No more short cuts!

Arzua (by detours) to Monte do Gozo. 6/22
Reception left the keys to the gate as we told them it has been to hot to wait for a ride back to town to start our day so we would just walk from there (5km from the town we were in). We let ourselves out the gate at 6 with a well plotted map approved by the Casa.  Along the way we see what looked like a short cut on another road, yes, we were far out, we’ll take it! Ah BIG mistake!! Are we going to come out of this alive, bear, wild boar, drug cartel I was the most scared on this “short cut” as I ever was this whole trip. We are in the middle of NOWHERE, they may never find our bodies! It started as a dirt road, turning to a path, then game trail, then nothing!!! Thrones, downed trees to go under with our packs, more thrones, ticks, shot gun shell, fear, brush, thorns, more thorns a map leading us to more thorns, brush, weeds and finally a paved road. I have never been so scared, I knew we were goners, I wanted to turn on my phone for GPS purposes to find our bodies. Our short cut ended up costing us time, wet shoes, and now Eric’s new shoes were already shredded. Who cares we are on a road, a busy one but who cares, someone can see us….NO more shortcuts!
After walking for a bit I hear a lot of cars, “are we going under the interstate again?” Nope, we have to cross the highway, WHAT this has a LOT of cars going very fast, shit…oh yes, coffee break! Grande, now I have ordered two, the longer we wait the busier the road, great we got this. Praying for a wide opening as my Gram aways did, we got it, thanks Gram! Walking we saw a bird farm with beautiful pheasants tried taking pics but the fence was in focus, I just wanted to make it to an arrow! It should be just around the turn somewhere. We turned and WOW, we found it, and about 100 pilgrims walking right there…wow your not kidding joining with the French route, Pilgrim Parade! In front and behind, but with our new found wings of our shoes we were quickly moving by most of them. It was a solid mist most of the am that was turning to rain so we went for cover and a bite only to find Kara and Julia. We chatted about our destinations and nobody came up with a sure fire plan since it was early, cool. Lunch arriving Julia left to head on Kara decided to order lunch we all ate and decided to move forward. There weren’t  a lot of pilgrims on the trail in the woods that looked enchanted so we stopped for some photo opportunities and kept walking.   Many houses have shells  again nice photos. We hit a village around 3 o’clock and stopped for a beer because you had to buy something to get a code to use the bathroom.  Eric’s feet were getting worse as we walked, he wanted to continue on we had about 5 miles to go and it was probably the longest 5 miles of the walk.  Finally arriving in Monte do Gozo about 5KM from Santiago.