A Time I Stayed Too Long

Stories of the Camino de Santiago

May 19, 2026

The Moth and Me - Week 16

A time you stayed too long

I woke up on the coveted bottom bunk of the albergue and slowly stuffed my backpack, preparing for another day on the Camino—a 14-mile walk from Tosantos to Agés.

There were all types of walkers on the Camino: sunrise chasers and speed walkers, rewarded with early arrivals and long afternoons of rest; and late starters who lingered over coffee and walked until late in the day.

Then there was me—a woman of leisure, somewhere in the middle, with no particular need for speed or urgency. I used every excuse in the book to give my feet a break, stopping to smell every single flower or finding a place to “take in the views.”

When you’re both a leisurely walker and a late starter, the combo is a bit risky.

I started this cold and windy day on the trail with fellow pilgrims Pete and Sue from Australia. All day long, pilgrims I passed going uphill would then pass me going down.

After a long stretch of blooming heather, I walked with Pédro from Spain through the Montes de Oca conifer forests. He slowed to my pace to practice his English, he said. When we arrived in San Juan de Ortega, we shared some banter and a beer before I continued on to the historic village of Agés.

Late afternoons were golden—quiet and peaceful. I would rarely cross paths with another pilgrim.

As I neared Agés, I noticed a pilgrim on the crest of the hill I’d just been on ten minutes before.

I picked up my pace. Agés had only two albergues.

She was gaining on me.

An arrow or two later, I made it and sighed in relief.

Two men were filling their water bottles at the village fountain. Their backpacks were on—a sign that they hadn’t settled into an albergue yet either.

I stopped in the middle of the path in awe. Every one of these Spanish villages was mesmerizing—the sunlit stone buildings, the church bell ringing, the feeling that you’ve walked into a century long ago.

When the fountain men walked past me into the first albergue, I snapped out of it and turned to follow them in.

After greeting the two men, the albergue owner shifted his neck to the right to tell me that there were no more beds. “The municipal,” he said, just as the girl from the crest of the hill walked in. She flipped a fast u-turn and walked out.

I walked toward the municipal with cautious confidence.

When I walked in, the albergue host looked at me and said: “Completo.” I understood. The girl from the crest of the hill got the last bed.

I had no words, but apparently my face said it all.

“Sit, sit,” she said, pointing to the small bistro table behind me.

There was literally nothing left for me to do other than sit. I couldn’t make it to the next village.

She returned five minutes later and picked up the phone, nodding to me with a smile. I didn’t know exactly what was happening, but I knew in that moment that I was going to be taken care of.

The girl from the crest of the hill, or the fountain men before her, quite literally left me in the dust that day. But, as they say, “the camino provides.”

A different lady arrived, picked up my backpack and motioned for me to follow her to her car. She put my pack in the trunk and pointed to the front seat.

I go where my backpack goes, I thought. Fifteen minutes later, we pulled up to an albergue. I had no idea where I was, but by then I’d learned to trust the camino.

👇

These were my contenders for Week 16 of The Moth and Me.