Upstairs, Downstairs

After my first night here I got moved into a room upstairs. I’m pretty sure it was because I forgot to put my device in until after 1 a.m. and Cloti could not sleep because I snored so loud. Cloti went back to Barcelona today, so I moved back downstairs. The bed isn’t as big or as comfortable, but I am right next to the router, so I have the possibility of working. Upstairs the connectivity was too bad.

The good news is that I am in the room with the mural, so it will be easier for me to work on it. Here is the mural as it is now.

Instead of lumping all my entries together, I am going to separate them out. This one is done.

Update

I haven’t posted in a while, so I will have missed some things. Carlos and I worked in the garden the second day and got it ready for planting. I made Mexican Chicken Soup, which turned out to be a big hit. The third day Cloti made lentils (lentajes) for lunch, and there was so much food that we told Stef the cooking was done until we had eaten down what we had. But last night Cloti showed me how to make tortilla de patata for us to take on our excursion today.

Antonio told me you had to dice the potatoes and soak them overnight, but Cloti just diced and fried them with onions right away. Then she mixed the potato/onion mixture with six beaten eggs and a little milk. She didn’t have a tortilla pan either. She flipped the tortilla onto a plate then slid it into the pan to cook on the other side. She did this twice.

On Friday I bought some chalk and started fixing the large black tree in the mural a volunteer started a few months ago. The tree was knobby and kind of…threatening. Yesterday I finished the drawing and painted over the black bits I don’t want with white. Tomorrow I will do another coat and possibly cover the white with the red and yellow of the sunset.

I should have taken a picture of what it looked like before I started.

Today we went on an excursion. Stef asked if I would contribute to the gas, and I said of course I would. We went all around the mountains, to a village where the newest house was over 200 years old. In a different village we saw a church that was established in 608 and reconstructed in 1997. I told Stef it was hard for me to wrap my head around the idea that that church was over 1,000 years older than my country.

Here is the church

So many of the villages here are dying. The 200 years or more place has a total of ten people living in it. Pola de Allande, one of the larger villages, is full of the elderly. Our house is one of the few where younger, more open-minded people live, according to Stef. I believe it. In the first village we toured, Montse said the house where it said, “Se Vende,” (For Sale) was 50,000 euros. The thing is, it would probably cost that much again to make it livable.

And I could only live here from April to October. I arrived in the middle of March, in Madrid which is south and not in the mountains, and I was cold practically the entire time. I still get cold here, especially at night.

That is actually one of the reasons I haven’t been posting. During the day I’m busy, and at night I’m too cold.

As long as I am updating, I will tell you guys about the Market of San Miguel. My guide to the Royal Palace referred to it as the “temple of gastronomy.” I was so sorry I wasn’t very hungry when I was there. I did get myself a fruit skewer.

It was so good!

They had almost every kind of food, from all over Spain, that you can imagine. I plan on going back early, just so I can go there and eat.

Here are pictures from our excursion today.

Carlos, Montse, me, & Stef
Cloti, Montse, Stef, me, & Carlos
This is a wild horse from a herd near the village. Can you see her baby?
A “cascada” near the dam
The dam
From the top of the dam
A place where the Virgin Mary supposedly appeared. This picture was taken from the dam.

Stef says at this time of year the road I am standing on should be underwater. The water is supposed to be up to the trees in spring. Asturias, here in the mountains, will be okay, but he says he doesn’t know what the south will do.

First Day

We got a lot done today. There is a woman here they call “Cloti,” which I suspect is short for “Clothilde.” Not a very Spanish name, but that is all she speaks that I know of. Cloti is a force of nature. There was a room Stef said would take days to clean out. Cloti got it done in one.

I cooked dinner, and everyone enjoyed it, although I didn’t make enough. Stef bought mozzarella instead of parmesan, so I couldn’t put cheese in the butter sauce, but that turned out to be okay because he is doesn’t eat cheese. It is hard cooking in metric when you are used to imperial. Next time I come to Spain, I may bring more equipment.

Today was also Stef’s birthday. He turned 46 today. He said it was a quiet birthday but a good one. I’m glad. He is a nice man. He deserves good things.

Carlos and the Bull

There is a young man from Germany who is staying here. I thought he had latinized his name, like I did with “Juanita,” but no, he is genuinely called Carlos. He and Stef are the only ones who speak English, and my Spanish was better than his. This morning. I swear, he is improving by the hour. But he is working harder at it than I am.

Anyway, we were talking and I told him my story of an encounter with a bull. The story was prompted by this.

Not only do you not really see that many sheep in Texas, you definitely don’t see them downtown!

So Carlos told me about HIS encounter with some bulls.

But first some info about Carlos. He is only nineteen. He graduated at seventeen and has been hitchhiking off and on ever since. He also is with Workaway, but he will only stay a week or so.

Anyway, Carlos told me that a year or so ago he had a hammock. He and some friends camped near a meadow and he hung the hammock from some nearby trees. They all slept without incident and in the morning they were making pasta in a pot on their campfire. Suddenly the owner of the field opened a gate and here came about 30 bulls running straight for them! They all ran away, leaving all their stuff, and the bulls ate the pasta. They had to wait until all the bulls had left to go get their things.

It’s not a camino story but it is a story. My first for the new book. I hope to get many more.

First Night

We ate at 8:30 then everyone was in bed by 9:30. I guess that helps my being hungry at night. I got an extra blanket, so I did my favorite thing. Slept warm in a cold room. Now I am going to see what useful things I can do today.

Tineo

Tineo is a small town and how it merits a four star hotel that calls itself a “Palacio” is beyond me. I’ve spent most of the day in the lobby charging and updating, too far from the router to get any work done and without a Brenham VPN anyway. I’m starting to suspect I should have gotten one before I left but I thought one was built in because the computer said I was in Brenham even when I was in Navasota. I’ll investigate more when I’m at Stef’s place. He is supposed to have good WIFI.

Tineo is on the Camino Primitivo and here is proof.

The mark of the Camino

I walked around a bit but it is threatening rain and I’m not used to the altitude. I don’t know if Pola de Allande is in the mountains but Tineo sure is!

This was a really cool sight.

Don’t they look like stairs to an enchanted garden?

Stef is going to be on the same bus to Pola de Allande I will. There is only one bus from here to there a day. This is good because I won’t have to pay for international data to know where to get off or to find his house. And I found out why I couldn’t buy a ticket straight there. Tickets can only be bought from the driver.

I went to the station around 12:30 to purchase a ticket, and the ticket window was not only dark and empty but clearly abandoned. So I went upstairs to see if it was there (although I didn’t think so,) and a woman asked if she could help me. She didn’t speak English, but managed to make me understand I will get the ticket from the driver. So I am back in the hotel sipping Coke Zero and waiting.

The picture of the ridiculously expensive Coke Zero won’t upload. Let’s just say I could have gotten twice as much from a grocery for 0.50 euros less. I figure this is rent for the chair. I’m debating whether to have a bocadillo before the bus. On the one hand, I’m pretty sure Stef hasn’t eaten, and I don’t want to get out of sync, but on the other I don’t want a repeat of yesterday. I didn’t eat for over twelve hours and I got REALLY hungry. I decided that starvation has to be one of the worst deaths out there.

Drowning and death by fire I think are worse, but far less common. So many people feel what I felt yesterday, without the prospect of remedy if they could just get to their hotel. How do they do it? How can we stop it? What do I do with this lesson?

A View from My Window

Missing the bus had one advantage. My view went from this…

My view from the hotel in Madrid

to this.

My view from the hotel in Tineo

Now granted, there is nothing to do in Tineo, but I plan to park myself in the lobby till it’s time for the bus and try to work. Switched my laptop from the big mochilla to the small one. It is less protected but more accessible. And now I have to go check out.

It Was the Right Bus

I am now ensconced in my hotel In Tineo. Stef suggested I stay in Madrid but I had already bought the tickets and booked this place. It’s very different from my last place.

Like…night and day different

The bathroom almost makes up for the bed, which is as hard as a rock. (The picture of the bed won’t load for some reason.) Had I the money, I might travel with my own mattress. I’m glad I’m a) exhausted and b) the possessor of sleeping pills. I’m gonna need ‘em. I hope the beds are soft at Stef’s place.