Day 15: Hot and Heavy | Alex Carruthers

The Meseta.  It's hot.  It's flat.  And it's hot.

But we're over halfway to the land of milk and honey.  We're over halfway to the Big Dawg.  The Grande Perro.  We're over halfway to the one and only Santiago de Compestella.

In the words of iconic American hero Thomas the Tank Engine, "I think I can."

Today, we hiked 24 kilometers.  This seems like a piece of cake if you look at our track record.  But this was not an easy 24.  The majority of the hike was by a highway.  We have those in America.  They have them in Spain too.  The Spanish and Americans must have coordinated because they are identical.  And they are not prettier in Spain.  We had planned to go 28 kilometers today but due to exhaustion and the hot sun we decided to stop 4 kilometers shorter in a town called Sahugun, Spain.  It's a pretty big town and is kind of cool.

It's not that we are not grinding.  We are.  Don't worry.  We figured that it may be in our best interest to be able to rest this whole afternoon and drink a lot of water so that we will be ready for the Meseta tomorrow.  It was a very intentional, calculated decision that will pay dividends in the future of our hike and our team: The Memphis Pilgrims.

So yes, maybe you could say that today we lost a battle.  But you just have to think about the big picture while also thinking about each step.  The War is not over.


Pictures. Alex is by a statue in Sahugun with an arch in the background (left). This is a wine cellar in a hill that a small town uses to store its wine.  It sounds more like a cover up story to us.  Looks more like Bilbo Baggins and the boys are hiding out there (right).

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