What a morning! It will go down in my annals of history as the worst ever! Unforgettable!

It started innocuously enough, with the decision to play music in our little cabin (as inspired by our Dalai Lama host last week). Then Jade told us that she had just woken from a horrid dream about giant bedbugs.

Weirdly, a few moments later, we realised that Hartmut was covered in a series of bedbug bites. I, too, had rows of them on my arms and legs!
We laughed about Jade’s power of conjuring and invocation, as she had no new bites herself! (other than the ones from the past weeks).

We discussed bugs and bites as we got dressed and decided that we might have brought them from the last albergue in our sleeping bags.
Bedbugs are apparently big enough to see with the naked eye, but the inside of my sleeping bag was black, so we went outside to shake and beat them off.

It was still dark outside (around 7am) and I noted that it had been raining, as the ground was wet. At this point, I was halfway through getting dressed, and was wearing just my merino top and underpants, wool socks and my croc sandals. I was carrying my sleeping bag.

Just a few paces outside, there was a square hard plastic cover which I had to cross. I stepped on it trustingly, but was immediately plunged into deep, freezing cold water! What a rude awakening! I screamed out loud, then began to laugh hysterically at the ridiculous situation I was in.

George, Jade and Hartmut came running to see the cause of my hilarity, but the look on Hartmut’s face, as he hurriedly hauled me out of the hole, struck me with panic. I looked down at my bare legs as they emerged from the hole and realised the reason for his expression.

The hole was in fact a sewer! My legs were covered in human fecal matter, along with clumps of sodden toilet paper!

My laughter turned to horror.

We all stared at the hole in disbelief. The liquid level of the sewer was undulating in a sickening fashion, obviously due to the plunging effect of my legs. Then, almost comically, from underneath the surface, out popped my green croc!

This was the last straw! I felt sick. I was apoplectic with disgust. I just couldn’t believe that this was happening to me! Everything was wet with waste, including my sleeping bag, which made me want to crawl out of my own skin.

I had the dawning realisation that it hadn’t been raining after all, that the wet ground had been due to a blocked and overflowing sewer outside our cabin!

I was shaking with revulsion. I didn’t want to touch anything, but managed to totter to the albergue, where there were unsuspecting breakfasters. I asked to speak to Miguel. He was clearly horrified and scurried off to examine the situation.

Meanwhile, I tiptoed past the breakfasting pilgrims to the shower, where I stripped off as best I could. There was a knock at the door. A concerned and caring Jade appeared with my soap bag and towel.

My socks were the last thing to come off as I just couldn’t bring myself to touch them. I just wished that I could be detached from these feet. I stood in the shower directing the shower head at the lumps of fecal matter stuck to my socks, but to no avail…they clung on for dear life!

By now I was standing in a brown pool, accumulating in the shower base. The feeling of repugnance was indescribable and overwhelming!

When I finally managed to extricate myself from the shower, I made my way gingerly back to the scene of the disaster.

Miguel, by all accounts, had been a hero. He had just rolled up his sleeves and plunged his arm right in, to extract the offending blockage, which turned out to be a t shirt that some kids had shoved in. He had hosed down the whole area, though we could still smell the evidence.

I was fascinated by the fact that I didn’t want to put on any of my familiar walking clothes, even though they were clean - a bit of a challenge, as I had so few clothes with me! I somehow couldn’t face even wearing my walking trousers. I ended up wearing thermal underwear leggings and an emergency fleece top.

Miguel offered to wash all my sodden clothes and my sleeping bag and said he would deliver them on to our next albergue in Arzua that afternoon. He also cleaned the floating green croc sandal. (Hartmut cleaned the other croc) I was hugely grateful.

It was clear that he felt responsible for the calamity, even though it was, by no means, his fault. He certainly felt sorry for my experience and did his utmost to make amends. He also wouldn’t take payment for my breakfast.

I was glad and thankful to be surrounded by caring friends. I cannot imagine how much worse it would have felt if I had been alone. Not to mention, if there hadn’t been washing facilities nearby!

We decided that our first meeting point of the day would be at the pulpería (octopus house), Casa Ezequiel in Melide, about 12k away. It was specially recommended, both by my personal guide, Cecilia Bernardini (who had done the Camino last year), and by Jade’s sister.

With this in mind, I couldn’t get on the road again fast enough. I realised that I had a distinct desire to escape from the feeling of being soiled. I therefore walked as fast as I could, as if I could run away from my own skin!

I also needed comfort and this I found in music. For the first time, I played music on my phone whilst walking. Quite unusually, I chose one of our recent albums, Birds and Beasts, with Mr McFalls Chamber, which is the music of the late Martyn Bennett. I hadn’t listened to it since the release. It was uplifting and meaningful and spurred me on my way.

There were plenty of pilgrims about, but this didn’t bother me today. I was overtaking them at a rate of knots! Luckily it was overcast this morning, so I was at least not impeded by the sun.

Melide is a strange town, seemingly divided into two separate parts (or perhaps they were different towns?!). The first part was very old : winding narrow streets in an ancient farming village, no cars in sight. The second part was new : bustling town with shops and cars and tarmac roads.

I had to get directions to Caza Ezequiel in the first village part, by asking an old lady washing her dishes by an open kitchen window. She, and consequently her son, directed me to the busy town part.

When I reached the pulpería, I was dripping wet with sweat. The emergency fleece is not at all breathable and it felt as if I’d been running whilst wearing a plastic bag. It came swiftly off. At this stage of the proceedings, I didn’t give a hoot that I was just in my merino bra and leggings!

The sight of cauldron upon cauldron of octopuses was impressive. It seemed that in this place, they served octopus, or more octopus! Although it wasn’t even 11 in the morning yet, the pulpería was already packed with people, mostly steamy pilgrims.

It was a vast place full of long communal tables and benches, everybody eating octopus. The octopus (pulpo) was boiled, chopped into bite sized chunks, placed on wooden boards and covered with olive oil, salt and paprika. Simple, yet delicious!

We saw the german lady who had joined us for dinner the night before and we joined her now. She donated half of her copious amounts of octopus to Jade and George, while I devoured a whole one to myself, washed down with chilled local white wine!

Soon we were joined by some of our familiar pilgrim veterans: Raoul, Marcel and Julian, who had arrived from Palas del Rei. There was a festive atmosphere, and I was just desperately glad to be in a completely different mental space than just a few hours before!

After discovering that the pulpería served the local Galician speciality of coffee or herb liqueurs (which Jaime had highly recommended), we celebrated with a round of them to finish up. 

I can now highly recommend them too!

Su-a Lee