Day 8

The pilgrims are all in bed and its silence and lights out. This is the only time in the day that I get some time to myself and I look forward to it. Often we battle to get the pilgrims all out of here by 9.am but today most of the 45 pilgrims were waiting for breakfast when I started it at 5.50 am which was a bit daunting - and they were all gone by 7.30 am so we could start cleaning earlier than usual. We were done by 11am and then went into the supermercado in Santo Domingo to do a shopping for the next 2 days. I am wondering whether the 8th day has some significance in the life of the hospitalero because we are feeling very tired now - almost as if we are running out of steam. Looking back on these 8 days I realise that we arrive here in great trepidation and the first few days are such a steep learning curve and I guess that we must exist on pure adrenaline. Then we gradually gain confidence and begin to feel more in control (although I still find shopping an ordeal as we never know how many to cater for). I think that our feeling tired is because we are now more relaxed and the adrenaline rush. has subsided so I hope that things will stabilize by the 9th day. What I find difficult at times however, far more than the physical work, is that there is no time to oneself. Often pilgrims arrive early in the day, while we are still cleaning and have not yet had any breakfast or a even a shower and I am tempted to ask them to wait around for another hour until we ready to receive them but that is not the ethos of this place as no one is ever turned away. So we welcome them, offer them coffee and sign them in but sometimes I hope and pray that there will be no early pilgrims until I have managed to get a shower. Rachel, who is nearly 83 and much loved by the pilgrims, needed to take a break, so she is in the Parador at Santa Domingo for the night and its been just Barbara and me today. Fortunately we are not overwhelmingly busy with only 22 pilgrims and we have two wonderful guys who have been hospitaleros. They washed all our pots for us. We have a sweet young Japanese girl who has knee problems and is very homesick and tearful, and a wonderful lady who has walked from her home in Prague. She is in great health and spirits. We have some Dutch, Italian, Danish, Taiwanese, Australian, Spanish, Brazilian, Italian pilgrims today. Our Dutch pilgrim is a physiotherapist and he has generously been helping pilgrims with foot and knee problems. I see from our visitors book that all our pilgrims find the true embodiment of the camino in our albergue and they all show such gratitude for simple acts of kindness. We provide the opportunity for genuine fellowship and by morning all pilgrims leave here as friends. Oh yes- two pilgrims arrived with the dreaded bed bug bites but we have been well trained so knew just what to do. We take great precautions here and wash, disinfect and spray the mattresses every day and spray the blankets and around all the rooms. I am told Sept and Oct are bad months for bedbugs. Hope we don't see any more cases
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