In Santa Catarina

I am now in a town that I walked through in 2000, and again several years later. It is about 10 km outside Astorga. When we walked through it before, it was a totally abandoned town, and now there are restaurants, albergues, and bars. There are several First Communion luncheons-dinners here in the albergue, so who knows when we will get a bite to eat. We are at the bottom of the food chain here, I think.

Today we left the meseta. I walked with two other peregrinos until Astorga, where we enjoyed the Gaudi palace, the castillo, and a nice long café con leche in the plaza, just watching peregrinos arrive. We had about a 28 km walk to this small town, and here we sit waiting for the rain to move to the east and leave us alone. The albergue is quite nice, there are showers with hot water and no bunk beds -- so everyone has a "bottom bunk", which is quite nice.

I have met a nurse from Santa Rosa, which is pretty special, since danagrina lives in Santa Rosa. I´m hoping to hook those two up. The nurse, Paulette, told me that my toes look like they have gangrene, which gave me pause, but I am confident that´s not what they have,

Now we start the mountain walking. The day after tomorrow I will leave the Camino Francés and start on the camino del invierno, probably all alone but hopefully with someone else. This is a beautiful town and I am so happy and thankful to be here.