i am writing you from tossantos, and hopefully there will be photos to see very soon!  watch for pictures of the meal at eunate,  breath-taking landscapes, what the camino looks like, what it is like to approach a town, and, of course, manfred! 

tossantos is an even smaller town than most.  i walked from granon, which is  a walk of only 20 km-plus, there are towns about every 5 km along the way which made it a super-easy day.  when i left azofra, i really didn´t know how i was going to make it.  i hung around there, not wanting to leave because my left knee was still hurting.  usually after a good night´s sleep, all aches and pains have miraculously disappeared, which makes walking again possible!  by mid-morning, or mid-afternoon, sometimes everything hurts, but the mornings are usually pain free, and very jovial as we all eat together, pack up and leave.  on this morning, though, i was very dubious as to how i was going to walk.  i read my 40 day mind fast soul feast, and here is an excerpt:´´today, continue to nourish your dreams.  hold fast to your vision and do something every day to bring it into manifestation.  everything is possible in god because god is the infinite possibility within everything.  know that you are god´s beloved in whom god is well pleased.  never give up on yourself!´´ so i read that and was sitting there thinking, okay, how am i going to do this when the hospitalera walked over.  she had seen me limping around, and asked if i wanted to send my bag onward so i could walk without the extra weight.  i hadn´t thought of that!  she also told me where the red cross is in the next town.  so all of a sudden, i had a plan!  a plan that sounded like it would work!  it was that easy.  i filled out the form, put my money in the envelope and started off with nothing more than my poles and some supplies that fit in my pockets!  happily, my knees stopped hurting after about an hour, when they were fully warmed by the sun and my walking.  i walked through to santo domingo de calzada, where they keep 2 chickens in the church (long story-i will try and relate it some other time) and where she had said i could find a red cross.  it wasn´t where she said, so i asked at a hotel.  the woman working there showed me on the map and when i said that it looked far, she looked at me, and said, ´but this is nothing for you!´   that made me laugh, and it was true, it was only a few blocks.  well, i couldn´t find that either, and had just asked a police officer if he knew where it was when lydia came driving up.  so all of us, the police, lydia, the camerman, sound, etc. went to the side of the traffic circle, and finally the police decided they would drive me.  the van followed, but where they took me was closed, too, so i decided, since it didn´t actually hurt anymore, i could wait til another town, and i continued on my way.  again, blissfully pain free as i walked the last few kilometers to granon. 

what a treat granon is!  the hospitaleros are especially loving, and giving, and when you stay there you are invited to eat a communal meal.  so we ate ´family style´a meal for about 30 or 40 people!  afterwards, we went through a secret passage back into the church for evening prayers.  the was they do it is we all sit in these ancient chairs carved into the sides of the room, each with their own candle and read a paragraph each of several prayers.  everyone has a booklet in his/her own language, so the prayer morphed from spanish, to english, to dutch, to french, italian, german, english, and i read in french since there were no more english booklets.  it was just beautiful.  finally, we passed a candle so each one of us could say our own prayer, either aloud, or to themselves.  it was very moving.  we filed back up to our beds (sleeping bags unrolled onto mats on the floors) and slept til morning.  we all ate together again this morning, then i got to walk with lydia since they were filming me today.  it was a wonderful way to start the day.

i am rushing because it is another family meal tonight in this albuerge and i will help with the preparations.  this town is so small there isn´t even a church here.  2 of the canadians hiked up to the ruins of a monastery just up the hill and said it is gorgeous.  i may do that tomorrow morning before setting out.  the hospitaleros have made the top floor of their albuerge into a chapel.  i sat there to meditate after i arrived and it was lovely.  there will be night prayers there tonight after our meal.  tomorrow they, too, serve a pilgrim breakfast.  and, like granon and eunate, this is all on a donation basis.  you put whatever you want into the bin.  whatever they get determines what they can serve the next group of pilgrims. 

so that is all for now-i still haven´t taken my shower, and i want to help in the kitchen.  thank you thank you thank you for all your lovely comments, and i am thrilled to see all of you following along with me.  it definitely gives me strength, and tom, i love the idea that when you are driving home from wed. night service, you are singing me awake!  keep those songs coming!  my days are filled with them!  i sing all the time.

peace and blessings-
a