Roncesvalles to Zubiri

Saturday, October 16

¡Saludos!

To return to where I left off -- posting this from Pamplona

October 14 -- after crossing the Pyrenees we stayed the night in Roncesvalles at a delighful inn called La Posada. The steam heat in the room was great for drying some laundry! For dinner, The management sat all the pilgrims at the same table and about eight of us chatted -- English being the lingua franca most of the time, but we also lapsed into Spanish periodically. Our table included a French airline dispatcher in his early 40´s from Paris who had done the camino before, a Dutchman from The Hague - about the same age -- who was on a bicycle and camping in Roncevalles, an Australian mechanical engineer in his 30´s who was on an extended holiday due to his firm being bought out, and two middle-aged couples from Navarra, Spain.

I mention the ages because John and I were both amazed at how tired the younger guys were, how much they talked about the difficulty of the ascent and descent, and how all of them were aching. John and I both felt pretty good, and neither of us was had an aches. But we also had very light and comfortable packs -- mine being even lighter because John very graciously was carrying some of my stuff. John, of course, has great strength and stamina, but I can only be grateful that I trained by hiking toward Peak 2 and 3 several times a week, hiked out to Hidden Lake twice -- always with a pack-- and did Wolverine to the top, my first time to summit. Previously I had made it as far as the cairn. After doing Wolverine with a pack, the Pyrenees were not nearly as daunting as I had imagined. The younger fellows were all carrying packs that were heavy to begin with -- and lots of stuff. While in St. Jean, we had watched at the Pilgrims´Office as one of the staff had helped one young man empty his pack and started suggesting to him what stuff he should send home by mail and send poste restante to Santiago. The woman helping us also weighed our packs and was pleased -- they actually hand out information about pack weight, gear, etc. Gettin caught in the pass because of snow or fog happens -- and there was one part of the route that you could easily miss in bad weather and end up going over the wrong pass.

The next morning we took a few moments to see the ossuary that supposedly holds Roland´s bones and those of his fallen comrades. It also holds the bones of pilgrims who died at Roncesvalles.

October 15 -- Roncevalles to Zubiri -- we were mostly descending and did about 14 miles that day. Those of us who had left St. Jean the same day ran into each other on the street. And we saw our friends on horseback again. A couple crossed the Pyrenees riding beautiful horses -- truly a marvelous spectacle to see them galloping across the grassy pastures and up the pass. They are from Cognac, France --yes, like the drink -- and had started in Cognac.

Zubiri is a tiny town and we happened on an unprepossessing looking hotel. Inside was warm and delightful -- very rustic with lots of antiques and a very reasonable price! The room had a steam radiator and it was on! Did I mention it´s been colder than last year and colder than we had anticipated? Luckily we have layers and when we are walking it is not as noticeable. But I have worn cap and gloves a lot! Bright overcast, some sun, and no rain! So we are not complaining. I am running out of 1 euro coins for the machine -- so I have to stop shortly!