am considerations. Santiago bound?

The further from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port the more uptight I've become: some days I have been less wound up, but over the duration I've definitely become more and more like a coiled spring ready to release all its tension in one moment of expiration - with a bang and not a dampened whimper!

It's as though the closer I get to reaching the goal the less happy I am to cross the finish line?

During the second part of this Camino Frances I have had a couple of mind altering moments, peak experiences? Reaching Galicia on that tough day and then seeing echoes of home on another tough day... But otherwise empty?

Buenos Días. It's foggy. There is a guy called Raphael who has walked from his home on the other side of the Sistema Central north of Madrid (Sierra de Guadarrama), along the same route I walked in December 2022, before the old war wound of the left foot broke my step coming into Segovia! This is his '100th' Camiño ... He's done loads! But that's because it is running in Spains blood. As a northern barbarian, with our 'protestant' ways, this is all foreign muck and not the be trusted ... I thought he was French as he definitely had a döppelganger on the other side of the Pyrenees in days gone by... Perhaps back in 2013, but he was from Brittany!

The 'red' albergue, for a full €2 more, has been a learning curve for me. The Xunta Municipal albergue is definitely in the past now as there is too much wanting for €10 (which is a strange one as the Xunta of Galicia wants to showcase the Camiño as part of having the UNESCO stamp of approval and the area feels a little on the brink of penury with so many ruined houses, etc)

Writing a journal is not the same as writing a narrative - I rarely go back to the journal and rewrite it, unless there are glaring spelling, grammar or sense issues: and I need a true theme for the 'story' of the way. What hasn't been said about O Camiño?

Waiting to begin the day in the light, watching a platoon drift passed on their way to the pit head (with a coal mine lamp in place), it's huevos con tomate y tosados.

Back in October the brutal attack by Hamas on innocent civilians led to brutal attacks by Israelis on innocent civilians. We really don't value life highly. We value values more than flesh and blood. We would rip eachother at the throat before looking beyond the everyday into a brighter future together?

I almost had a shower yesterday, but I've no fresh clothes for Friday morning: one more day soiling soiled on top of unclean body... It's not the end of existence!