The tale of cats and panties

The real Camino experience includes sleeping in cheap hostels called albergues. We headed to our very first albergue right across the street from the pilgrim office. The host was a small French woman called Cristiane. We received our very first packs of disposable bed sheets and bought a big shell that people tie on the backpacks to identify themselves as pilgrims.

As pilgrims in covid times, we were explained a set of house rules:

• The albergue is locked at 10 pm, you can’t enter or exit until 7 am.
• The albergue has a huge living room full of dogs and cats, but it’s not possible to gather there. It’s ok to gather in the sleeping area, but for covid reason not ok in the living room.
• We cannot do the laundry ourselves, only the host is allowed to operate the machines because the room is too small and not covid safe.
• No food is allowed in the albergue. We can’t use the kitchen, except the microwave.
• We were kindly asked to pack our backpacks in the evening. You should have seen the excitement in the hosts’ eyes. She opened a big binder full of documents. After careful examination, she found what she was looking for – a plastic bag. Our confusion was quickly resolved. She had to demonstrate us that plastic bags make a lot of noise.

Nowadays, covid seems to be a universal excuse, it doesn’t need to make sense. We gave our laundry to Cristiane and I asked her when it was going to be ready.

Indeed, nowhere to hurry. She made me feel uncomfortable. Is this how the Camino works? Relax and let the life flow? No deadlines for the hosts only deadlines for the guests? I decided to stop worrying about the clothes.

Our room had two other pilgrims. One of them was a French guy calling his family for hours. He decided to stay in the albergue for a few days because he was expecting an important package from his sister. Hm, what’s inside the package? What’s so important that it cannot be bought in hiking stores in the town? Why cannot she send him the package to Spain, to any albergue along the Camino? I’m sure he has his reasons. I will relax and do not ask him why.

Our other roommate came with a guitar. We saw him earlier playing at the town gate for some cash. He didn’t sleep with us, even though his stuff was in the room. Did he understand the first house rule?

It was almost 11 pm and I went to ask Cristiane about the clothes. No, they were still not ready. She seemed surprised by my request and promised to deliver them in the morning. One of the cats escaped from the living room to greet us upstairs. If pilgrims don’t come to cats, cats will always come to pilgrims!

Our laundry was ready in the morning, nicely folded, but Juan was missing a sock. Cristiane looked inside the washing machines and luckily found it. All set, ready to make the first Camino steps!

In the next albergue I realized that I was missing my black lace panties. I did not see them on the ground, Cristiane did not see them in the washing machines and dryers. Hm, did the cats like them? Let this story to be forever known as Camino panties mystery which made my backpack insignificantly lighter.