Made it to Cercedilla

Well, day three is done. I´ve had two really nice days of walking, with a huge downpour all night but so far not a drop of rain while walking. Yesterday I had a long-ish walk to the town of Manzanares el Real, where there is an incredible castle -- according to the pamphlet, the best example of XV Century Castilian military architecture. I got the reduced price ticket, not sure whether it was for being a pilgrim or for being old, and I was able to spend an hour or so without my pack, walking around and climbing turrets.

As I left the castle, I saw two obvious pilgrims, my first. They are both Spaniards, and know all the ins and outs of the albergues (the places pilgrims sleep), which I was kind of confused about. They told me we could call the village priest at 3 and he would give us the key to the albergue that was 3 km out of town, high up on a sacred rock, in the back of a little "ermita" (I suppose it´s something like hermitage in English). What a great place, though a little far from town. We even figured out how to turn on the heat. I had my own room of 15 bunk beds, totally quiet. There are views of incredible austere mountains and boulders all around. This is the Sierra de Guadarrama, lots of Spanish Civil War history here, where Hemingway wrote.

This morning we packed up early, it had been raining all night, but we were lucky. At 7:15, not a drop was falling. And I was also lucky that one of the two guys volunteered to take the key the extra 2 kms back to the priest´s house. Seems like a silly way to do things, having the pilgrims go a total of 4 km out of their way to return a key. But the priest is a bit "unusual," we were told, and if he doesn´t like you he doesn´t give you the key at all!

 

Albergue in Manzanares on the Pena Sacra

 

                                             View of the Guadarrama mts. from the albergue

Today´s walk was through meadows with lots of streams, marshes, wildflowers, just beautiful, with the mountains in the background. We´re in a mountain town called Cercedilla, which is more than anything a slew of summer homes and tacky apartments with a little old town center that has this internet place. Our albergue doesn´t open till 5 pm, so we will have to eat and buy groceries before heading out there. Once again it´s way out of town, another 3 km or so, so I will not be coming back to town today! This is so different than the other caminos, where the albergues are right on the way, all you have to do is turn to get off the camino and enter their door.

I was glad I met these two guys, they met on the camino about ten years ago, and they walk together every year. One is an Asturian miner, who spent his working life going down into mines (in Spain, miners get three years´credit of work for two actual years of work for purposes of social security and pesnions). The other worked in nuclear power plants and has some stories to tell -- he was sent on detail to Chernobyl and has also been to Three Mile Island. I don´t think I´d like that particular line of work. These two are what is called "pre-retired" in Spain. What that means, I was astonished to find out, is that they are not working but still receiving their entire salary. When they reach retirement age, they then go on the pension, but till then they enjoy full benefits with no work. I´m not really sure why this is in the employer´s interest, but they say it´s fairly common. They have been walking a month a year for the last ten years and like me were looking for alternatives to the busy Camino Frances. They are not going the same way I am, but we will probably walk together for at least another 7 or 8 days.

When I opened my email today, I saw with horror that I had 85 new email messages -- I was expecting to find some bad news, but the source of all these emails was one of my favorite topics, pension reform. It looks like the Illinois legislature is going to adopt some very serious cuts to our pensions going forward, surely it will bring about a lawsuit, but who knows what will finally make it out of our dysfunctional legislature. Luckily I had already written a legal memo on this particular bill (which we thought was dead), because otherwise I would be unable to give my most sagacious legal opinion from here in Cercedilla!

Tomorrow up and over the mountain pass, I think it´s 2000 or 2500 feet, so it won´t be too awful. Should be beautiful as well, because between this town and tomorrow´s destination, which is the town of Segovia, there is nothing, no fountains, no bars, no towns, nada. 31 km of mountain bliss, I´m expecting!

Thanks for all the news and encouragement, I am well and hope you all are too. Abrazos.