I woke up at 5.30am and mentally prepared myself for my top-bunk descent in the dark. I obviously didn’t mentally prepare enough because I found myself stepping down to an intimate moment between the doorknob and my derrière.

My poor older French lady roommates woke up at 5.33 to me screaming.

(Good thing I knew how to say ‘bum’ in French to explain).

My day could only get better. (Little did I know that I was in for an extremely toasty day)

I ate some porridge and set out. Lorca is one of the teeny tiny towns on the Camino that ensure a morning of solitude if you leave early enough.

I set off through the farmland along the path in the dark and eventually watched another gorgeous sunrise along the Camino.

I soon passed through the bigger town of Estella but once again found myself with no desire to stop walking. The day was starting to warm up but I trudged on.
Soon I stumbled across one of the most famous stops along the Camino de Santiago – the famous wine fountain. Yep, that’s right. Not another water fountain to fuel pilgrims. A wine fountain to super-fuel pilgrims. This holy grail of the Camino de Santiago is a part of the Monastery de Irache and was definitely one of the best break stops I had encountered so far.

I poured myself a swig of wine and feeling drunk revived continued along the trail.

I eventually stopped for lunch in a small town simply because I discovered the small store had a hummus supply. I bought some vegetables and feasted. I don’t think the hummus would have been that impressive under ordinary circumstances but on the Camino de Santiago everything seems to taste 354% better (or maybe I was just drunk).
I hadn’t read my guide book’s warning that the route would go through ‘remote vineyards and open country but very little shade’. If there was any day that I needed shade it was today.

I was dying. Yeah sure I had experienced some heatwaves in my life down under but never had I been insane enough to go hiking in them. I could feel myself transforming into a burnt piece of toast. This was the day I discovered the true power of the sun and I found myself dreaming of my recent time in Antarctica. What I would have down to be lying on one of those icebergs right at that moment…

Unfortunately there wasn’t an iceberg in sight so I decided to distract myself by listening to some of the podcasts I had downloaded. I had been recommended the series ‘Serial’ by ‘This American Life’ which basically is a series of podcasts investigating the circumstances of a murder case in the US. And the woman who narrates it has a pretty damn mesmerising voice.

I strolled on in my murder-mystery bubble of distraction. The path was almost empty (because every other pilgrim had some level of common sense and decided to take the oven-like afternoon off), but every other pilgrim I did come across I immediately assumed was a serial killer and quickly said a ‘Buen Camino’ before I walked on and avoided murder.

Was I still drunk? Was it heat exhaustion? Would this be the day I actually lost my mind on the Camino!?

Finally I stumbled upon a mirage-like shady area where happy people drank beer and sat around merrily…

Yep. My mind was gone.

I saw my Polish friend Anna sitting enjoying a cold drink with other pilgrims. At least my insanity had brought me to a fun place.

I soon found out I wasn’t insane after all. In fact some kind entrepreneurial people had set up a small food-truck area in the middle of the most barren part of the path to refuel the poor pilgrims sweating away their sanity.

Quite logical really when you look at it in hindsight.

Soon I had rehydrated myself sane and enjoyed the little oasis as a woman free from paranoia.

I decided to leave along with Anna, and a Canadian man she had befriended that day. I thought having some company might help with the whole ‘going insane’ thing.

The minute I was back in the sun I wished I had never left the shade. Apparently the devil was holidaying in Northern Spain and had brought his personal depths of hell climate with him. At least I was distracted by my fellow pilgrims now.

I can only recall one tree along the whole path that afternoon. And it was the best tree I have ever encountered in my lifetime. There are few shady moments in my life that I so fondly remember the relief from but that tree was the most heat-relieving piece of shade in the short history of Kat.

I also remember watching a young man dressed in a long white-sleeved shirt and pants hike straight past the most relieving tree in the world. I was in a state of complete shock as I watched him deny a moment of shade on such a hellish afternoon. Was it the devil in disguise?

At some point we gained the courage to follow the white-shirted heatproof man. After what seemed like a lifetime we finally sweated all the way to Los Arcos. And immediately ran under the first shade we found. It happened to be a small vending machine area where the heatproof man was enjoying a cold drink.

It turned out the heatproof man was beautiful. After almost a week of being surrounded by people mostly at grandparent age I had forgotten the beauty of young men.

Or maybe I was still drunk… Or still insane…

No. He was beautiful.

I complimented him on his heatproofness and soon we were discussing everything from the weather to his work with refugees. I had been wrong. This man was an angel in disguised. Following a career of helping misplaced people. He was from Slovenia and he was wonderful.

But I wasn’t heatproof and I needed to find a place to sleep for the night. My beautiful heatproof man continued along the Camino.

Finding a place to sleep had been a challenge every day so far on my pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago and this day was no exception. Every albergue had a sinister ‘COMPLETO’ sign adorning their door. I tried a completo place anywhere.

“We have some beds… But…”

She lingered on the but. I had already had my fair share of butt injuries that day and didn’t like my luck.

“…They are in the attic… It might be hot.”

Inspired by my heatproof friend I accepted the option anyway. It was either that or toasting along the Camino a little longer. My feet were sore and I decided I would rather toast horizontally.

I dumped my stuff next to my attic bed, showered and headed out to explore town. It was beautiful and pilgrims filled the streets, celebrating the end of another days walk with food and wine. I decided to make my own dinner that night and bought some fresh veggies and fruits from a local store where the man proudly informed me that everything was from his own garden.

I say this with complete honesty. His tomatoes were the best I had ever eaten in my life. Who knew such a ‘basic’ fruit vegetable could taste so heavenly.

But then again I had lost my mind that day so maybe it was just an ordinary tomato and an insane amount of over exaggeration in my diary entry that day…