Journey to Santiago - Day 30, Twenty-eighth Stage

Day 30 - Portomarin to Palas de Rei

Distance walked today: 25 km (15.6 miles)

Total distance walked: 458.4  km (286.5 miles)

Total distance left: 67.9 km (42.4 miles)

Information on the stage traveled here.

68 km to go!  How fast it all seems now.  It seemed just yesterday Adal headed out on his adventure.  Like an old-fashioned knight's tale, out to discover the world.  And even though it has been an incredible experience for him, as with most goals we see so close after having traversed a long journey to achieve, he just can't wait to get there.  He really just wants to get there, badly.

He felt great today, almost as if he walked barefoot.  His feet were just cooperating the whole way.  But when he took his sock off, he was shocked to see one of the middle toes was black halfway down.  Now, we know this doesn't look right.  So he headed off immediately to the doctor.  Luckily, it just seems to be a hematoma, a bruise, pooled blood in the toe.  He just doesn't understand how his feet could feel so great and then look that bad.  So no worries for now, unless it keeps spreading.

The people are different now, although he still recognizes some long distance trekkers in the crowd.  Most are there for the last 100 km stretch, and there isn't the same sense of sharing with others as there was at the beginning and middle of the journey.  

To think of all the interesting people I met that were walking.  There was a couple from Italy; she was from Cali, Colombia and moved from Florida to be with her boyfriend in Rome.  She does graphic art for the Vatican.  Her boyfriend said he was crying from the pain of tendonitis on some of the stages.  Both were beautiful people.  Or how about Alejandra, from Salamanca, who just decided one day to do this, with minimal planning, and now doesn't want to stop.  She feels it is an alternate reality she is living on the Way.  How to go back to a job, an apartment, a life that is so different?  

I think Walkers, "peregrinos," will need a time to recover from coming back to our world.  It is a shock to the system to leave this path, this way of life however temporary, and come back to their "normal" life.  They need time to settle their thoughts, their "survival mode," and let the introspection they experienced on the journey slowly concretize.

I think I am ready to help Adal with the transition.