Rabanal del Camino/La Cruz de Ferro

 

This is Albergue Gaucelmo. A Donativo in the small town of Rabanal del Camino. At the Donativo you pay only what you can afford, including a breakfast also by donation.

We had to wait a couple of hours for the Donativo to open. This was a lovely young man and the sweetest puppy, both tired from their earlier walk.

Although the women in the town just across the way from the albergue assured us the albergue was open, or would be open very soon and that it would be a great place to stay. They were right about one thing, it being a great place to stay.

The two women at the top right of the picture are the volunteers at the albergue. They served us five o'clock tea. They volunteer for two weeks time and must have walked a Camino in order to be eligible to volunteer. 

Sitting around our tea table was a young man from Tasmania (pictured left), walking the Camino with his mom and dad and after  they walk to Santiago they will attend his sister's wedding in Bulgaria together. 

Also at the table was a woman from Australia walking with a woman from South Africa (pictured top right). They met on the Camino years ago and continue to walk Camino's together, although they live more than one thousand kilometers from one another!

While learning each other's stories, in the middle of tea, there was a small commotion with loud music and horn honking. The volunteers told us it is the fruit and vegetable truck.

We all walked out to see and out popped the fruit man!

Somehow I missed the picture of his open truck. It all happened so fast. He had avocados, plums, bananas, tomatoes the size of a small melon. The entire truck was full of beautiful fruit. 

Peppers for dinner, fruit for the morning. Nothing left to carry. Perfect!

Inside the small room with 19 beds, many full of fellow foot 👣 travelers

Tomorrow is the walk to La Cruz de Ferro, pictured below. It is the place where pilgrims leave a stone that they have carried from home to symbolize a laying down of one's burdens. I have brought from home a tiny piece of a meteor to leave behind. I wish I could lay down all of your burdens but I know my limitations.