When Fabian and I arrived in Caldas del Rei, where Katie had a hotel, we checked into an albergue. We met up with a South African couple Fabian has met when he was at a different albergue than Katie and I. The couple's names were Dom and Paul, and they were staying in the same albergue. The albergue was connected to a bar and restaurant, owned by the same person. We waited at our table for about half an hour as the hostess walked by several times. She hadn't stopped.
"Maybe she thinks we're just hanging out?" Dom said.
After 30 min, Fabian nicely waved his hand to get her attention. She snapped at him in Spanish, "I see you."
Fifteen minutes later, she returned and said "dime" abruptly. I choked back a laugh. Fabian ordered a bottle of wine with four glasses.
"What did she say?" Dom asked me.
"Tell me," I said. "'Dime' is 'tell me.'"
We all cackled.
The hostess brought the bottle, we thanked her. We each had a glass. It was getting late, and we all had a long walk tomorrow. We waited to get her attention to pay for 45 min. Nothing. Then, she came out, and in Spanish said "okay chicos, you have to pay now, we're closed."
Fabian paid her. I translated to the South Africans, cackling that she'd called us "chicos" (kids).
"We've been trying to pay for 45 minutes!" Dom exclaimed, laughing. Fabian tried to tip the hostess anyway, and she rejected it. I don't know if she knew what it was (tipping isn't common here), but it was also hilarious.
The lights shut off. This woman was not playing around. (Yes, she was also loudly cleaning up the rooms an hour before checkout the next morning.) "Time for the chicos to get up I guess," Fabian joked.
Katie texted me that morning that she was feeling better but would wait one more day to start walking. She was going to taxi ahead to Padrón, and then walk the next day. I had already made her and I a hostel reservation for O Milladoiro, 7 km outside of Santiago. I confirmed the plan before leaving the albergue and losing wifi.
As Fabian and I stopped along the walk, I reconnected to wifi when I could to check in with Katie. She was meeting people whom she had read about in my blog!
The Camino famous Marriett and Shirley:
When she met a man from Belgium who lived in Spain, she thought that situation sounded familiar.
“Wait, do you do home projects for your wife to be able to go on trips?” She asked him.
“Yes!” He said surprised.
He was Frank from Belgium.
I was worried about Katie being in hotel by herself again. But turns out she was in an albergue, not a hotel. I checked her Instagram story.
Yeah, she’s good.
Fabian said the man kissing her on the cheek looked like his father.
"Oh, you want me to be your step mom?" Katie asked.
Obviously the man was not Fabian's father, but he has since been calling her "Mama Katie" and she's been calling him "son."
When we arrived in O Milladoiro, Katie padded out of the albergue in flip flops, rubbing her eyes. She’d clearly just taken a nap, a first for her on this trip.
“I just woke up,” she confirmed.
“How’re you feeling?” I asked.
“I’m here, I made it,” she said. She mentioned something about carrying her bag.
“YOU CARRIED YOUR BAG?!” I scolded.
“I’d rather not walk than not carry it,” she said. “I know it’s my pride, but I can’t help it.”
It’s a common thing now for pilgrims to ship their bags ahead instead of carry them. We have met some people who do it every day just because they don’t want to carry it, and it drives Katie nuts. But we’ve also met injured and elderly people, and this feature makes the trail possible for them. Not for Katie though.
“Oh and I ate raw chicken today,” she said.
“What?!”
Apparently the only restaurant by this hostel literally served her raw chicken. She took one bite, realized it, and told the waiter. He grabbed the plate and refried it. Such excellent service we’ve had here in Spain...
“So if I have salmonella tomorrow, you know why,” she said. I think we both had flashbacks of her food poisoning in Peru.
“So for dinner, I take it we’re not going back to that restaurant?” I said.
“Hell no.”
We went to the supermarket and bought some food to make pitas at the albergue. When we returned, Fabian, Dom, Paul, and Marcus (another German we’d met once before) were all hanging out. They invited us to sit with them. We ate and shared wine for hours and were definitely the loudest group in the albergue. None of us, besides Katie and I, had made reservations together, but all of our bunks happened to be next to each other (except Marcus who is bougie and had a hotel).
For the first time in a while, I woke up early enough to walk with Katie. We wanted to re-enter Santiago together. For the first time on this whole trip, I woke up full of energy and Katie was drag assing.
“I stole all of your energy,” I told her.
“Apparently,” she said.
I waited in the albergue common room for her, and bought coffee out of a machine that I actually DIDN’T break. I waited for her so we could walk the last 7 km to Santiago, once again.
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