretty much everyone I worked with at CTNA knows that I have issues with deadlines. It I don’t have a time hanging over my head, I stay calm (relatively so, shut up Brad). We had already gone through everything, but we didn’t have boxes to ship stuff in.

We got to the PO, and Isabelle was a big help to us. I thought we had to buy prepaid boxes to ship to England. Isabelle fixed us up with boxes and got our price down to about 1/2 of what it would have cost doing it my way. With the extra savings, we’ve only spent about $220 (including England and France) to store and ship all the extra stuff we brought with us to Europe (and we still haven’t gotten a storage quote from Richard–we’re hoping that he’ll be gentle since he’s a man of the cloth). We will not make this mistake again in the future. It would have been cheaper to buy the extra stuff we needed when we needed it. A fool and his money soon part. More fool me.

After the post office, we did the shopping we needed to get done. New bite valves for our platypus’, extra fuel for the new Jet Boil we bought in Santiago, a new short sleeve hiking shirt for me, and just a few groceries. Not only do we bring extra stuff we don’t need, we don’t bring the stuff we do need.

We got a big help at the B&B we are staying at. They agreed to throw our laundry in with whatever their daily load would be. With the threat of rain hanging over the area, they went ahead and dried our laundry (and folded it, too). Clean laundry, showered bodies, full stomachs, updated blog, what more could we ask for (maybe a beer?)

We spent a large part of the afternoon at the tourism office uploading all of the blog entries. Wifi in France is not a given at most restaurants, bars, or cafes, but the tourism offices always come through. We also took the time to talk to family.

We did manage to walk around town a bit before and after the tourism office. The city of St Jean has spent a lot of money maintaining and improving the medieval wall that separates the old city from the new. There is a great walk along the wall where all the kill slits are. Also, you get a great view of the back of the buildings along the main street in the old section.

As we were finishing up for the day to head for my beer reward, we ran into Nadja and Susan from Ireland. Susan hurt her knee on the section of trail that we took the alternative around. She got into St Jean a couple days ago and she is trying to allow her knee time to recover before she resumes the GR10 on Monday morning.

Nadja walked roads into St Jean and has decided to switch from the GR10 to the Camino. We were worried about her attempting the section out of Bidarray into St Etienne all by herself. We thought she might never hike again if she did that solo. As I have said, that is the toughest hiking we have ever done.

We will get all packed up tonight after the beer and before we go to bed. We’re not going to be in a hurry to finish the GR10. We have an extra couple of weeks in October we can take from sightseeing if we need the extra time completing all the trails we are planning.

Now the blog is really up to date!

We had a scare before we were really awake this morning–the farmer came and started his tractor at 5:30. Pam was in a deep sleep and didn’t even hear it. It sounded like he was revving the engine to give us a warning to get going–he was just on the other side of the hedge row from us. We were up and out in record time. I wish I would have recorded the sound to use on Pam every day to get her moving.

We lit up the trail as fast as two old sore people can–not very fast. It turned out to be a good thing that we got going so early because it was another hot day even at 3300′. We made it to about 1500′ before we found a shady spot beside another barn to have our breakfast.

The walk today was uneventful, just a steady climb for about 5 hours until we reached the summit. We did pass through Amityville at about 2000′. We were attacked by flies! These were killers. I smacked the first one and ground it down hard. When I took my hand off, it just laughed and said “is that all you got?” I heard a whistle and I was completely surrounded. Two flew in my mouth while a dozen went in each ear. I heard then laughing and saying they would teach me a lesson. Their goal was to either get me to knock myself out, or to get me to fall off a cliff–they settled for me racking myself trying to smash them.

I ran up the hill to try to get some distance from them. Pam had to fend for herself, but that really wasn’t a problem for her. Since she didn’t react to them, they thought she was boring and left her alone.

Getting to the summit today was really just an easy uphill walk all the way. Take away the flies and Pam’s repeating how much she hurt and it was a pleasant stroll. At the top, another type of flying insect started bothering me–word of my approach had preceded me. These guys were not as menacing; more like lightening bugs without the cool lights. Nonetheless, I wasn’t in the mood for another mouthful of bug, so I headed down fast. That is, a snail’s pace.

About 1000′ down, I ran out of water (I had already drank 3 liters and it wasn’t even noon yet). Ahead, I saw a cow trough with a bunch of ladies lounging around. When I got closer, I could see a drinking water faucet on the side. We were due for a break so we stopped on the cliff’s edge to have lunch and watch vultures for a change (they usually watch us pretty closely on steep ascents and descents).

When we got going again, we took our first wrong turn on this trail. The most frightening part was that Pam called it right away and I ignored her (usually a safe bet to ignore Pam when it comes to directions). In 8 years, she finally got one right. Now I can’t just ignore her when she says turn right, I actually have to consider it because of one lucky correct call.

The trail wasn’t marked real well on the way down. While we were considering which turn to take, an Aussie walked up and agreed with my choice of trails. We started talking and walking with her all the way into town. Jessica is originally from Tasmania but has been doing physics post doc work in Paris for the last few years. Her contract is up a few weeks before her husband’s is, so she had enough time to tackle the GR10 before moving back to Australia.

Another nice thing about walking with someone (Shaun will verify this) is that Pam walks fast–really fast. She says she can’t walk fast when it’s just me and her, throw in some unknown person and she morphs into the “Energizer Bunny”. Bunny Tracks, Energizer Bunny; coincidence? I don’t think so.

After Jessica left us, we went to have a cold drink (just a Coke) before we started to look for a place. I went to the tourist information center, and they found us a very nice bed and breakfast just up the street from the Municipal Albergue we stayed at in May when we were starting the Camino.

We dropped off our packs, went and retrieved our other gear we had in storage, and went through everything trying to reduce our pack weights. On the way to the bed and breakfast we had weighed our current loads. Pam was carrying 31# today and I had 50#–way more than we want to carry. After going through all of our gear and getting it ready to ship to Richard, I’ll bet both our packs go up in weight.

Supper was last item on the agenda and then an early sauna tonight. Why anyone would start the Camino when it’s this hot in France with the Meseta in front of them is almost as great a mystery as why would anyone publish a guide book with times for distances. We now have our Cicerone guidebooks and they have actually distances. I can quit bitching about that one and start on something else now. Any suggestions?

The storm never came. It did cloud up below and above us. Every time the wind blew through the trees, we thought it was the start of rain, but it never was. Did not having the storm give Pam any relief? Hell no. She stayed awake all night worry about the storm anyway.

Needless to say, Pam was cranky and slow today. Partly from not sleeping, but also from not eating enough. Since I’m not a member of the American medical establishment, my opinion doesn’t matter. True, I am not a dietician, but I have read dozens of books about long distance hiking and all describe the symptoms Pam is having as calorie deficit (but they weren’t dietitians either).  Can anyone guess what we argued about today?

We hit the trail by 8:15. By 8:30 we were out of the trees and rewarded with a sea of clouds all below us on both sides of the mountain ridge. We bagged two more 3500′ peaks by 11 before the sun started breaking through the upper cloud layer. We were also both dragging (from lack of food, primarily) but also from an incomplete recovery last night (how can your body recover if it doesn’t have the nutrients it needs?). I broke out the big guns at the second summit that always gets Pam eating–peanut M&Ms.

You’d think that since we were at the 3rd summit and all we had was a few thousand foot descent into town, we’d be golden. Not so. As horrible as the climb was up yesterday, it was worse going down. I don’t mind a little scrambling, but two hours solid is a bit much for me. Maybe we’re just old and over cautious, but we have to pay close attention to each and every step or risk falling and ending our 5-10 year hiking plans (we are still in discussion as to how long this will last).

We saw a French lad running down the trail jumping from rock to rock and holding poles. In his hand. When he got to the level stretch, he started using his poles. It made me as angry as when I watched Redford and Nolte carry their hiking poles in the whole damn movie and never use them once.

The descent down was stated at 2 hours, we took 4. We only know the distance because of our satellite tracker. I think everyone can see where I’m headed with this discussion, so I’ll stop here. But only after I say, why in the hell would anyone publish guide books with times for distances? Excuse me, I digress.

We got into Saint-Etienne a little after 3p and went straight for a cold drink and food. Being France, no hot food is available until 7p. We went grocery shopping to get enough food to get us to Saint Jean (hopefully tomorrow, but we don’t know how far it is. We won’t get that piece of information until we get there. We do know that a steroid junkie, not carrying any gear on a perfect hiking day with water stations every 1/4 mile can make it in just 7 minutes over 6 hours–possible digression). I got more than we got yesterday since we wolfed that down (and Pam felt better afterwards, but different sore point).

On the way to the grocery store, we found a pizza place (this is France, not Italy you may warn) that opens at 5:30. We had enough time to stop by the river to soak our feet, rinse out the clothes we were wearing, and sponge bathe. This was a highlight of our day.

We still had time to make it to the public water closet (who really wants to dig a hole and hope to not hit your pants?). The WC was right next to the tourist info center so we got free internet. We had plenty to keep us occupied until the pizza place opened…at 6ish. We are very close to the Spanish border so manana is very much in play.

We got our extra large pizza to split that we could eat on a bench in front of the tourist office. This was a top dollar pizza–we were drooling with anticipation. Now’ where we wished we would have listened to your warning about France not Italy. I live by the creed that no pizza is bad pizza, but I might have to use caution in the future. Pam could have eaten two of these. I could have polished 3 off. It just makes me miss Mackies in Marion, IL all the more. Go tell John I say “Hi” and that he is one of my first stops in December.

We ate our pizza appetizer, filled our water bottles out of the water closet, and left town. We don’t know how long the hike is tomorrow, but we do know we have another 3000′ climb right out of town, so we wanted to get a little of it done this evening–even if it’s on empty stomachs.

With big steep climbs over indeterminate distances, usually comes a shortage of level spots. We ended up jumping a farmer’s fence and got a level spot in the back of one of his sheep fields. Hopefully, he won’t check the field tonight.

Today was the hardest day of hiking in my life. Grand Canyon; piece of cake. Maroon Bells; no problem after 3 days adjustment to altitude. Philmont twice as a Boy Scout; bring it on again. This all comes back to the problem I mentioned when we started the Camino–the concept of switchbacks hasn’t made it back to the old world.

Granted, we didn’t start out at a reasonable time. Since we had paid 10 Euros for a level bed, shower, and breakfast, we wanted to get our money’s worth. Actually any one of those 3 items was worth the money. We got up and had breakfast with Jenny (the owner of the estate), Nadja, and Abder. Jenny showed us all around her lovely home and made us feel like family. We spent a pleasant breakfast with good conversation. Abder (pronounced “Ab dee” for us Americans) is from Marseilles (take my word for this, you just pronounced it wrong. We butcher the French language).

Jenny drove us back to the GR10 on the far edge of town. Nadja is taking a day or two off, so she said her goodbyes and stayed back at the estate. Once Jenny returned home, we said our goodbyes to Abder and he started flying up the hill. There are two reasons we didn’t hike with Abder: 1) he is young and in great shape, we wouldn’t be able to keep up and we didn’t want to slow him down; and 2) we wanted to backtrack a bit through town to cover all of the trail. Jenny dropped us off further than we got picked up. We didn’t come to France to hike most of the GR10.

The backtracking was well rewarded. Bidarray is a charming village built around the church in the center of town. We found a public water closet (aka bathroom) and took full advantage. The facilities at Jenny’s were wonderful, but it was a close space with no sound dampening, if you get my drift. Pam suddenly became shy. Let me tell you, after spending 42 hours straight with her in a tent, she makes all the same noises any man does (with an amplitude factor thrown in as well).

We also found a little grocery store to buy some chees, olives, crackers, and fruit. After necessities completed, we sat on the plaza by the church and had a coke at the cafe before hitting the road. It was 11 before we actually started hiking.

I tried a new approach and didn’t actually tell Pam what to expect today so she wouldn’t fixate on it, but we had a 3000′ (that’s right, three thousand feet) in just about 3 miles. This was a steep climb and after the first 1500′, exclusively in the sun. Most of the trail was very rocky. For anyone familiar with The Appalachian Trail, this was like hiking in the Whites without benefit of trees. The trail was almost non existent, just a rock scramble between markers. It kicked our ass.

The views were amazing. We didn’t realize until we got past the summit, that we were walking up the backside of the mountain and the front side was pretty much a sheer drop down to the valley. We felt like we were on top of the world.

At one point, we did find a little shade beside a rock outcropping and we stopped for some lunch. We thought we had bought enough cheese for 2 or 3 meals, olives for a couple of days, and fruit to last all day. We polished it all off in one siting. We even struggled over who got to drink the olive juice.

I’ve also been trying to drink more (and remind Pam to drink more). I carried 3 liters and drank it all before the top. Pam had drank more than two. We found a water supply for the horses near the top and got another 2 liters thinking that would hold us.

3300′ is really tall when you are near sea level. We were on the tallest mountain in the region and just kept climbing. Every time we thought we were reaching the summit, a higher part of the mountain was revealed. The guidebook says 3 hours and 5 minutes to the top. We took 6 hours and 10 minutes–proving once again that publishing a trail guide with times instead of distances is the most asinine thing I’ve ever heard of.

We were hoping to make it to Saint-Etienne-de-Baigorry today so we could make St Jean tomorrow after the thunderstorms are done. Instead, we made it a little over half way today, were completely out of water when we started to descend, and both weak legged from carrying too heavy of packs. Now we are sitting in a low point between two peaks and the clouds are already rolling in below us. We did find water and filled up everything we have.

We are not alone though. There are several other people camping just slightly below us. All the flat spots in the saddle were gone which forced us to climb higher to find a rock shelf big enough for the tent. I tried using my new jet boil stove to make supper tonight. The instructions for the minestrone were in French, so I scorched it. We were so hungry, we ate it anyway. We just put crackers in it so we couldn’t tell the cracker crunch from the burnt crunch.

We have a pretty good spot in the middle of a beechwood forest. We can see both sides of the mountain from our camping spot. I love thunderstorms and feel pretty secure with where we are. Pam is scared to death of storms. It will be an interesting night. We won’t get out of the tent until the storm is past–who knows how long that will be.

Happy 4th of July to all our family and friends back home in the states. We are planning on a short day so we can have time to get a good seat for the fireworks here tonight. It’s a rare treat for me to not have to work in a tire plant over the 4th. I usually have to catch the fireworks on December 28th with all the other CTNA employees.

I’d like to give a special shout out to a few people. First off, my Aunt Margaret turned 29 for the 48th time on July 2 (I know she’s saying the 47th time, but the first time counts as well–don’t argue math with an engineer). Happy Birthday, Margaret. I miss you and love you.

Secondly, I know I’ve already missed it, but there’s a tradition at the Settlement in Mt Vernon to have a 4th of July blowout (canon and quiet roosters all night). Dan and Sue have been great friends to me over the years. They played a big part in making our escape from the corporate world possible. They volunteered their time to come down and help me fix up my place to make it market ready. Sue is also celebrating a special birthday this year. I don’t know how women feel about people knowing when they turn 60, so I won’t mention her age. Happy Birthday, Sue.

Housekeeping aside (how gallant to call family and friends housekeeping, but I used to be “organizational inventory” so deal with it), I’ll share a bit about our day. We woke up BEFORE 8 (10 minutes, but it’s before). We got going by our new standard starting time of 9. We seem to e sleeping about an hour and a half later than when we were on the Camino, but then we hike until 8 at night (with lots of rest breaks and foot soakings).

The climb we started yesterday didn’t finish itself through the night so we picked up where we left off. A two mile walk with a steady, steep incline. We came to a charming chapel in a grove of trees with horses hanging all around. This was built to honor Mary of the Hawthorne Bush. The Virgin Mary appeared to a shepherd in a bush on the side of the mountain. No one questioned his sobriety, so a shrine and chapel were built. It really is a beautiful setting on the side of the mountain.

We were watching other people go by and start climbing to the peak. We couldn’t convince ourselves to get going because we were so hot. We just sat and cooled off for about 20 minutes. We could delay no longer so up we went. When we got to the turn everyone else had made to the summit, we noticed everyone coming back down just as we were following them up. They had made a wrong turn. Our long break didn’t cost us any extra effort and we caught up with everyone in front of us. We met Nadja from Namibia in Africa. She speaks German and English fluently.

Today was a lot of ups and downs but in the full sun. There were shady spots along the trail for us to hide from the heat periodically. In another 3 miles, we decided we needed a lunch break. We were in the middle of a descent and saw a great shady grove of trees. We picked our tree to lean back on and watch other hikers pass us while we had our PB&J wraps.

When we got back to hiking, we met a bunch of older French hikers. They seemed very intent on passing information on to us, but none of them spoke English. We signed for a bit while their one English speaker caught up. They were giving us a warning that 4 people had gotten hurt on the descent into Bidarray last Saturday while Pam and I were doing our marriage tent retreat in the rain and that we should take an alternate route. We didn’t quite understand everything they said, but they were very friendly and joking with us. They were day hiking and found out we were going all the way across France just after we had done the Camino. I think they were slightly impressed.

As we continued on in the hopes of finding a restaurant back in the mountains (the French guidebook says it’s there, or it might be the sight of a political massacre–my French needs a lot of work), we ran into another French man that was trying to communicate with us when he found out we were heading to Bidarray. He got very frustrated with himself because he can read English and understand it when spoken, but can’t speak it. We got google translate out but it has it’s problems with an English keyboard. He managed to tell us to take the left trail into Bidarray.

In another mile or two, we did find the restaurant in the middle of nowhere. It was a very nice family farm in a pass that caters to hikers on the side. It looks like they might have a local following as well because they had a very nice dining room. We got ham and cheese sandwiches (I have never eaten so much ham in my life). When we were getting ready to leave, the woman was emphatic that we take the orange trail into Bidarray.

Leaving the restaurant, we saw Nadja and the French man she was hiking with. We stopped them and asked if they had heard anything about the trail being in bad shape. They hadn’t. We told them we had been warned 3 times to not take the trail. When we got to the top of Mehatche Pass, they decided to take the main trail while Pam and I whimped out and took the alternate route.

The alternate was longer, so I don’t feel like we cheated. I was running low on after, so we had to stop and filter a few liters (the whole brown urine thing hasn’t disappeared, but we have traced it to dehydration so I’m trying to drink more–3+ liters today and good progress, so I won’t mention this again). We were going to stop at the first level spot by water we could find to camp for the night. There wasn’t a level spot anywhere in 4 miles of trail so we ended up hiking all the way into town.

While we were trying to decide what to do, a car pulled up next to us. We saw Nadja in the back seat. She told us we had made the right decision to take the alternate. They had gotten a ride to a campground down the road. They told us it was a 30 minute walk–again, no directions or distances. We started heading to the campground. After 15 minutes, the car came back and picked us up to take us to the campground. We would have never found it. It was over 2 miles and a convoluted path. We were concerned when we got to the place because no one was around.

Eventually, a French woman came and let us in the gate. She spoke English and told us she’d get us back to the trail at whatever time we wanted in the morning. She spent 6 years in Australia many years ago is how she learned English. She and her husband bought the land where we are staying in 1977. Sadly, he died 12 years ago and she just keeps building things on the property. She told us the cost was 10 Euros whether we camped or stayed inside with a bed. No tent tonight and unexpected showers that weren’t in the forecast.

We were ready to see the fireworks, but they were cancelled–must be budget problems.

Last night was not the most restful. We thought we had placed the tent on a level spot but there was more of a slant than we realized as soon as we got in. I let Pam choose her side and she chose the downhill side. I’d have slept fine if Pam didn’t believe in sharing her misery. Added to the slant were the horses with bells that decided to come eat the softest grass in the field; right outside of our door. Surprisingly, the sheep were quiet even while I was counting them.

Just as we were starting to stir around 7, it started to rain. Not a bad rain, but enough that we were obligated to go back to sleep for a while. By 8 the rain had stopped and it looked like it was going to be a cloudy day–perfect for hiking.

It was all downhill to the little village of Sare; about 1300′ down. It was pretty steep and we could tell it was going to be a very humid day. I was already sweating profusely.

Disgusting man paragraph: skip now or don’t say I didn’t warn you. Before we went to bed last night, I took one final pee. It was brown. I was afraid it might be rabdo but I haven’t done anything new. Pam said it might just be an irritated bladder bleeding a bit. It’s the first time I’ve ever hoped for blood in my urine. By morning it was clear again.

When we got into Sare, we lost the trail for the first time, but we just headed to the central plaza. We found a bar that served coffee (but no food). There were plenty of other shops around so we got some food and brought it back–we didn’t want to move because the tourist information center had great free wifi. We spent some time bringing the blog back up to date while eating.

Sare sits in a bowl surrounded by the Pyrenees. It’s a charming village and we would have liked to spend more time in, but since we have only hiked 2 miles and it was already 12:30, we thought we should get moving. Today was an easy walk across the bowl to get to the mountains on the other side. This is where we will start getting to at least 4000′ peaks.

The walk out of Sare involved a fair amount of back road walking. Since the GR10 has been pretty much all trail to this point, I’ll let it slide. A nice French/Japanese couple met us on the road. Neither of them spoke English but we managed to communicate pidgin for a while. She can only walk 2 hours a day and he can handle 3. They were interested in how much we walked a day and where we were headed–12 with lots of breaks, and the Mediterranean.

We needed a break and they pointed us to a a stream where we could soak our feet. We were in heaven for the next 45 minutes. Nothing, I mean nothing, beats a cold stream for hot tired feet. While we were soaking away, an Irish woman stopped by to join us. She’s a teacher and wanted to try hiking for a while until her boyfriend can join her next week. She’s just hiking to St Jean Pied de Port.

With revitalized feet, we continued our walk into Ainhoa (your guess is as good as mine to pronunciation–we received the proper sound but quickly forgot because English and French are so different on pronunciations). When we finally made it to town, we thought we’d find food to eat and a grocery store–no such luck.

After looking around a bit, we settled on a cafe next to a playground with the local kids playing soccer. I tried my hand at ordering in French by pointing at the menu and saying “deux”–I’m becoming tri-lingual. Fortunately for us, the waiter/bar tender spoke English. As we were getting ready to leave, the crowd thinned out and we were able to talk with Igor about traveling. He took the time in his 20s to travel the world. He hiked the Camino, the GR20, spent 4 years in the US (favorite city–New Orleans, mine as well). He was a really cool guy that we could have spent hours talking with. He was fascinated by us selling out and traveling.

After we repacked from filling our water, we headed out of town. We’ve got the biggest climb to date in front of us, so we wanted to knock it down a bit. We’ve got a 2300′ climb first thing in the morning. We decided to take the first level spot we could find. About a mile out of town and 300′ up, we found our spot. We’re going to have an early night so we can get an early start tomorrow. We hope to make St Jean by Thursday evening.

A great test for every couple should be to spend 42 hours straight in a 6’x7′ tent where only laying down or sitting up are possible. We survived, but only because I am, quite possibly, the easiest person in the world to get along with.

The rains continued all night long. There was a festival in Irun, Spain just across the border. They had planned for fireworks, and fireworks they had. Lassie doesn’t like the sound of distant booming any more than she likes the sound of thunder. There was no hope for peace until after the show had the grand finale around midnight.

When we woke up at 7, it was still raining, but just a light one. We decided to give it a little more time. By 8, there was no more rain on the tent and people were walking around on the trails outside. We decided to make a break for it.

We survived the storm amazingly well considering. The only thing wet that we packed up was the tent. Lassie kept taking off and then returning about 10 minutes later. She had been a good guardian for us the last two days.

At 9, we took off walking. Lassie was right by our side or leading the way. We both asked her if she had ever seen the Mediterranean Sea. She didn’t understand us. We both had brain farts and realized that she only speaks French.

The first mile is a steep climb. About half way up, I ran out of water. At the first decent stream, I dropped my pack and got out the filter. Pam and I knocked out 4 liters in no time flat, but I was having a mild panic attack. We were both dragging terribly this morning after not eating or drinking much for two days. Pam kept insisting she wasn’t hungry. I know from my reading that the number 1 reason most people quit long distance hiking is because of malnutrition. Pam kept stating that we weren’t burning that many calories and that she didn’t need to step up her eating. I was panicking, worrying about her caloric intake and arguing so much against it.

With water all filled, we took off again. Lassie seemed reluctant to follow but she came along. Around the next bend was a cairn. We didn’t realize it until after we were 100 meters past the cairn that Lassie wasn’t following us any longer. We looked back and she stood there staring at us. We thought she might have been a herding dog and this confirmed it. She was at the edge of her territory and wouldn’t go on. She had graciously escorted us to the edge of her territory. I was very sad that I hadn’t given her a proper goodbye.

In about an hour, we crossed into Spain and what turned out to be a French shopping Mecca. Tax rates are incredible high in France, but Spain is cheap by comparison. We stopped at the first cafe/grocery store we came to. To my relief, Pam ate a large breakfast of eggs, bacon, bread, 2 cups of coffee, and some of my French Fries. Afterwards she said she hadn’t realized she was so hungry and that she felt much better now. I was relieved beyond measure.

The rest of the day was great walking even if there were lots of ups and downs. We dropped back down to sea level from 1000′ only to climb back up to 1800′. The second time we dropped back down near sea level, we crossed a nice flowing cold stream. We both agreed to drop our packs and soak our feet in the stream. This is a luxury we only got to do once on the Camino and that was after we were done hiking for the day.

We were going to try to make it into Sare (every time we say the town name, Pam thinks of Sarah, her daughter. But since we mispronounce everything, we think we might be saying it wrong as well, but Pam claims to have named her as a baby so hopefully she’s got the pronunciation right). The descent down from 1800′ was taking us longer than we thought it would and it was later than we thought. We called it a day about 8p so we would have time to set up camp, eat, and get ready for bed before the sun goes down. One big plus for us is that we have a tremendous view outside of our tent.

We woke up at 8 after a pretty successful first 24 hours in the Pyrenees. Let’s recount the stats: 24 hours on the trail, 5 hours of hiking to cover 7.25 miles, 19 hours in the tent.

It has rained continuously since we got in the tent. The few times the rain let up, we took advantage to empty our bladders. Lassie was right there with us to make sure our smells didn’t attract wild animals, so she graciously covered our urine with hers. Hers could not hold a candle to Pam’s though. The horses started coming around our tent to add their scents.

We have been surrounded by horses with bells, whinnying all day. Lassie hasn’t left the side of our tent since we set it up (she sleeps under the trees beside us). She tried to come in a few times, but she wasn’t happy with the vestibule so out she went. We did discover that she likes green olives.

Everyone we met on the trail yesterday told us we were going to have another day of rain and then it would be great weather from there on. We are hoping they are right. We have 4 days of food so we are staying put until we get a break in the weather to pack up. So far, we have been in bed almost 30 hours straight. I’m getting bed sores and Pam is losing bone mass. She refuses to eat and I’m not ready to insert a gastronomy tube. I might try force feeding in a while if she doesn’t lay still.

Two months may not be long enough for us to do the GR10. I’ve been looking at the guidebook and I think there might be a village in a couple of miles. If the rain breaks tomorrow, I’m making a coffee and porcelain run. I haven’t dug a hole yet on this trip and don’t want to start in the rain.

Pam’s bone loss is scaring me. It’s like I have a boneless wife until she rolls over and kicks me. Why is it always the heels that are last to go?

If you read this on the blog, we survived. If you are reading this in our tent, I was conditioned as American to eat boneless meat. My wife’s demise was agreed upon by both of us (even if only one of us was conscious at the time).

When you start at sea level, unless you are in Death Valley, there’s only 1 way to go. We started climbing as soon as we left the beach area. The first mile was on road through town, but we quickly got to the country and actual trails.

I woke up at 5:30 and it was raining. I thought we can sleep a little longer in this nice dry hotel room. At 6:45, there wasn’t any rain (that I could hear) so I got up to shower and get ready. Pam slept until I was done in the bathroom. We headed out hopeful that we were going to miss the rain. As soon as we stepped outside, our hopes were dashed.

We stepped back under cover and put on our rain gear. It was more of a heavy mist than a rain so we’ll be ok. Often times on the Camino we had philosophical discussions with other pilgrims along the lines of “I’d rather hike in the rain than 90+ heat”. I’ve just got to keep reminding myself how miserable the heat was.

The trail takes a pretty direct route out of town. We were hoping for a cafe along the route since we got up and left before the hotel opened for breakfast. No such luck.

After a couple of miles, we came to a small village with 2 bar/cafes and a hotel with a restaurant. We thought for sure we’d find something here. Both bars were closed so I went into the hotel. It was a very classy place, the type that doesn’t like to see me on their doorstep. I looked at the menu, and I shit you not, they wanted 11 Euros for coffee. I’m not cheap, but, yes, I’m too cheap for that.

After the village, we started to do some steep climbing (on empty stomachs). After a short bit, I got Pam to stop to split a snickers and have a banana each. This is not the most hardy breakfast, but it beats the two bread heels that we started the Camino with.

Next we played the rain guessing game. The rain would stop and the sun would come out. We dropped our packs and took off our rain gear. 10 steps later it was raining again, so we dropped our packs and put on our rain gear. After doing this a couple of times, we decided the best approach was for Pam to wear her rain jacket and I wouldn’t wear mine–we would play a little mind game with the rain gods. This worked for about a mile.

We climbed up a nice stretch to give us a great view of Hendaye behind us. We also got a stupendous view of the rain coming up the valley that was currently beating the crap out of Hendaye. We made tracks thinking that we were about to go down the other side of the mountain.

Instead, we had another rise in front of us. We got to climb the mountain the rest of the way in the rain. Fortunately, it was only strong winds and horizontal rain without lightening. By the time we made the top, the bulk of the storm was past us. There were horses free grazing on the mountain as well as sheep. We could see some trees down in the next valley and we aimed for them for a rest spot.

There was a lovely spot in the trees that was dry and protected from the rain. We stopped for another fruit and snickers break. Pam has been going strong today and not complaining at all in the bad weather. I haven’t been complaining either, but I am hurting. I don’t have energy and my Achilles’ tendon on my right foot is tighter than a drum. After we sat down in the woods for a break, I said we’ve got to either get moving or set up a tent because I’m starting to get very chilled in the rain.

Pam said let’s set up the tent. I’m always a compliant husband when Pam says something I want to hear. We had the tent set up by 1:30 when a French man stopped in the trees for a food break. We talked to him for a bit. He recognized our Z Packs tent and we started talking gear.

While we were talking, the sun broke through the clouds. We started thinking maybe we should head on. Another lone hiker, a woman from Switzerland stopped by and we talked to her a bit. She had walked around the mountain we came over. Our guidebook is actually in St Jean and we’ll get it in a few days. In the mean time, we bought a French version of a different one that doesn’t believe in using distances. For some reason, Europeans like to use times as distances. To make it worse, the publishers go find some steroided up hiker to run the trails and give us his best times when the day is clear, he’s not carrying any gear, and he has just had a fresh shot of roids. The book sucks. It took us 5.5 hours to do what the book says is 2.3 hours.

While we were talking to the Swiss woman, the French guy took off and another solo French woman came up. While we were all talking, the rains started again. The girls took off and we went to the tent. We were inside lying down under our quilts by 2. An Airedale came up while we were setting up the tent and everyone that came by thought it was our dog. Even the Airedale came to believe she’s our dog.

We fell asleep with the constant sound of rain on the tent for the next 5 hours. The dog is lying outside of the tent protecting us. The worst part is that she’s more afraid of thunder than Pam so she barks at the storm. Once she gets started, the dog won’t stop either.

Looks like we’re going to break our tent record we set in Mt Rainier. We’ve already got 7 hours in and it’s not even close to dark yet.

We caught the train out of Santiago to Hendaye, France, without incident, Monday morning. It was an all day ride across Northern Spain to make it back to France by 9:30p. I’m glad it took so long–it legitimizes how far we walked.

Like last time we got to France, we had no plans of where to stay and absolutely no understanding of the language. We ended up meeting Aziz from Spain who was also in need of a place to stay. With his help, we ended up in a hotel near the train station. Aziz spoke a little English, fluent in Spanish, and no French. We only speak English. The hotel operator spoke Spanish and French but no English. I learned to appreciate Google Translate in a hurry.

Aziz had to get up at 4a to catch another train (we never could quite figure our where to). We did gather that he is only 18 and is traveling to find a job (possible to Brazil–but my ears are not attuned to Spanglish). He was a very respectful and a brave young man. I’m sure he makes his parents proud.

When we got up, we headed down to the beach area because that is where the GR10 starts. We walked about a mile to get down there and were hungry. We stopped in at a crepe restaurant for some breakfast/lunch–it was already noon. The waitress spoke no English, but did speak Spanish and French. After we tried some very bad French, she tried to rack her memory for English. Between her broken English and our broken Spanish, we managed to get enough to eat and get some good ideas where to stay.

We headed to the tourist information center on the beach. On the way, we saw a nice looking hotel on a side street so we decided to drop in and check prices. It was more than we wanted to spend, but less than we thought the area would command since we are on a beach in a resort town. We said we’d think about it.

At the tourist office, we met a very nice young lady that spoke French, Spanish, and English. Nahia (Basque for “desire”) was very helpful to us. She showed us where the GR10 starts, gave us some highlights to see in Hendaye, and offered to set us up in pilgrim housing since we were returning from the Camino. We really considered it, but decided with the language barrier we create by only speaking English, we should just get a hotel. We went back to Bergeret Sport Hotel.

One of the reasons we chose to spend a few days in Hendaye (other that the 5 days of rain in the forecast) was to get caught up on all of our blogging. We checked before we registered that there was wifi in the hotel. They knew this was very important to us. After we got settled in, we discovered the wifi wasn’t compatible with US electronics. The owners were very accommodating to us and offered use of their laptops and called in the provider to come out and work on the wifi for us. We were going to check out after the first night, but they are such a nice family and so kind that we couldn’t do it.

We ended up back at the Tourist Information office where Nahia set us up with internet to use. We also found a very nice tea/coffee shop with fast wifi where we spent several hours over the last couple of days. Evelyne was very kind to us as well. We have found that most people know a little English but are afraid to try until you show an effort to try a little French. Once the effort is made, communication becomes more of a game than a barrier.

I will say that I am embarrassed by our lack of language skills. Most Europeans speak at least 3 languages where most English speaking people only speak 1. I do plan to work on my language skills, but in the mean time, we are thankful for google. I know we are butchering the language, but at least we are trying. The local people appreciate the effort. It is scary as hell to be in a foreign country and not speak any of the language.

The entire Bergeret family have been so generous and patient with us these last few days. If it weren’t for their generosity and patience, I would probably have sat up in the room afraid to go out. We had a wonderful multi-course meal with them tonight. We purposely went down early to avoid interrupting their normal clientele. They explained everything to us on the menu because it is only in French. Even so, I was afraid of etiquette breaches in front of the French diners. The food was fantastic.

Tomorrow, we will begin the GR10 (as soon as the rain of the day stops). There is only a 90% chance of rain tomorrow, but it gets serious over the weekend with 100% both days. Maybe we can outwalk the rain.