Astorga, or, the Meseta Concludes

Because I'd pushed on yesterday, I had a choice to make today. I could either stop after a short 15km in Astorga, by all accounts a very lovely city, or continue on an extra 20km to reach Rabanal, cutting an extra day off my arrival in Santiago. I decided to play it by ear, and set off for Astorga.

The Meseta wasn't going to make it easy to get out though. When I left my albergue in the morning, the Spanish weather bureau in León had issued a wind warning, and I was walking straight into it. Even with my wind shell on over my fleece, it was cold. Thankfully the next town was only a few kilometers away, but heading out alone into the dark with the wind buffeting me at every step was certainly a unique and memorable experience.

At breakfast, I once again ran into the same couple I'd met on the road yesterday, and chatted with them a bit, since they were in the same dilemma as me. Halfway through breakfast, another familiar face walked in, and I got to catch up unexpectedly with yet another person I thought I wouldn't see again. Truly, one of the coolest parts of the Camino is the way you keep running into the same people over and over. And one of the most unfortunate parts of trying to make up time is that you have fewer and fewer such encounters.

The rest of the walk into Astorga was quick and easy, and upon arrival I spent a few hours looking at Roman ruins, visiting a castle designed by Gaudi, touring the cathedral, and buying some of their famous chocolate. After that, I decided that I was feeling pretty good and would rather press on than spend the night.

Astorga is the traditional end to the meseta, and I could feel that as I walked. The landscape began to be more heavily forested as it started to slope upwards forward the mountains in the distance. At one point I saw a deer, but it crossed the road too fast and too far away for me to do more than see its silhouette.

Then, a complication. As I was walking, my left foot caught a stone at just the wrong angle to kick it under my right foot. I stepped down on it, slipped, and felt it in my knee. It wasn't immediately painful, but I was immediately aware that it wasn't happy with what I'd just done. I kept walking, testing my knee each step to make sure it didn't feel like it was getting worse, and put a lot of effort into ensuring my posture and gait were as correct as I could make them, to stress it as little as possible. On most days I would probably not have been as worried about this, as it didn't feel major, but the problem was that tomorrow was the longest downhill of the entire journey, so even a small knee issue could easily compound. It kept letting me walk without issue, for now, and so I decided there was nothing for it but to rest it as best as I could for the night, then wait and see how it felt in the morning.

Upon arriving in town, I ran into yet another familiar face, a man who'd shared a room with me and a bunch of my friends a while back. I agreed to meet up with him after finding a place to stay, then headed out to look for just that. Somehow, despite being almost totally deserted, nearly every albergue in town was booked full. Eventually I found a place a little ways off the main street where, although their albergue was full, I was able to secure a reasonably priced private room. I figured it wouldn't hurt to get a good night of sleep before the hard day tomorrow, either.

Once I was showered, I headed back to the bar and met up with the folks there. We chatted for a bit, then headed into town where we were told there was Gregorian chant happening. It took us a bit of looking to find the church, and we slipped in apologetically, as service was already underway. The monks were chanting in Latin, but helpfully they had provided a guide in multiple languages to follow along. The others I came with decided this wasn't their scene, and slipped out after a few minutes, but I enjoyed the service. The homily was even in English, which was extremely kind of them.

After that was dinner, and I was unable to turn down the promise of salmon at one of the two restaurants in town. It was fine, but nothing like the salmon I'd had last time on the Camino. I might be chasing that high for a while. After dinner I went back to my (private!) room, and settled in for a good night's sleep, which was exactly what I got.