Today has to be the most glorious days of my walking life.

I didn’t set out to walk 41kms – it just kind of happened. But I have to say, it was truly memorable.

I made a big mistake though with my intuition, but we’ll get to that later.

I woke up late – 7am. And what with my repacking my bag and general rooting around, I didn’t leave Carrion until 8am. The light was flat and uninteresting. High cloud, which once again was fantastic for walking, but uninspiring for photography.

Today was defined by a 17km stretch from Carrion to the next town. No villages in between, which meant no food or drinks. Everyone had stocked up at the supermercado the previous evening, including me. I bought two pears, a huge apple, some sliced ham, some sliced cheese, some dried apricots, and a baguette. Also 750mls of water to augment the 600mls I always carry.

I had a quick coffee at a bar, then another one, then left.

I dawdled leaving town, trying to wrench a half decent photo out of the crap light. I had no set destination – vaguely I was thinking of a town about 27kms away. Of course because I was late leaving, and because I was slow, all my friends had either left before me, or soon overtook me.

But as I got out of town, and the path stretched out ahead, something very strange happened. I realised I had no pain! I was walking freely, and quite swiftly. It was cool, there was no sun, the countryside was breathtakingly beautiful, and I felt great!

I felt the best I’d felt the entire Camino. Because I’d slept in, I was fully rested, but walking without pain was a completely new experience for me. I was walking with the ease and joy and speed that I’d been doing in my training hikes back home.

The other thing about today – I passed the halfway mark!

At around about the pace where I estimated the halfway point was, I felt a small stone drop into my boot. How did that happen, I wondered. It was aggravating my little toe something fierce so I found a place to sit down by the side of the track. I took off my boot, took off my sock, but couldn’t find the damn stone.

I then realised that I had a blister on the bottom of my little toe that was as big as the toe itself! It hadn’t been a stone I’d felt, it was this bulbous blister.

I put some Sellic 15 on it, a lubricant, (thanks Wayfarer!), put my socks back on (liner and Icebreaker merino), put my Asolo boot on again and set off. I wasn’t going to use Compeed after what it did to my heel blister. I was just going to ignore it.

It was as though the Camino, at the halfway point, was throwing one last bouncer at me. (Cricketing term). I let it go through to the keeper. (Another cricketing term.)

I wasn’t going to let a measly blister spoil my wonderful day.

It hurt, for a while, and then when it realised that I wasn’t going to stop and bawl my eyes out, the hurt went away. And I returned to my Pain Free Zone.

I got to the 17km village and kept walking. When I’d stopped to take my boot off, (about 11am), I’d had something to eat, so there was need for me to stop. I was feeling strong, and not at all tired.

At about 1:30pm. I stopped to have some lunch. I sat on the edge of a stone bridge, pulled out my Opinel knife, cut open the baguette and had a sandwich of ham and cheese. There were no pilgrims on the trail. But there were several Cuckoo birds. There have been Cuckoo birds all along the Camino!

Just a side note – most pilgrims stop walking about 2pm each day. That’s when the albergues open, and they like then to do their laundry and relax. So if you’re walking after 2pm or 2:30pm, chances are you’ll have the path to yourself.

I then got to the 27km town, (Terradillos de Templarios) where everyone had stopped, but I was having such a great time walking I decided to keep going. By this time, it was about 3:30pm, and other than the 15 minute blister break and a 15 minute Cuckoo bird break, I’d not stopped and rested.

What kept me going was that the light had become very dramatic. Rain was coming, there were big dark clouds roiling, and it was such a lovely day to walk! i was having a blast!

When some rain did start to fall I stopped and put on my jacket, and my rain cover for my backpack. There were two more villages coming up, and I figured that if I wanted to, i could stay in one of those.

I met up with two sisters from the US, and we walked for a few kms together, but they decided to stay in the albergue in the first village, Moratinos. That to them represented about 30kms for the day.

I kept going. I was still feeling great, the country was looking amazing, and I was still having fun!

I decided to get something to eat in the 2nd village, San Nicolas del Real Camino. In the town’s albergue/restaurant, I ordered a ham and cheese sandwich, and two Diet Cokes with ice.

I got talking to a fellow there, his name was Ben. He was a retired chemical engineer from South Africa, and we very quickly connected, and he started explaining his theories of how there are errors built into the cosmos.

Interesting guy.

I would have liked to talk to him more. And then Boris from Slovakia walked in. Boris and I became friends after I did a video for his daughter telling her what a “true” pilgrim he was!

I had it in my mind though to to go the next town, about 7kms away, called Sahagun. I’d seen pics of this wonderful medieval place, and it called to me.

Big mistake.

I overrode my intuition.

I arrived in Sahagun at 7:30pm. I’d been walking 10 and a half hrs, excluding a total of about an hour during the day for rests. I didn’t walk 41kms to prove anything, I did it because it was so beautiful walking in the afternoon, all by myself, and because I still felt good.

But the walk into Sahagun was ugly, through the commercial zone, and I ended up in a place where the receptionist was rude, and the room has a view of a brick wall.

I should have listened to my intuition and stayed at the previous town, and talked more with Ben and Boris.

All things to take on board, and learn from.

Here is a selection of the pilgrims I met today:

Fernado from Australia and a lass from Romania who had spirited discussion with me on intuition –

Nolbert and Josef from Germany – (more on them in a separate post!)

Two lovely ladies from Alberta Canada, both 68 and ripping it!

Frannie and Lucy from America. Frannie lives on a boat in Sausalito, and Lucy is soon to become a doctor in New Orleans.

Ben, the retired chemical engineer from South Africa.

Again, today was one of the most sublime days of my “walking” life!

I hope I don’t pay for it tomorrow!