50: "You should get an umbrella."

I was very happy to arrive at a village, because I was feeling weak and hungry. I went into the "Tabacos" shop. The smaller the village, the more you find in these shops, because they are more likely to be the only place where a villager can buy anything. Often they'll also have a small bar or cafe attached.

I got a baguette, a bar of chocolate and an apple. This combination was to become central to my diet for the remainder of the pilgrimage. I could eat all three in alternate bites so that the bread wouldn't be too dry. Butter, jam, honey, and even cheese are not very convenient to eat on the fly or transport in the backpack; oranges are a mess and bananas are usually sold before they're ripe.

There was construction on the road as I headed off toward Lezama. It was still going to be a good 15 Kilometers.

One of the things that surprised me about the Basque country was how Basque it was. When people said that there are parts of Spain where people speak Basque I had assumed that they meant something similar to what we mean when we say that there are parts of Nova Scotia where people speak Gaelic. I had expected maybe a few of the old people in the villages to have memories of their language and culture. I had not expected everyone, old and young, to speak Basque as a first language -- a default language. I had not expected all the roadsigns and advertisements to be in Basque.

Another thing that surprised me, but that was to continue long after leaving Basque country, was the amount of construction work going on. Apparently Spain's northern coast was becoming a fashionable place for people to move to. There were large generic Legoland suburbs being plunked down everywhere.

Two other pilgrims caught up with me right as it began to rain. They had large umbrellas, and one of them held his over me while the other helped me as I struggled with my raincoat.

"You should get an umbrella", he said. "We're doing this walk for the third time now, and umbrellas are the way to go. You sweat too much in a raincoat. Besides, water just drips right off of it onto your pants and your boots." I had my doubts as I pictured myself trying to maneuvre an umbrella through some of the foliage of the forest trails or on the windy coastal ridges, but it was hard to argue with their experience.

"What's your name?" one of them asked.

"Marco."

"Well, I'm Julio, and that's Antonio. Ha, we're all named after Roman Emperors."

"Are you still going far?"

"To Bilbao today. We'll stop at Lezama for a meal."

And they were off. Fifteen minutes later I couldn't see them any more, but I could locate where they must be in the scenery ahead by the sound of dogs barking.

What a pain it must be to live along the Camino de Santiago, I thought. If you have a dog, it's just barking at pilgrims all day long. The dogs were annoying enough for me, but what must it be like for the owner? Especially to see all these (let's face it) tourists walking by, in many cases right through your property. The locals were surprisingly friendly about all this.

I felt somewhat defeated because these two men had just breezed by me like that. I kept telling myself that this wasn't a race, but it was still hard not to notice that my pace must be abnormally slow. I tried to push myself for a while, reasoning that I would be happy to be at the pilgrim shelter a little earlier for a nice shower, but my knee started hurting again and I lapsed to my accustomed tempo.