Dear all…we have successfully completed our first day of walking The Camino Frances!  3o kilometers (or 18 miles) and 3500 feet of effective elevation gain in the rain, muddy valleys and slick hilltops of the Pyrenees.  Thank you for your well wishes.  Enjoy the photo from the summit/mountain pass (above).  We are going to sleep.  Don’t forget to tip your waiters and waitresses.

No…we are not going to let exhaustion and good judgment prevent us from sharing a few insights while they are still fresh in our impaired brains.

The first day is well-known as the most arduous and physically challenging Day of the Camino Frances as you climb over 1000 meters and move from France into Spain.  It took us over 8 hours to navigate the narrow, muddy up-and-down paths.  But we loved it, really loved it.  (Actually, that is what we spent dinner aligning to as we split a bottle of local red wine….and tried not to let our calves seize up.).  The reality is that conditions could have been a “bit” more favorable…but we were indeed proud of  tackling the physical challenge…and we were very happy that the weather cleared the last 2-3 hours of the walk.  Sarah led the way and chose the least muddy paths through the forests and valleys.  The great news is that there is only a 70% chance of rain tomorrow (and we are genuinely happy saying that) and most of the path is downhill.

We crossed over from France into Spain at the village of Valcarlos at about the halfway point.  This is where we started experiencing communication difficulties.  (Old joke…What to do you call a person who speaks 3 languages?  Tri-lingual.  What do you call a person who speaks 2 languages? Bi-lingual.  What do you call someone who speaks 1 language? American.).   As my previous posts reflect…I definitely fall into that camp.  So when you know little French or Spanish or the Basque local language…you become a really loud and embarrassing charades player.  But it’s not all my fault.  The Way of Saint James is “Camino de Santiago” in Spanish, “Le Chemin de St. Jacques” in French and as far as I can tell…all sides insist that their title is most accurate.  So we will do our best…in the meantime…we are expressing our gratitude with a warm smile and an enthusiastic “Domo!”

Finally, I want to mention we started today’s hike on what would have been my Dad’s 86th birthday.  Ron Smith passed away in 2005, but we all think of him often and know he’s keeping an eye out for us.  Right before we started and walked through the official starting point at the Spanish Gate in SJPDP we stopped at Eglise Notre Dame-du-Bout-du-Pont (Church of our Lady at the End of the Bridge) to light a candle in memory of him and say a prayer for a safe journey.  Based on our successful completion of today’s route…I guess I owe him another one.