Santo Domingo de la Calzada, June 18

First things first....we enjoyed Crete - not unlike a holiday somewhere like Mexico....lots of tourist spots, tons of restaurants and tavernas serving food. Their livelihood is tourism or growing olives here and somewhere all the tomatoes and cucumbers must be grown. The interior is very mountainous and the roads are amazing. It was nice to be driven in a bus....especially for Clive as he does most or rather all of the driving abroad (in England, anyways) and we just enjoyed the scenery - very dry, hairpin turns and amazing condition of the roads. It is up one side and down the other. and sometimes up again and down the other side before reaching the next coast. Chania has a wonderful town centre built around the harbour, and the neighboring streets small and old with little shops and restaurants. You dine outside on the walking streets and they are not very wide. We spent 5 nights in a cute room overlooking the sea from our 150 year old room inside the city walls. As per usual, lots of walking and eating, a little beaching and a day out walking the famous gorge. I enjoyed the drive to and from the gorge and the gorge itself was a lot of walking down - nice to walk but not as good as so many that I have seen. So glad that Clive was able to do it. He enjoyed it but would not be keen to repeat....and neither would I. We walked to beaches and caught the bus on other days.

SAMARIA GORGE

We were going to rent a car for a couple of days but Clive got stage fright at the last moment. We arranged it all with a very nice lady and her daughter. When we came back the next am, the man working (husband?) left blank the amount of money due and then he wanted to increase the rental amount because we did not have an international driver's license. More bullshit to feed the tourist. Clive was not overly keen to drive so with this prank at the last second he and then we decided that we would continue on public transport (though difficult that day because of reduced service on a Sunday).

I liked the town that we stayed in and the restaurants and the being outside. I also liked when we found a small place to eat and spend time that was not full of so many tourists. A bit like leaving Banff and finding Field.

View from our bedroom Chania, Crete

All of our connections worked 100% from taxi to plane to plane to bus to bus to arrive at St. Domingo late evening. Another interesting bus ride through the mountains here and then arriving in a very flat area.

St. Domingo is a very cute town - an old cathedral and some cute old streets with old housing, part of the old town wall is still intact. Lots of little restaurants to eat in and nice to wander about in. Not much exercise as it is quite small and flat though interesting.

We have a great room in this alburgue. The hospitaleros are not in the dorms and we share a bathroom with each other. There is a Spanish (Basque) lady and a French man and the two of us. The Spanaird, Hunckle, speaks a lot of Spanish and we have no idea what she is saying. She is now getting that we have no idea what she is saying. It is probably good that we don't understand much as she is the control freak of the group. Everything is always 'in a moment' and someone always has to wait for her to finish talking or dealing with whatever she is doing...and everything seems to take a lot of words. And of course she manages and controls - pretty funny really as I see this happen constantly. The French gentleman is very interested in communicating, using the dictionary and learning a few English as well as Spanish words. He seems fun to work with. Clive really has not liked the bossy lady but I think that as he is feeling more comfortable in this environment that he is letting that go. Me, well I am perfect and get along well with myself! ...and then I have my judgements and heaven forbid my flaws! I see each coming with their own personality. I am not very good at listening to long explanations of things in a foreign language that are related to rules. In fact, I appear off hand and disinterested and sometimes just walk away and let her work it out or wait until she figures out her solution- that probably bothers her. She is totally inflexible in the bunk arrangement and the order that she does things. I would prefer to give people what they want providing we are filling up the room in a reasonably sequential order. I am happy to work whenever and do whatever. It is all good. I love talking to the peregrinos, trying to communicate in English, French or Spanish or hand language to the volunteers and a little to the people from the community who visit and socialize here as it is their confraternity (I guess that they own and manage it, especially the bottom line). There Spanish is very difficult as they are older and speak very fast for the most part. However as time passes and I have the dictionary handy that is changing. So many people with so many stories. Each one is different ...and from so many countries. Yesterday someone arrived who had walked from Germany and today someone who walked from Holland (2.5 months) and neither were tiring of it. Of course, the Camino is so much more social than walking in the countries outside this route in Spain. Then there are those who have sore and blistered feet and sometimes pulled ligaments or tendon issues. A fellow comes in everyday and treats people here.

Already I know that I want to do this again and next time it will be in a more intimate alburgue where I will have to do more cooking and cleaning and spending more time with fewer individuals. ( It reminds me of teaching school - I like teaching Home Ec but I really preferred more time with fewer students teaching whatever). I was really uncertain how I would like being here but now I know. As one of my quotes said we are now the stone in the river - that is the people come and go every day and we stay here to greet and settle new guests in. I am amazed how 2 years ago I could not visualize volunteering here and here we are. I find it hard to believe that I slept in dorms for 35 nights two years ago and loved it. I guess that you settle into whatever it is that you are doing at the moment. I wonder if I will choose to walk some camino experience again. The walking the Pyreees in France will give me another different experience and then I shall have lots to compare. I guess that the most important is enjoy the moment.