More awesome videos

Our first videos were so popular that we decided to make a few more.  Enjoy!

at long last...camino pictures!

We know these have been a long time coming - we hope a few people are still checking this from time to time. These got posted in reverse order, so view from the bottom up...videos to follow shortly!

And even higher fashion in Portugal...

High fashion in Spain

In Santiago at last...someone is taking this very seriously

Giving the emergency ponchos one last airing on the final approach to Santiago

Life support machine

Galician granary

Hiking amidst the eucalyptus in Galicia

Grungy lodgings in Melide

A very appropriately sized dinner for two in Triacastela

Kirsten with her favorite saint

Gettin' cuddly in Foncebadon

D.R. strutting his stuff outside of Astorga

HB and the Three Musketeers: Roger (aka Sexy), Gerard and The Man in the Yellow Hat

Weary pilgrims in Mansilla de las Mulas

Biggest blister ever, pre-mystical healing rite

HB and Sexy

Checking on the laundry in Najera

Hey! Beer that tastes like beer!

Filling up at the wine fountain

Baguette, the universal camino food

6:30 a.m., day #2. Not terribly encouraging.

Making good use of the emergency poncho on the way into Cirauqui

Sampling the grapes of the Rioja

  Xavier, whom we thought was mentally handicapped based on this and other similar interactions, but who actually turned out to be quite bright...

Bing bing

Well, we lost our French friends Roger and Gerard (and their new third musketeer, The Man in the Yellow Hat, brought in to replace their other friend Jean who claimed he was "united in unity" with them and ditched them the next day), but Roger had begun speaking almost entirely in sound effects, so we were starting to have some difficulty communicating with him anyway. We did get some pictures before we parted ways that we´ll post here at some point. We´re now teamed up with a super speedy Spanish man who carries a large umbrella at all times, an Australian guy who´s taken to calling himself Pepe, and a German theater dude who´s into self-discovery and insistent about dessert. We´ve only got two days left ´til Santiago, though, so this is really the final stretch - Kirsten made the excellent point that, on my birthday, I might want to wake up in an actual bed in a room not reeking of body odor sometime later than 6 a.m., and it was well taken. So, we´re going to sit in front of the cathedral in Santiago on the 8th and clap for all the other pilgrims (and maybe hand out beer - it´s just so cheap). We´re hoping not to be chased by any more German shepherds between now and then, but we now know a Spanish kung fu master whose specialty is doggy defense, so we should be in the clear. For now, it´s time to go enjoy our second-to-last egg & cheese vegetarian special dinner...more from Santiago!

oh la la

Okay - we´re having no success at all uploading pictures from public computers, so we thought we´d post a little text update just in case anyone´s still reading this. We´re officially halfway across Spain - we´re still aiming to finish on Heather´s 30th birthday, and we´re pretty much on schedule. We might be ahead of schedule if we throw in any more 45 kilometer days - the first one didn´t kill us, though, and now we have a reputation as the Crazy Americans. There really aren´t that many other Americans doing this in general, though, and the others all seem to be older women, so we probably are crazier than many of the other Americans here. We´ve made a lot of new friends, including the older French guy trio of Roger (frequent wearer of sexy mesh shirt and mystical blister healer), Gerard and Jean, who routinely greet us with "Oh la la", stated with various degrees of enthusiasm based on their level of morale or fatigue. There are also a lot of old German guys who like to hang around in their underwear, but we´re trying not to make friends with them. We miss our old beer-drinking Swedish friend, John, and our ever-swearing Basque pal, Xavier (we were pretty sure we knew the F word in Spanish, but now we´re definitely sure), and we´re hoping our new Australian friend Rosemary catches up to us again. In the meantime, we´re learning the word for snoring in many different languages, and we´re grateful that earplugs block out the sound no matter what. We´ll post pictures soon...

Okay - here's a shout out to the Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron beer.  It's strong and thick, but you can really taste the Paraguayan mate cup in it (tastier than it sounds).  So support Paraguay if you see it.

So, here's a final toast to walking across Spain for the next month - sadly, we can't bring champagne in a can on the plane any more, but we'll have plenty of opportunities to drink wine out of an odd assortment of containers once we're there. Check back in for the blister report soon!

O Canada!

Okay, this is rapidly turning into Heather's own blog, so here's what I did with my time off.  I went to Hamilton to watch Zainab eat Timbits.  I enjoyed my share of Timmy's coffee and muffins. Unfortunately, Quebec still has relatively few Tim's outlets, and I was unable to get anything to bring back across the border.  (Sorry, Heather.)  But there are now a few Tim's on the New York section of I-90 so you can pick up some next time you're driving from Albany to Buffalo.  

Zainab and I did the veggie highlights of Toronto tour, which is always excellent.  

We headed up to Montreal to meet up with the physio and math crew and Zainab tried to eat Genia's super cute son, Rayan.  I still didn't get my Analysis book back from Nermein, but I guess that gives me an excuse to go back.  

 

Finally, we met up with Clare, revisited frosh week Open Air Pub (with new ID checks) and enjoyed more excellent veggie food.  Zainab also dragged us (I think Clare was a little easier to convince than I was) on a St Laurent shopping spree.  

The St Laurent restaurants seem to have all changed, but Club Tokyo is still very much in place.  We finished off the weekend at the club.  

I'm not entirely sure how this guy got into the photo, but in all fairness, Zainab does know him.  

I made the requisite Montreal bagel and Canadian beer stops on the way out of town.  The drive back was most notable for an extremely long border line and excellent hospitality from some of Heather's camp friends.    

I know a place

This is just a bunch of pictures from the amazing weekend just spent at my true home, Camp Little Notch. It truly is the greatest place in the world, and I'm not just saying that for the benefit of any Girl Scouts of Northeastern New York staff members who might happen upon this (if any of them are, though, we are definitely not standing inside the furnace in the bottom picture). I don't have too much to say about it because the whole place is a little bit beyond words for me, but it was great to catch up with people and see how much some people have changed, how much some people haven't (see Pizza Mikey, right - only Mikey...), and how deeply I'm tied to people and a place I see only infrequently these days. So, my apologies to those involved for the bathingsuit shots, but thanks to everyone who made my weekend and my entire childhood and adolescence and, well, life totally incredible...