I've been feeling a bit lost since the Ireland race; a little ungrounded, unfocused, and unmotivated. Not meaning to sound like a whiner, but recently it's been the first time in a long while that I hadn't had a race or adventure in the concept/planning stage. I needed something to get me going again.
In 2008, my Finnish friend Janne Kankaansyrjä completed a solo run along the Camino Frances de Santiago de Compostella and blogged about it. Straight away, running this ancient pilgrim route was added to my personal "bucket list". And then earlier this year, my friends Christian and Ursula had reinforced the idea by buying me a wonderful coffeetable book of the route, which they themselves have walked during several trips from their home in Switzerland.
The third piece of serendipity is the organization of the third edition of a race along a French part of the route (the Via Podiensis) from Le Puy en Velay to the Pyrenees. An old friend from the now legendary Transe Gaule 2005, Patrick Bonnot, is the race organizer. The April dates of the race fit reasonably well with family plans (just after the birth of grandbaby #3 in March, for example). And so I am delighted to be preparing for another (almost) cross-country adventure. 730km (450 miles) in 12 days - my tenth country - following routes along which pilgrims have been passing for more than a thousand years. Very cool.
