Estella to Los Arcos, 13.4 miles

I now have my Camino Family. These are the people that started on Day 1 and you see over and over again and you develop friendships. I walked with Raen from the Netherlands today although I hadn't seen him for a few days. Walked with Elín from Iceland, the ladies from New Zealand, and made a new friend, Onno, from Norway who I walked with for quite a long time. He was very chatty and we talked about music, food, our families—all sorts of topics. He was fun and we laughed a lot.

The path was relatively flat, although nothing is truly flat here, but compared to the previous days it was easy. We had a huge thunderstorm last night with lots of lightning and pouring rain but surprisingly the roads were not particularly wet.

I'm in another albergue tonight sharing a four-person room with two of the girls from last night and one man from Quebec. Weird, but again, it's the way it is on the Camino. You just accept it.

I am disappointed to say that I have given up my fully loaded backpack due to shoulder and nerve pain and have decided to have it transported every day with the luggage service. I bought a daypack yesterday to use instead. Today was a much, much better day using the daypack. I was determined to be a true pilgrim by carrying all of my belongings but that's just the way it is.

Buen Camino.