Camino Frances Journal – Day 29

A glimpse into the journal I kept for all 38 days on the Camino Frances, including up to 10 photos (not necessarily the best pictures but more that they represent that day in some particular way). Today is day 29 – May 19^th. Molinaseca to Ponferrada

Didn’t get very far at all today. I walked with yesterday’s group into Ponferrada. We all wanted to see the 12^th-century castle so we got distracted by that. Wasn’t much but it was still worth a look and I learned a thing or two about the Templars. I really enjoyed, though, the exhibition of medieval religious texts and their stylistic writings. Near the end of my wander, I ran into Johny who said he was off to find the McDonald’s. After almost a month of pilgrim menu, that sounded like a gourmet meal to me. Off we went. It took us forever to find it, even after asking several people for directions. When we did finally find it near some old steam trains, it was like, “Hallelujah!” I did feel like I was cheating on the Camino by having a burger and salty fries but I just couldn’t say no…

Johny and I found the others who told us that the new plan was to take a short day. By then it was early afternoon and no real point in moving on. So I stayed as well. We got a few hotel rooms and hung out for the afternoon. The guys went out and bought the group t-shirts with the red Templar cross – black shirts for the ladies and white for the guys. …

Dinner got crazy. It culminated when Johny stepped away from the table for a bit and Derek decided to pull a prank – he tossed some hot sauce in to Johny’s wine! When he came back, someone proposed a toast and we all tossed back our drinks. Poor Johny…

Evening was spent in an Irish bar – I don’t know how they found one, but they did. It was after 1am after I left, leaving the others to continue the party. They wore me out…