Monday, December 31, 2012

Dec 29 2012 Heading to Pamplona

Our day began at 6:00 this morning to allow plenty of time to close up the house and make it to PDX for a 1:30 pm flight to Amsterdam which connected to a KLM flight to Madrid. The connection was about an hour and we were concerned it might not be enough time. As luck would have it we made it just fine and arrived in Madrid to find our pack duffel waiting on the carousel. Always a very nice feeling. We picked up a cab about 1:15 pm and arrived at Atocha station about 20 minutes later to catch our 3:05 pm train to Pamplona. Getting a non stop from PDX to Amsterdam was great. This removed about 5 hours of flying time. Our travel day has been going remarkably well. Thank God.

Atocha Station, Madrid
We are now enjoying dinner and a glass of wine in the Preferente coach of the high speed Ave train. We are expectedly tired as we have not slept since our day began in Vancouver over 24 hours ago. But our spirits are high now that the bulk of the traveling is done. Pamplona lies to the NE, just 3.5 hours away. We have booked into the Europa hotel in Pamplona for one night. We will go to mass on Sunday and then look for a cab to take us to St. Jean where the work and the fun begins. No more slacking, time to start pilgriming. We are still planning for a 12/31 departure from St. Jean. More later.

Pilgrim kit for two in that bag
 

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