El Senderismo

Alright, well I had been planning on writing about my trip to Madrid, but then I got sick and spent all of my time this week either in class, eating, or sleeping. So the abbreviated version is that Madrid is an amazing city, I met some great people, and I crammed everything possible and then some into my 3 days there (and then got sick...big shock).

Now I'm packing my bag to get ready to hike part of el Camino de Santiago, a pilgrimage route across Northern Spain. I'll be going with one of my classes, aptly titled El Camino de Santiago, and we'll be spending 5 days hiking, 1 day exploring Santiago de Compostela, and about 26 hours sitting/sleeping/bonding/going crazy on a bus. For anyone interested in checking it out on google maps (this probably applies more to you parent and grandparent types than to you college hooligans, I would imagine...), this is our itinerary:

We're taking off early tomorrow morning from Alicante and driving for 12 hours or so until we get to Triacastela, where we'll spend the night. Sunday we'll drive just a bit down the road to Sarria and start our hike from there, going 22 km to Portomarín. Monday we'll do 25 km to Palas de Rei, and then Tuesday another 25 km to Ribadiso. Wednesday is 21 km over to Arca, and a potential laundry day (clean clothes while hiking? how bizarre). Thursday we'll do 15 km to Monte do Gozo, drop our stuff at a hostel there, and then do the final 3 km to Santiago de Compostela where we'll visit the church, get our compostelas (certificate for anyone who has walked 100+ km of the Camino), and have dinner. Friday we'll wander around Santiago de Compostela in the morning/early afternoon, and then hop on a bus and spend the next 14 hours or so driving back to Alicante, arriving around 6 in the morning. Oof. I'll have Saturday to recover (and watch the start of the Volvo Ocean Race, if I'm awake for it) and then Sunday-Wednesday my parents will be in Alicante before we take off for Granada Thursday-Sunday. So basically, tomorrow is the start of two very full but very fun weeks.

Things I'm somewhat disappointed about:
- we're going to be driving straight through Madrid on the way to/from the Camino, and stopping just outside the city for food both times, but there's not going to be any time to actually go into the city and play.
- the weather forecast says it's going to rain pretty much the entire time we're up there. I can't say that's a surprise, though.
- my bus pass is about to run out and I have to go buy a new one.

Things I'm really excited about:
- Camino!
- Parents coming to Spain and us going to Granada and Sevilla!
- Euro-dollar exchange rate going down again!