New day, new adventure. The light of the fluorescent tubes in the sports hall where we slept pierced our retinas at 2 in the morning so that we could do our 43 km. We did the first part of the walk at a good pace, crossing the dry tracks of La Mancha by the light of an ever-waning moon.
Legend has it that in La Mancha the heat bites, but nobody warns you that the morning cold can cut sharper than the Gillettes Jaime brings us every day. Being far-sighted, the pilgrims had kitted themselves out with sweatshirts, except for Uri Gel (christened “the Little One” by the veterans), who found another method: putting his arms inside his T-shirt. The joke was over when he fell flat on his face and couldn’t get up on his own. The laughter of the moment broke the strict hour of silence.
The technical stop at 7.30 revived us more than eight Red Bulls, because the parish priest of the last few villages we passed through, José Juan, surprised us with 4 trays (and what trays!) of churros with chocolate. While we were filling up the tank, and despite the low temperatures of the early morning, the sun woke up in a bad mood and showed no mercy: it made us put on more cream than a cream horn.
The next part of the stage was hard. No less than 22 km of road awaited us, which means single file. And every good pilgrim knows that this way of walking ends up turning into a funeral march on the tarmac, because, unless you’re walking behind Quirrell, talking to the back of someone’s head isn’t entertaining enough to make you forget your blisters.
After another performance by the Rolling Smokes, we finally reached our sports hall in Villarrobledo; in difficulties, but not in despair. There were some girls there doing a gymnastics display to music, and that set Emma Sarsanedas and Clara Crespo off dancing with more intensity than university students at Pont Aeri in the nineties. Even Edur Lejarcegui, who people have lately been saying looks a lot like Moana, performed the film’s choreography for us when its big song came on.
Later we were able to go to the municipal swimming pool, where Marc León, intending to splash 2 pilgrims who were chatting at the edge, had the brilliant idea of jumping into the water and made a bigger splash than a hydrogen bomb on the Tutuki Splash. His mischievous smile faded when he saw that an innocent little old lady had suffered collateral damage.
The Mass was as beautiful as the church where it was celebrated, with the young people of the town and the notes of the violins of Martina Vitagliano and Inés Arroyo, which would make the composer of the Schindler’s List soundtrack himself weep with emotion. At the end of the Eucharist, a good man with an even better camera filmed us for television. The Pope told us to make a mess, and we’re doing as we’re told: from Barcelona to Lisbon bearing witness to our faith.
And that’s all for today, family. Tomorrow, another marathon distance. Good night, Vietnam!