Day 4 -Pampolna!!!!

Day 4: Pamplona!!!

After Wednesday’s little hotel blunder, I was so grateful to get a private room from a last-minute cancellation at an albergue that also offered an official pilgrim dinner.

Almost everyone staying there seemed to be 40+, and very few were carrying their own bags—which made me feel much better about my Donkey Express decision! (It’s the service that transports your bag to your next stop.)

The pilgrim dinner was awesome. Everyone staying at the albergue is walking the Camino, and we all sat together at long tables while the owners served dinner. You meet new people, exchange stories about the day’s walk, talk about plans for tomorrow, and quickly realize everyone has a slightly different way of doing their Camino. The food and wine were delicious and, most importantly, I finally got a full night’s sleep.

Most pilgrims start walking around 7:30 or 8:00 to beat the afternoon heat. I didn’t start until about 9:30. The jet lag had clearly caught up with me, but I discovered an upside to leaving late: for long stretches, there was no one ahead of me and no one behind me and strangely, I loved it.

I’ve loved meeting and walking with so many incredible people, but I realized I was running on fumes. I had sold my house, moved, hopped on a plane to Europe, and walked 37 miles over mountains all within about five days. I needed quiet. I needed to stop talking for a while, walk by myself, and just take everything in.

But the Camino has a funny way of giving you both solitude and connection. At my first coffee stop, I ran into Diana from Arizona and Patricia from Brazil, two women I had met the day before. They immediately taught me another important Camino lesson: whenever you stop, take off your shoes and socks and air out your feet!I had thought just the opposite.Apparently, it helps prevent blisters, and at this point I’ll take every piece of blister advice I can get.

We walked together for a while, but they were moving slower because of some backpack issues, so eventually I continued on alone. The scenery kept changing from a factory town where the Camino literally wound through a huge industrial area, to beautiful paths along rivers, and eventually into the city of Pamplona.

Just as I reached the outskirts of th ewalled part of the city , I saw Diana and Patricia again. We walked together toward the entrance of the old walled city, climbed what felt like the steepest hill yet (it wasn’t), crossed an actual moat—yes, a moat!—and literally started cheering when we made it inside.It was so fun.

Something also happened that I wasn’t expecting. For 4 days, walking with hiking poles, dusty shoes, a backpack and a Camino shell hanging from it had felt completely normal. Everyone around me looked pretty much the same. Then suddenly I was walking through this beautiful, cosmopolitan city looking very much like a” pilgrim”. I became incredibly aware of myself. I felt like people were staring at me .For probably the first time in my life, I felt a little out of place walking through a city. That was definitely a new one for me.

My hotel was close to the entrance, while Diana and Patricia needed to find beds at a municipal albergue, so we exchanged WhatsApp numbers and promised to meet later.

Then I checked into what felt like the best hotel in the world for one very important reason: CENTRAL AIR CONDITIONING. For the first time since arriving, I had real AC. Heaven. As I was cooling off and regrouping, my WhatsApp started buzzing. A group I had walked with the day before was meeting for a pintxos ( a form of tapas ) crawl. Then the Swiss couple I had met invited me to dinner to a restaurant they researched I literally started laughing out loud in my hotel by myself .I came here solo, yet somehow on day 4 I had different camino friend groups inviting me out in a city where I had known absolutely no one just a few days earlier.

This is one of the things I had read about the Camino that made me less worried about traveling alone. the theory goes You can come here alone, but you are very rarely lonely.

And Pamplona! What a beautiful, cosmopolitan city. I completely understand why “pilgrims” take a rest day here. I wished I could, but because I delayed my trip, I’m on a bit of a time crunch and need to keep moving. Pamplona has definitely been added to my list of places to return to although probably not in July for the running of the bulls.

That evening, as I walked toward the square, a small band was playing in this gazebo in the center of the square and hundreds of people were dancing. It looked like a giant flash mob, except it wasn’t organized at all. It was simply people having fun. Of course, I tried to join in. Between my burning quads and being about six seconds behind everyone trying to figure out the moves, I decided I was probably better off watching.

And honestly, watching people have that much fun was awesome