Days 92-94: Nothing is Cold like Cold, Wet Feet

Nothing is Cold like Cold, Wet Feet

Travel Days 92 – 94

March 30 – April 1

Camino Day 25: Ponferrada to Villafranca del Bierzo

Daily distance: 24.1 km

Total distance: 591.8 km

When my 7:00 AM alarm went off, my phone was sitting on the floor and plugged into the wall.  I glanced down at it from my top bunk and used telekinesis to turn it off.  It kept buzzing.  For a moment, I contemplated not turning it off, and just lying there.  But that would be a bad idea.  I told myself that I only have one hour to eat breakfast, get dressed, pack up, brush my teeth, blah, blah, blah, and then get out on the Camino.  The women at this Donativo weren’t messing around yesterday, and they surely wouldn’t be messing around this morning.  I trusted them to stay true to their 8:00 AM kick-out time.  Which they were.  They started mopping the floor in some of the rooms at 7:45 AM. 

Wandering out at 8:00 AM, I walked past the Ponferrada castle and cathedral.  And in front of these historic buildings, there was an assembly of several men, woman, and children wearing black cloaks and tall pointed hats, carrying crosses, and arranging several altars for the day’s precession.  The Spanish take this Holy Week thing seriously. 

The lavishly decorated castle in Ponferrada.

The five kilometers before Villafranca, I walked through a downpour, the kind that’s ideal for my umbrella.  When the winds are blowing, especially sporadically, there’s a risk of breaking one of the fiberglass supports.  But when it comes straight down, it’s almost a leisurely Sunday afternoon stroll.  Almost.  My boots still get wet and muddy, and as every step slowly degrades their waterproofness, I can feel the heat being sucked from my damp feet to the cold environment.  Not exactly the Spanish Spring I imagined.  I planned to continue five kilometers after Villafranca to Pereje, but changed plans after I sat down for a meal.  I knew the rain wasn’t going to stop today, but tomorrow promised clear skies.  I decided to wait before beginning my climb up the mountain. 

Camino Day 26: Villafranca del Bierzo to Hospital da Condesa

Daily distance: 34.1 km

Total distance: 625.9 km

After my bag was packed and I came downstairs for the albergue breakfast (which included more than just carbohydrates and sucrose this time), I realized I made a fatal error last night.  I never stuffed my boots with newspaper; they were still soaking wet.  My toes were cold immediately, and I considered myself fortunate to have a mountain to climb and distract me, keeping me somewhat warm.

The road began its steady upward climb, a welcome departure from the flat stretches characteristic of most of the Camino.  Here I met Monica, a Spanish girl living just south of Barcelona taking time from work to walk from Ponferrada to Santiago.  In the last two day, I’ve met many people in the same situation.  Ten kilometers into the day, we arrived in Trabadelo and we stopped for a bite to eat.  As we were leaving the café, a slew of pilgrims poured in, all preliminaries of Ponferrada, eager to meet everyone on their second pilgrimage day.  We exchanged polite greetings as we shuffled our way towards the door, feeling like politicians trapped at a rally. 

The Camino departed from the road and onto a muddy trail, continuing upward with increasing steepness.  A river created by melted snow flowed down its center.  And then we met the snow that was melting, first piled on the sides of the trail, then encroaching on the trail, and then covering the whole of the trail.  Slushy footprints outlined the width of the river.  My deteriorating boots allowed wetness to seep in, and I cringed at the thought of the snowpack increasing.  We arrived in La Faba, stepping on groomed roads carved by snow plows.  Over lunch, our boots and socks came off to give them a chance to dry. 

La Faba was a base camp to a miserable climb.

At the restaurant, we met Josepe and Severina, two pilgrims from Italy.  Together, we started the 5 kilometer, 400 meter climb to O Cebreiro.  On a normal day with good weather, this would have been nothing.  But the Camino we walked that day was flanked on both sides with piles of snow that reached over the tops of our heads.  A continuation of the slushy recently-melted river carved the only area for our feet.  My fresh pair of socks was immediately soaked, and I felt the cold closing in around each of my toes.  There was no way out of this; I just needed to keep going.  I told myself that we only had an hour until we reached the peak.  I only needed to keep moving; frostbite was unlikely to develop by then. 

The initial ascent wasn't so bad.  Yet.

Snow-covered mountains are high on my list of awesome places.

The serene and beautiful scenery surrounding us helped keep my mind off of my feet.  Only the sound of our footsteps through snow and slush disturbed the silence of the windless frozen landscape.  As we climbed, the temperature dropped, and the snow piled higher.  We were soon taking steps in hard-packing snow that reached up to our knees.  Every square inch of my boots and socks were saturated, and every new contact deep into the snow sucked a little more heat away from my feet.  Nothing is cold like cold, wet feet.  As we approached O Cebreiro, we saw that we were walking amongst the tops of fences and walls.  We were cautious with our footsteps.

Monica, Josepe, and Severina admiring the scenery.

Josepe is leading the charge up the hill.

Despite the care in my footing, one step plunged my leg up to my hip in snow.  I foolishly attempted to use my walking sticks to leverage myself out of the hole, but only buried them up to my wrists.  Monica grabbed my arm and helped pull me out, and we continued the march upwards.  Eventually, we reached the well-groomed road.  I stripped my boots off, dried my feet, and changed into the last pair of dry socks I had. 

Finally found a dry road!

O Cebreiro looked like a frozen Disneyland.  Kids were running up hills and sledding down them.  Families built snowmen.  Everyone was having snowball fights.  We even broke out in one between ourselves before we decided that packing more snow in obscure places was only going to add to the cold we just endured.  At the municipal albergue, we learned that the town is usually not this crowded.  But because most people do not work during Holy Week and there has been unusually high snowfall lately, everyone and their grandmother flocked here to play winter. 

The chapel in O Cebreiro

The four of us wanted nothing to do with this circus.  From here onward, we had groomed roadways, and Liñares was only three kilometers away.  We continued onward so we could enjoy the peace of these snow-covered mountains sans crowds.  On the way to Liñares, the water in my boots soaked through my fresh pair of socks, and the now-blowing winds brought snowfall with them.  I kept an image of a warm albergue in my head and pressed onward.  But I only found disappointment when I arrived.  The heaters in the albergue were all broken, and there was no newspaper at the albergue or anywhere in town.  If I stayed here, I had a promise to wake up to wet socks and boots. 

We pushed the extra two kilometers to Hospital da Condesa, betting on this option.  If this failed, there was nothing else for 15 kilometers.  We lucked out: the albergue had heat, newspaper, and a nearby restaurant.  After 34 kilometers, much of which was spent with wet and cold feet, I was glad to be finally freed from my boots and sharing a bottle of wine with the pilgrims who shared this miserable yet beautiful day with me.

Camino Day 27: Hospital da Condesa to Triacastela

Daily distance: 15.4 km

Total distance: 641.3 km

I woke up at 3:00 AM with an unsettling feeling that my boots and socks were not dry.  I’m glad that I followed my urge to check them because my socks were still completely soaked.  The albergue had a rule that clothes were not to be laid on top of the heaters because they were fire hazards, but at this point I would rather the whole building burn down than have to walk another day in snow-covered mountains with wet socks.  I placed all three pairs of socks on top of the heater and set an alarm for 90 minutes later.  When I awoke again, they were toasty warm, with the dirtiest ones being the crunchiest.  I was beginning to enter that desperate-need-of-a-washing-machine phase again. 

Inspecting my boots before putting them on, I counted all of the holes, broken stitches, and points of cracking leather; these boots needed luck to make it through the rest of the trip.  And I couldn’t help but notice how clean they were.  All of that stomping through the snow scrubbed the dirt and mud from every surface and crevice.  I packed all of my things and left the albergue before 8:00 AM, eager to get to the restaurant and eat something.  There was nothing between here and Triacastela. 

We had to walk on top of a wall to get past the deep snowpack.

Although it was still very cold (probably below freezing), and there was still plenty of snow on the ground, there was no new snowfall last night, and navigating the packed footprints from the albergue back to the road was easy, with only some questionable footing.  But at least my boots were not immediately soaked by freezing snow again.  Following the groomed road westward, I traced the mountainside on my left and had a wide snow-covered mountain range to my right.  Leafless trees and evergreens too weak to hold snow provided contrast to the blanket white ground.  Easterly winds urged low-lying clouds to crawl in the valleys between the hills.   

The snowpack on the sides of the road shrank as I slowly made the 1000 meter descent.  The road weaved with the mountains, scrolling different panoramas all the way to Triacastela.  Eventually, one of these panoramas had the edge of the snowfall on the ground; I was almost at the end of this.  I breathed a sigh of relief.  Now that I was in Galicia, there were no mountains anywhere near this high.  I only had the rainfall to endure.  

All things come to an end.  Including snow.

An 800 year old tree just before Triacastle.