Wednesday, June 29, 2016
Leon to Villar de Mazarife (Villavante)
Day 29
On our last morning in Leon, who should appear in the hotel’s breakfast room but Father Pascal, the priest who gave the Pilgrim’s Blessing the night before. We chatted for a bit. He is one of eight priests at St. Isidoro’s. That sounds like a lot, but a number of them go out and serve at rural parishes that have no resident priest. In a last walk around Leon, I saw an ancient plaza whose cobblestones appear to be just the way they were hundreds of years ago. For additional photos, go to our page for June 29.
While James rested, I took a last walk around the city to see a few places I hadn’t had a chance to see. Then with James, we took a bus to Villar de Mazarife, where we had lunch, and which was our scheduled stopping point for the day. Our hotel for the night was actually farther down the road, in Villavante. The hotel owner picked us up and drove us to his place, a charming Rural Hotel. There we had dinner family style with other guests: a Spanish couple from Mallorca; a Mexican- American couple from California; and three Americans. It was a very convivial evening, conducted in Spanish and English, with lots of jokes and stories. The Mexican-American pilgrim is a dedicated marathoner, but he said that the Camino is taxing even his endurance, and his wife had outpaced him that day. James’s foot is still hurting, and I told him that I think it is time to seek out a doctor, but he doesn’t want to. (When we lunched with Veronica and Randy back in Reliegos, they each said that they had already been to the hospital twice. Obviously pilgrims are giving doctors in northern Spain a lot of business, and in particular a lot of experience with foot problems!)
Steps: 13,998
There are additional photographs at:
June 29, 2016: Leon to Villar de Mazarife (Villavante)
The Half-Fast Camino Walking* Club 