Horses and people

Today was another untypical day on our Camino. We started by riding horses from Herrerías  up a 7.5 kilometer mountain trail to O Cebreiro. Victor, a former economist who now owns the six horses and leads the ride up the mountain everyday. He walks while everybody else rides. He then brings the horses back down the trail to do it again some days.  Needless to say he is in very good condition. He arranges for lunch upon  arrival in O Cebreiro. A very delightful man who is living the life he loves and enjoys. He does travel the world extensively when his horse business is closed in the winter. 

Among the other people we have made friends with are  a recently retired college president and his wife from the U.K. They moved ahead of us when we took a day off in Astorga to visit the chocolate museum. So we are now stretching our walks to try to catch up with them and our other Camino friends Rick and Donna from New Hampshire. We did reconnect last night with our wine making Camino friends from Colorado, Kevin and Gina. We actually had lunch with them but they were staying in that village and we walked on another 12k to our planned stop. We do have plans to reconnect with them in Santiago. 

One of the most fun parts of the Camino is meeting and remeeting people as well as making new friends from all over the world. While eating lunch today Kathy jumped up and ran out of the bar. She had spotted the young Korean man ( Yongbae Lee) we had walked with for many days early in the Camino but had not seen in a couple of weeks. Last week we met a woman from Namibia. Who would have thought. 

Young and old walk the Camino. We befriended a wonderful young woman ( Isabelle ) who is walking the Camino alone  during her gap year before she will attend William and Mary University. She is fluent in Spanish, French and English and a delightful young lady. It seems everyone walking knows Isabelle. 

Kathy talked to two young women walking alone and discussed if they had any fears on the Camino. They said they never felt safer traveling as they do on the Camino. It is an international community that watches out for each other. 

The Camino is a joyful place with many wonderful people from all over the world all walking the Way for their own personal reasons. We are looking forward to our final week of walking as we expect to arrive in Santiago on Oct 5. 

Isabelle with Kathy and her father who joined her for just 3 days of walking. We were lucky enough to see them in Leon where he joined her. 

On to a Santiago. 

Buen Camino