Rochester to Madrid - Leon - Los Condes

Day 0


Distance: across the Atlantic Ocean and then some in Spain

Goal for the Days

Make it from Rochester, across the Atlantic ocean to Madrid and then by bus to Leon, Spain to rest for the night before catching the next day's afternoon bus to wherever Linda is.

Meaningful Moment

Linda backstopping me in a crisis, and Carlos reaching out to me when I needed to vent.

Random Thought of the Day

Life's tests can build us or take us down; what happens depends on how we act.

On the Road

Arrived Rochester airport at 2 pm. Had a good send-off. Carlos, Jaime & Jayden. Jorge & Daniel. Mom, Liz and Anthony.

Got to the gate to find out that the plane was still on the ground in Toronto. I will be lucky to make my 6:45 connection to Madrid.

Left Rochester at 4:30. Arrived Toronto gate for Madrid at 5:45.

Left for Madrid at 7 pm. Arrived Madrid at 8 am on Sunday. Despite some long lines, I made it thru immigration in just under an hour. Next up and it went smoothly was to navigate the Madrid subway system to get to the bus station. Got the 8 line with transfer to the 6 line at Nuevo Ministerios.

Arrived at Madrid Moncloa bus station, walked around the area until 3:15 when I caught the bus for Leon at Estacion Sur.

The Camino chose to test me and I failed it. For some reason, as soon as I landed in Toronto, both of my devices failed to make wifi connections ... not connect or not maintain the session or even see the network despite seeing many others. ... By the time I checked into the albergue in Leon, and everyone around me had wifi, I was convinced that either both devices were broke or they picked up a virus in Toronto airport. Either way I was bugging out.

As I was failing the challenge, both Linda and Carlos came thru for me. Linda kept providing me with useful info to help my solution figuring, and Carlos called at just the right time for me to vent my frustrations. It is easy to forget in the heat of the moment about who is there to support you, but that is why unconditional love is so powerful ... it can get you thru the most intense storms.

While all this was going on with communication devices, Linda was advancing her distances in bigger legs than we planned so I became very afraid that we would miss each other, or lose contact and I would have no idea where to find her.

After a fitful sleep in the hostel due to heat and exhaustion, I was lucky enough to walk past the train station on the way to the bus station. I dropped in to check and there was a commuter train, leaving for Sahagun and Linda in 10 minutes.

At 7:30 I was in Sahagun, tired and thirsty, but glad.

Surprise, surprise ... I found a bar with wifi that my devices can connect with. So apparently, my devices were fine all alomg, but as to why I had so much trouble ...

Coincidentally, several problems during the trip resolved themselves in the time between I arrived and Linda and I met.

I had forgotten my pin number to my credit card, but today I tried again in a local bank and I got it right. That means access to money! I did explain to the bank manager that she may need to retrieve my card from the atm, if it kept the card due to suspected fraud. She said "No problem." Must not have been her first time to handle that pilgrim problem. Lol

 Verizon messaged me in the middle of the night to say that they activated a 10 dollar a day fee since I was overseas. Fortunately that was a simple phone call solution.


Around 11:30, I headed out of Sahagun to meet Linda. I'd say about 3 miles out, we found each other. She was gorgeous to these eyes even tho she was wrapping up 2 days of super intense  hiking. From there we headed into town to catch up on her adventures and my weeks without her.

Toronto, on the tarmac
The Arch of Victory in Moncloa - Madrid, Spain

Interesting architecture, Moncloa in Madrid
Sahagun, view from the hostel

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