A rebel without a clue.

Why do mosquitoes bite on bone? Are they getting a fix of marrowbone too? White and red blood cells. Delicate eaters - apparently they eat nectar the rest of the time which makes them sound like Roman Emperors, decadent fucks. Short day today at just under 20 kilometres. Cloudy all the way. Not too warm. Think I've finally passed out of the Forested region. This is Cap de Gascogne. Saint Sever. Been out for fruit and veg. Will return later for Fromage and lentiles. Had fine food last night. Very nice sausages. Exactly like at home. Lots of fat came out of them, the Dutch ladies sopped it up with potatoes. Fat is useful on The Way. In the square with a Paulaner: sorry state of French beer. Was not allowed to serve myself in the fruitiers. OK. It's a service. Part of the cost. Blank faced lady. Has seen us all a million times before.  French beer is continuing bad: Guinness Special Export ... Warming my body. Time to get cooking I feel. Three Dutch ladies. Now one from Eindhove...

Monday The birds are singing and A rain falls against the windowpane Coffee made 5:50am. Monday morning. Final coffee, reheated... With 4 slices toast, butter and HM blackcurrant jam. Listened a bit more to Archive on Four/Barry Humphries. Written a bit on CdS forums. Getting ready for allotment? If the rain has whisked away? Allotment from 8:30 until 11:30 Went to Aldi for mum - eggs and bread. Staples... Having a half in Bar3. Adnam's Ghost Ship. The sun was shining and birds were collecting twigs etc for bedding. Ate lunch and took Lola for a long afternoon up to Ashdale Lane. Had a little chill on the sofa with her. Pint of Guinness at 16:30 waiting for the bus back to Leeds. Can't come to Wetherby until Thursday... Gonna be a challenge. Not on Tuesday, but definitely Wednesday when the weather is meant to be turd? Came back to Leeds on the 5pm. Got back to the flat at 6pm. Made open sandwiches of the remainder of the cheese and a mountain of onions Tired.  Ran a bath and w...

Awake at 5:30 Coffee at 6 Podcast: chocolate until 7 Washed up the pots and pans. Had toast for breakfast Up to the allotment 8:30 until 11 Paid Andy the £1 I owed him for potatoes when he brought water to the butt. Caught the, now, very busy X99: Saturday. This journey used to make me ill when I was a teenager following the crowd for no idea why. And I responded by climbing off at Oakwood Clock. It's the end of the market. So I got a few items. Lincolnshire Poacher cheese. Had a few halves but was back at the flat around 3pm. Enjoying the music in Melbourne, but now I realise Sam had no idea what the music he was playing was - it was an algorithm... I was super excited that it was Deerhunter, shoe gaze, Spiritualized, etc. But it wasn't his music. It was an AI generated playlist. Oh well. 

Woke up at 5:30am Coffee by 6am Podcast - Hormones Put dried washing away Bath Porridge Down to Albion Street/Boar Lane Caffé Nero Bus at 8. Lola at 9. Bus back from Boston Spa at 11 Walk through town And back just after 12. Lunch and lay down. Left Lola around 2 Reading a new book - Watling Street Homage to Catalonia  can wait. Come to Bar3 for a long half Adnam's Ghost Ship . *** Then Kenny arrived just as I was leaving. I'd spent two chapters on one half and was slowly leaving for another chapter in The Mews, but Kenny literally came through the door as I was leaving... Until his 'lot' arrived and he went to join them (and I was a little forgotten), he wanted to discuss the Camino as he is interested in it... Went to The Mews after two pints of Guinness (half of one I couldn't stomach as I not really a fan of the Black Velvet) and had another pint and half of Theakston's XB, a beer I really like, left and got a lightly battered special from The Frying Pan. Re...

Spent the majority of the day walking. Walking to catch the bus, walking to return the nalgene flask and collect Lola, walking up to the Allotment and over the back bone of Wetherby (Barleyfields Road) to Touchwoods to get Lola a biscuit, then a break. Then walking to the medical centre to drop off mum's urine sample and buy some items marked down from Sainsbury's. Walked passed BAE, where I saw Andy Stoney(I had seen Tony Dudley in the morning sat on the bench above Deighton Road drinking his cans), but went and bought some kale from Johnson's Greengrocers and then sat and finished Of Mice and Men on a bench facing the Town Hall and then returned it to The Library. Then I collected Lola and gave her a good half an   hour and saw the X98 going up to Deighton so collected my bag as Lola devoured her dinner. It's 3pm and heading back to Leeds passing Scarcroft and thinking of getting off in Oakwood. Mum's decided to let me stay on Friday night ...  And next Thursday n...

The long return to Leeds, UK begins.. toilet at 3:30am. Clothes and boots on. Hot drink at 4am: cocoa as only instant coffee otherwise. Will set off at 4:10am. Broken night's sleep. Around 12 midnight two of the guests sharing the room had only just returned from whatever they had been doing all day long and a forth person put in an appearance around 11... The door entry system makes a God awful noise so switching off was really impossible while there was a lot of comings and goings. But I did sleep in places between 8pm and the alarm... My day is just beginning. For four chicas it's just ending. It was Shrove Tuesday. It's Ash Wednesday. The start of Lent. The moveable feast of Easter. Easily through security and passport control. The vast majority of bums on seats are those heading to Londres. I am not so lucky. I've another two legs, at least, until I head up Albion Street or Briggate to Merrion or North Street. It's ages since I visited London: two years ago whe...

Slight hangover this morning. Having first coffee at just after 7:30 as the world wakes up in Sevilla. Waited for a call yesterday from the Podiatry Service in Leeds around 3pm(2pm local time) but I have no missed calls so sent an email. The night guy last night is Brasilian ... They're everywhere. I've probably just sold him on a trip to Manchester as it's far cheaper than London, but he would like to see the Natural History Museum... That makes sense. I visited it with my big, but sadly deceased, sister Julia when I was either 10 or 11. I recall having a migraine on the final day - I think I was over stimulated. I owe for a beer and need to rent a towel to get clean as will be sensible this day. Need to be catching the bus at 4:30am tomorrow ... Sight seeing. Walking through the gorgeous Geography and History section of the University of Sevilla Facultad Geografía e Historia which was a tobacco factory? Royal in fact! So back to the hostel for a cleanse... I almost went t...

All fine. Packed up and stepped out to locate coffee. Down to the bridge? But, no, what's this? No coat! Well that's a first. And it's drizzling... Then it's raining. I had to laugh. That was a very good night's sleep in room 104. Took me 30 minutes to locate a coffee nearby the railway station. Another one opens nearer the river at 7:30, but this one is nearer the morning activities, but it's Buondi, not Delta ... The Brasilian from Recefe was very quietly, beautifully sleeping. And reminds me of Jorge Ben! Coffee flavoured sweet. I've been carrying a couple since Bushido, they're getting more gooey. Which reminds me of getting the sack from Linton Springs for helping myself to Tia Maria from the patisserie chefs stash without being invited: he was literally flirting with me a couple of days prior - the big whoopsy - and gave me a tipple and in my innocence I thought it was an open invitation, but it was an invitation to be accused of stealing bottles o...

Punjabi vegetable jalfrezi - no comment. Two chapatis for 5€! What... OK. 10€ for the meal, but the mental distortion for the flat breads. Leeds's finest from Abul Bakr £1? I don't know how The Algarve does it - supply and therefore damned? Certainly it filled a hole. Pilau rice slightly damp too ... And a small bottle of water 2€60¢. Don't go to Mehfil if you don't want to leave feeling Meh and not very happily filled! Time for a siesta and that's it? I made my bed prior to the late lunch. It's all good. It's in my belly. But the upper bunk squeaked every movement. The sour faced woman on reception said they have no lower bunks left so I accepted the upper bunk in 102, but everything was bouncing around loosely when I moved. Luckily the unhelpful woman had ended her shift and a more helpful man moved me to a lower bunk (which was a available in 104!!!) so I moved my stuff and took 102 key back. Now I have Samuel from Recife Brasil opposite: he was already h...

What now? Where now? One more day would take me further than my original destination - Beja - and further from Seville, where I return from on Wednesday. As there are a lot of connections from Faro, Tavira and the Algarve to Seville, by bus, that must be 'the' option... I've booked a Rede Expressos to Faro at 1020am. And will stay in Tavira. Indeed I could stay until Tuesday as I don't need to be in Seville except for one night. There is the Via de la Plata obviously, but that's in the future... This was just a short one. And I felt the Camino spirit the day before yesterday with António, in Alcoutim with the dogs and Sam and when I crossed the stream Vascão with my feet finding the none green stones and sandy spaces. So that's sorted. One night in Tavira too. Then forward to Seville and then back to Leeds, via Stansted, and my broken relationship with my mum... What's around the corner? Downstairs for breakfast and it's raining. It's grey on Beja. H...

A battled against the sinking mud, But I didn't fight. Slowing to a gentle, yet ploughing/sucking, pace as I reached the (disused) railway lines. Skirting Beja to the east and carrying the mud of (olive) war everywhere. Beja vu... Déjà vu. Don't I know this bar from before? I tried to stop, but I was called. A shower and a Saturday. A Prancinho and a Super Bock Preta. No, I've never been here before. But similar (somewhere) - I stumbled into - on another Way in another Time. A bit middle class hipster-ish, but it's not Portuguese? It's alright as I am being torn apart by New Wave and a lady in butterfly wings. Her son a stoned wizard, but not a True star. Polkadot stepple- hat: Reprehensible! 1979 is a broken glass Heart, which is still amongst them? *** Gosh I am tired as a man converts himself. A man becomes a sheikh. Another time was in Palma Mallorca. But I was only there for a coffee and cake as it closed. Middle class and simply out of ...

Slept until the dawn was crawling upon my eyelids. The first. So quiet up here, but cold. Blue skies, mainly. It was blowing a gale as I fell away from puddles, voices and fears. Then I grabbed the additional blanket in a half waking moment. Things are still damp which I washed last night so I wear them to use body heat to dry. I've four layers on: we're not in The Algarve now, for sure? But these layers won't last once António deposits me the other side of the river/stream/brook. The roads come up here, but they don't go on. A dead end, cul-de-sac, rural idyll: Amendoeira da Serra - off-roading. Home baked bread in the taverna de Maria overlooking the hamlet, without igreja. António bought his Citroen from a padre, as he departed these lands on the edge of Portugal... This was the end of getting into the feeling of being el Camino. From Castro Marim the feeling of being with spirit has grown as the number of cars, traffic, people has faded into a trickle. This toast is...

It happens infrequently, but just as I stumbled ankle deep into a newly formed puddle, after a 40 minute downpour from 10am as I felt the wind change and the temperature drop and put my deteriorating Páramo Halkon to cover me a little from the onslaught along the tarmaced road I'd followed from the turn off along the main Mértola/Beja route(single lane and plenty of articulated lorries), I deleted all of this morning. Which was just the usual. The café supplied me with two empanada and a good café grande. I am using the cost as a cape so it dries and I dry. I've somewhere ahead to stay this evening. And the proprietor of the café promised me nice food in 9 kilometres. Suddenly I am out of The Algarve and into the plains of Alentejo where oak trees dominate and sheep bleet in the pastures all around me. There are still a few Rock Roses but much fewer. Before that village Corto Gafo de Cima on my right I saw the plains pop into existence. Slowly, very slowly, I am beginning to un...

At 8:30am Thursday I left to join The Way after calling back to the youth hostel to drop off my keys and pick up the picnic bag. It's not there! Oh I was meant to collect at 6pm the previous night? I was snoring around then (12 hours kip as the wind chopped through the valley). So I stopped for a yogurt and a short longo and to make a sandwich, pilfer some Madeleine and collect another piece of fruit but now my backpack is weighing me down once more... ... As I am followed by all the dogs a man hollers me: stop. He comes off his plot with six fresh tangerines and three fresh lemons. So I stopped at the exit to the village, Monte Vascão, schooed away another Black and sat eat the final navel orange which I have carried in the disintegrating 40l Lacuma since just on the edge of Tavira. Now I am weighing more on my back, but just about to repeat the frontier crossing into Alentejo further along the Vascão from back in January? Every river has to be crossed... And every snake held off ...

Second pit stop at Pastelaria A Prova for more mineral water and a very delicious cheesecake. A takeaway cheese and ham sandwich - which was lovely! And I ate it leaving the village and heading off on the Caminho Nascente and leaving the GR15 as the option up ahead may be fully booked, or closed or on vacation... Casa de Paz Anne on a meeting. The casa is only available during July and August which is simply no fun in February. Nice dog. Busy lady. Carry on.  Fate. If I hadn't walked off piste, across a wheat field and alongside the river, missing both the yellow arrows and the GR signs, as they disappeared somewhere, the bus which came around the corner, just as I arrived at Foz de Odeleite, wouldn't have had me on it. And it's only 2€. Trust the Camino to open up? HI Hostel at the end of town Pousada Juventude de Alcoutim 17€ with a French cyclist. He says the weather will be different tomorrow. Yes I saw rain in the forecast too. Had a long cleansing shower. Changed into...

For the first time in ages I actually don't know what I am doing. Doing here in Portugal on a road to nowhere... Walking through the resort strewn shoreline, following the Ria Formosa to it's destiny. Passing between a giant of a manicured golf course to a town sat on the west side of the Guadiana river dissecting Iberia into The Algarve Portugal and Andalusia Spain. Yesterday was a none day. The previous day was a none day. I've felt less than zero since the argument with my mother, which appears to have broken something which can't be fixed ... And whatever I ate yesterday (cheese I think) was not good - it wasn't cold from the fridge so might've been at ambient temperature for a long time. Where do I go from here? East into Spain and the unknown (Like when I got off the bus at the Mexican/Guatamalan border and walked into the unknown)? I absolutely have no idea what the area around Seville/Huelva/Cadiz is like. I am the borderland with Spain... I don't kn...

There is always the same "essential" work being done by the night guy. Cleaning the floors. Outside in the corridor, next to the door (with its gap between it and the room I try to sleep in) and it's just gone 5am and I am a bit cold in bed too. Tiled rooms keep very little warmth. Thankfully I've a duvet and I can put on some clothes too. But now, at 5:30am I am pretty well awake. Yesterday was a long day. From yawning awake at 6am until I floated away on the lullaby being played on the honky-tonk piano by the good pianist. There were a group of three girls. I applauded one tune, when I passed by on the way to one of many toilet breaks(having drunk around 3 litres since the flight) and thought I had recognised another by Wim Mertens who is someone I'd stumbled upon during another period of my life. Mum has suggested I reflect upon the situation betwixt us. That's all I ever do. In the last year I've begun to see that I am the elephant in the room. No one ...

Day one. Nearly 7am. Dog barking outside and I switched on the phone: 6am. Running a bath. Had a cup of tea for breakfast as I forgot I have no coffee... But not on an empty stomach - still dry retching after the second cup even with three dates in my gut. Checked into the 1330 flight from LBA. Heading to Tavira. To escape myself ...the toxic me. Possibly two weeks (13 days) walking (money allowing). The prices are going up the week after... So I can't see it being possible to walk 13 days. My mum has replied to my messages this morning. I was feeling utterly pointless again because if she's disinterested in what I do then I am pointless. An utter waste of matter? 9:15. Caffé Nero for a oat latte. Cleaned boots in the river on Saturday and polished them this morning. They're nearly at the end of their lives. Same as the Páramo Halkon outer. Six days out from Tavira will get me to Beja. I can get back from Faro to either Manchester or Leeds on Monday for around €40. It's...

Awake at 5. Coffee. Dog out for a wee. She's had breakfast. Listening to Archive on Four; it's six. Thinking about what happened on Friday and Saturday. Between me, Emma and my mother. Emma added to the separation I feel went between me and my mother on Friday morning. The anniversary of my birthday... When she didn't break away from the TV, on the two occasions I came to her home, to give me any human contact on this, the day, she gave birth to me 52 years ago. Perhaps the pain was always too much to take? And Emma and I have had zero in common since she returned from Australia all those years ago as she wandered into a way of life I never sought: mortgage, flash car, salesperson... Flimflam. And I recall Emma came up to Newcastle to a party I had at the house I lived in those 3 years in West Jesmond. That was excellent. She came up with Paul Williamson and it was a brilliant party. Emma was way cooler then. Putting everything back as I found it, Including Ruby - LOL?! Wal...

Friday. Happy birthday to me? Awake at 5am. A good night's sleep after the worrying reoccurrence last night of sleeping too early and being quite awake around 9pm. But Ruby didn't bark once at all after I let her out at 7pm for toilet, etc, there were some phantom barks in my mind... So I sank into somnolence.    Breakfast at 7am. Baked beans. Homemade. Enough for another day. Rehydrating some black turtle beans for later if Glenn stays here or at my mum's? Running a bath and will do a wash shortly. Trying to slow down so Lola and Ruby can have a day light hour plus down the river as it's not rained in a few days... ... Another breakdown in our love hate relationship. Mother! Oh what a lovely day... Saturday* Glenn's asleep on the sofa. Ruby, after toilet and breakfast, is asleep on the sofa. I am sat on the sofa. Two sofa's obviously. I belong to the one with Ruby on it. Just gone 6. Slept well for a birthday evening. Didn't drink too much and nothing stron...

Tuesday* 6am. Got pinto beans on simmer. Cuddled Ruby and she's gone back to sleep. Made coffee Read lesson 30 ... (God Is In Everything I See Because God Is In My Mind). Everything is only in my mind... Boiled eggs (for me and Ruby) Ruby has come to ask for her Breakfast. She'll return to sleep afterwards? Demanding more - she's got a duck neck. She uses more energy with me? Her poos are so minute though... Apparently a raw diet does that... She's nugging her toy now and then back to rest. Added tomatoes, puree, capers Tabasco and Lea & Perrin's, and half a can of water to simmer away once more. Brewed another coffee as the Kappow blend is a bit lean for my pallet... I prefer French roast. Leaving for Portugal on the 5th, but school holidays from the 9th. So I must be over the hills (Algarve) and far away (Alentejo) by then. Beginning to feel I should set off once more the route from Faro. Not hitch. And give myself 2 weeks this occasion to reach Lisbon and bey...