I’ve had some learning moments during my Camino planning. 

First, I had intended to wait to book most of my lodging until I got there and discovered how my body was doing, but the scarcity mindset set in, and I became worried that most bookable options would be booked, especially since I’m using a luggage transfer service. So I went ahead and planned out the whole 170 miles and choose mostly hostels (or albergues) with a few hotels here and there so I would be assured a good night’s sleep and some quiet on occasion. But 170 miles in two and half weeks means I’m going to be walking some long days. Can I do it? 

Then I went to book the luggage transport service to each spot, figuring the more I did from home, the less I would have to do there when I am faced with my body and the miles, so I looked at three different services: Caminofacil, Tuitrans, and Pilbeo. Many of the places I had booked didn’t show up on their ready made list of delivery spots! Arrrg. One service said I should change my plans to places that did show up on their list, but another said I could contact the lodging, get some info, and pass it back to them, and they would make it happen. So I went with those guys. I went with the flexible peeps who would have my back. And as I worked through the list yesterday, I discovered a lot of my lodging WAS on their list….their list being a hodge podge of addresses and names that sometimes didn’t match the exact title of the hostel, thus the confusion. Whew. It was more work than I had planned, but good to note if you plan to hike the Camino in the future and use luggage transport. Start your booking process with the transportation folks and book from their list.

In other news, I got my chemo port removed this week! Woot! If you haven’t seen a chemo port before, picture a quarter-sized, no, maybe a bit larger… a half-dollar-sized round disk that’s about a quarter inch thick implanted beneath your skin between your collar bone and your breast. It can be on the left or right side; mine was on the right, closer to the lung tumor. It has three raised bumps on the surface, so the skin tightens around it and looks a bit alien. A tube comes off it and is threaded through a vein in your neck so that sometimes people will say, “What’s that in your neck?” When it’s time for chemo, I lather the thing up with lidocaine cream and put a bandage on it before going to the hospital. The lidocaine will numb the skin, and the nurses use a special needle to puncture the skin and port….the three dots guiding them in like the lights on a runway. The tubing is taped to the skin for the multiple courses of drugs that will be injected directly into your vein that day. It saves your arms from being destroyed by the chemo. My chemo was the kind that only needed to be injected once a month, but others get it daily or weekly. So getting this thing removed is a big step towards living with active cancer in my past.

When talking with the doctors during the removal, they asked how long I had had it in, and how long my treatment was. All of their eyes got wide when I said I got the port in January, the chemo lasted until April, and I reached “no evidence of disease” by July. “Wow!” they said. “That’s fast!” I know, I quipped back. “And I had tumors from head to thigh! 27 just in my brain!” It seems surreal to say it even now. How did I get better so fast? Is my body really that responsive to the chemicals and radiation? To the diet changes, supplements, love, and positivity from all of you? I feel like I’m a Radical Remission example, except to get that moniker, you need to have been in remission for three years. I’ve been in remission for one month. I have a ways to go, but I’m off to a good start!

Lets see, what else does the Portugal prep prep look like?

I walked 9 miles the other day, that’s training!

How about my current iteration of a gear list:

So there you have it folks! Next up: more walking.