Rabanal, Acebo, Ponferrada

In Ponferrada today.

Where were we? Ah, last post was in Astorga. That day, after I made my post, I met back up with the Italian man I was travelling with earlier. I also saw the British teenagers that I´d travelled with the first two days of the Camino, as well as the Belgian priest I´d seen often at the beginning. They´ve all headed on further at this point though, since they move a lot faster.

However, since Astorga, I have been seeing a lot of this pair of Canadian girls travelling with a pair of American girls, with a trio of Italian boys thrown in for good measure. They like to drink a lot, which makes things loud sometimes, but they are good to chat with.

So anyways, after Astorga, we headed to Rabanal del Camino. The pilgrim hostel there was nice enough, and I also saw the American that I´d seen in Pamplona. They had Internet there, but it was outside in the entryway, so I didn´t come online, because it was cold.

The next day was up and over the mountains to El Acebo, where the downhill part was especially painful - walking steeply downhill on rocks is not fun.

Today was generally more mellow, but there were some steep downhill parts on slate rock which weren´t fun - I´m just happy it wasn´t raining.

Now in Ponferrada, where it took a bit of a hike and asking a lot of people to finally find an Internet cafe. But I found it, and am posting now, so everyone can know what has been going on. Also visited an old castle that was built by Templar knights.

Tomorrow, on to Villafranca del Bierzo. Hasta luego!