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Day 8, to Ventosa
April 23, 2026 I left Logroño today once again with Zazi, in the dark, shortly after 6 AM. I again did not need to use my snazzy headlamp because of all the street lights. Walking out of the city, we went through a nature preserve. It has lots of pathways, native plants, birds and red…
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Days 5 & 6, Estella & Sansol
20 & 21 April, 2026 It’s been hot! And these two last days most of the trails were in open country or through towns. No shade. Hot! I don’t do well in heat. A number of times these last two days, especially on Monday on the walk to Estella, I wanted to quit. I wondered…
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Day 4, to Puente La Reina
April 19, 2026 On Sunday, April 19, I started walking at about 6:20. I wanted to use my spiffy new headlamp, but I was in a big city, Pamplona, and the streetlights were more than enough to see the way. From my albergue, the Camino went uphill into Pamplona’s Old Town (Casco Histórico). It was…
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Days 2 & 3, Zubirí & Pamplona
April 17 & 18, 2026 It’s been a couple busy days. On Friday, April 17, I walked from Roncesvalles to Zubirí, about 22 kms. On Saturday, April 18, I walked from Zubirí to Pamplona, about 21 kms. It always ends up being longer distances by the end of the day, especially with walking around town…
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Day 1 – over the Pyrenees to Roncesvalles
Thursday 16 April 2026 This is my first day of walking. It likely is one of the more difficult days because you have to cross the Pyrenees from France to Navarra in Spain. There are two routes, the Ruta de Napoleón and the Valcarlos route. I chose the Napoleon Route because it was such a…
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Day 0 – St Jean Pied de Port
On Wednesday, 15 April, I went by train from Bayonne to St Jean Pied de Port. St Jean is a beautiful town at the foot of the Pyrenees, on the French side. It is also the traditional starting point of the Camino Francés, one of the many Caminos to Santiago de Compostela. I stayed at…
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Calgary to Paris to Bayonne
The flight to Paris was uneventful, quite peaceful actually. I had a window seat looking out right over the middle of the wing, so mostly I saw sky and the airplane wing. The sun went down at the back of the wing at 8:07 PM on Monday, and rose again at the front of the…
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Leaving Home
Leaving is hard. Not physically, but emotionally. Home is known, comfortable, beautiful. But now I am at the Calgary airport waiting for my overnight flight to Paris. Ron and I left home yesterday. It was a foggy, drizzly day: We drove to Vernon, a city about 1/2 hour north of Kelowna. I am flying out of…
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Beautiful Memories
I’ve been looking over the pictures I made last year on the Camino Francés and making other pictures from them, pictures that look more like paintings. Even though they do not look exactly like what the places or flowers or things looked like originally, they are an attempt at giving back what I saw, what…
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Camino 2026
Mid April of this year I will start walking my second Camino de Santiago, again the Camino Francés. This time I will walk it by myself. I have 35 days to do it, from April 16 to May 20. I feel like I have to, although I haven’t figured out why, not yet. Just like…