Sarria--110K to go

I suppose I´ll arrive in Santiago later on this week. It will be excellent to see the other people who have made it there, though I want to make these last few days last. It´s funny to think that even though I crave a long day of 30K, I force myself to do a shorter day of 10K. I would never have believed that 5 weeks ago. I´m longing for the hard days of walking from Santiago to Finisterre. It will be quieter there, and some of the albergues are 30K apart, a good challenge.

Last night I stayed in a monastery in Samos, a gorgeous and hulking structure. We played a monk spotting game in town. I won because I got the most points, mainly because I had a conversation with a monk instead of simply seeing him. Nuns were worth double. There was vespers in the evening, but these chanting monks weren´t as good as the other ones I heard. I have standards, you see.

The night before, in a town called Triacastela, I was the English reader at a pilgrim´s mass. Mainly, I volunteered so that I could enjoy saying "I participated in a Catholic mass." Without a movie theater, mass can provide decent entertainment, particularly with all that trying to figure out when to stand and sit. There´s the added bonus of watching the German and French and Japanese and Hungarian etc etc Catholics keep up with the prayers. Besides, sometimes, mass is the only game in town.