Camino Training Update: Feet, Heat, and Shiny Umbrellas

After a delay prompted by my injury, we are back to training in earnest! This week, I’ve added some weight back to my pack, taking me up to about 16.4 pounds (without water). The only things I haven’t added back in yet are my breviary and prayerbook bundle, my “strawberry troll” poncho, and my journal.

We are continuing our daily 8km, with longer walks once or twice a week. Unfortunately, the injury set us back about six weeks in terms of training, so it doesn’t look like we’ll finish our “virtual Podiensis” before I leave for France.

(Note that it only shows 5km for today because Francine had to tap out early – I did the last 3km on my own, but our rule is to only record kilometers that we have walked together with packs.)

Of course, there have been issues. Obviously, there are days where for whatever reason we can’t walk. And my goal of getting to daily Mass at 9AM at least three days a week means we have to get out the door early. With the summer heat, this is no bad thing. But even with the earlier walking times, it’s started to get pretty hot.

So today, we finally broke out the hiking umbrellas. You might remember these from our walk on the Camino Primitivo last year. They really saved our bacon, and with much of Europe in a continuing heatwave right now, I wouldn’t walk without it.

We haven’t really used them much since returning from Spain last year, so we spent an inordinate amount of time this morning futzing around with them to get them into the proper position. Eventually, we managed. More or less.

They do look a little silly, and we certainly attracted a lot of attention during the hike, but that’s the price you pay sometimes for trying to avoid heat exhaustion.

(Originally published to our Camino journal, Pilgrims on the Way.)