We arrived in St. Jean Pied Port safely about 8 PM after a grueling day on SCNF trains from Paris. We arrived at Charles de Gaulle airport at 7:15 AM only to land in the midst of a railway strike, wherein the waas one (1!) ticket agent to handle 500 or so frantic passengers. We made our 10:16 train to Bayonne with minutes to spare. Changing trains at Bordeaux was an adventure but we quickly bonded with a group of others perigrinos headjng for St.Jean and "group translated" our way through information and ticketing to a standing room only 2 hour multistop rise to Bayonne where we knew we were arriving too late by minutes for the last bus to St. Jean. But miracles do happen and we msde the coach and relaxed for the ride through ever more hilly landscape as we entered the Pyrenees. We walked a half mile upon arrival to our hotel Itzalpea in the center of town. Blessed safe and dead tired after a 15 hour slog!
We had breakfast at the hotel and walking around town, somehow gathered our train friends as we walked. They were from America, Canada, Holland (lots of Dutch here), Australia and elsewhere. They say you meet your Camino family on the first day, meaning the people you will end up meeting again and again in the days and miles ahead. Today is the 12th anniversary of 9/11 and we all were a little sombered with our memories of that tragic day. We spent the night at Esprite d' Chemin, a wonderful refugio inside the ancient walls of the Citadel, a place run by a great Dutch couple thst gave us our first experience of life on the road. Along with 16 others, we shared stories of our reasons for walking the Camino and learned tips and ideas for the days ahead
So now we are back at the Itzalpea for one more night, to catch up on sleep before we start. Our plan is to take a taxi tomorrow morning to Orisson since there is no room for us at the refugio there and start our walk 18 km to Roncevalles, up 800 meters to the top of the mountains at 1450 meters. There we will spend the night at the big monestary. So far we are feeling fine and excited about whe where we are and what we're doing. It feels right. My quest for GIRLS has been fruitful so far. Yesterday's Sparkle was a beautiful red flower growing alongside the path up to a little meditation hut behind the L'esprite Chemin , place where Joan and I spent a quite half hour in the afternoon sun next to a little koi pond, talking about how fortunate we are to be here together.
