Behind the Albergue Door: Inspiration Agony Adventure on the Camino de Santiago

accurate to say there is no general consensus on when the lights can be turned off without interrupting people’s reading, packing, blister maintenance or creepy leering. Once in a while you’re bound to end up in a room with one of those guys who goes back to the room while everyone is still at dinner, goes to bed and turns out all the lights like it works on a first come, first serve basis. Like you’re supposed to tiptoe around, digging through your stash of q-tips trying by feel to find one that hasn’t been used yet, just so some narcoleptic can demonstrate just how little they are enjoying the whole experience. In such circumstances I found it great fun to go in and out repeatedly, turning the lights on and off again each time and, if I ever caught his eye, smiling inanely like I had done him a huge favour, or maybe just finger-banged his cat.
    29. Only let one item of clothing get wet per day
    Most albergues are furnished with one small rack for drying clothes, usually about the size of a relatively small love seat, or maybe a really large feeder hog. Shared among forty to sixty damp pilgrims at the end of a hot sunny day, or a cold rainy one, means you can probably count on a space allotment the size of a single Kleenex tissue. Perfect for women’s underwear or my jaunty blue neckerchief, but not much else.
    After a particularly rainy day it may be worth getting a hotel room if for no other reason than to have a radiator all to yourself. Some hotels (and occasional albergues) will even do your laundry for you. Just know that they are less likely to come back smelling like your mom’s fabric softener than garlic and wet leather.
    30. Think up some pithy graffiti for the really cool albergues
    Much like the world of drug-ridden youth hostels, intermittently you will come across an albergue that just goes right ahead and takes cool to a whole new level. With all sorts of campily unrelated decorations, posters with ironic sayings on them, road signs - normally found on roads with the intention of saving lives - comically displayed indoors, hilarious t-shirts pretending that the name of the albergue is really a type of beer for sale at the front desk. Many of these trendy albergues are so hip and cool, in fact, that you are actually allowed to write on the walls if you want, they don’t even care! Hell, they even encourage it! Because they are so cool, remember. So while lying on your bunk you can pass the time, and just maybe learn a thing or two about life, by reading profound philosophical nuggets such as:
    “dream it and it shall be yours” (which I suppose means I can expect a visit from Mila Kunis any day now)
    “don’t sweat the small stuff” (this is the Camino, everything is covered in sweat)
    “still up, even when I’m down” (the new Viagra slogan?)
    “reality is wrong, dreams are real” (written by an unemployed Pringles addict and author of Harry Potter fan fiction)
    “the crazy never die” (yes, they do, and usually sooner than most)
    31. Do not eat, smoke or heal in the rooms
    A prominently posted sign at an albergue in Astorga. Comprehensive and unequivocal, I thought.
    32. Be fiscally creative
    It took us longer than I’d like to admit to catch on to this strategy, but tailoring the room to the size of your group just makes good sense. It takes the wild card (i.e. chatty Russian, or drunken Korean) right out of the equation. If you have four people, specifically look for places with four-person rooms. If you have three people , consider paying a few extra euros to have a four-person room all to yourselves. Or a six-person room and play musical dorm beds at three pre-determined and equally separated times throughout the night. Or pay for an entire dorm room for yourself then spend the whole night pretending to play Monopoly really loudly.
    33. Don’t talk about communal living
    34. Don’t talk about communal living
    Sorry, every time I make a list of rules (which is surprisingly often for some reason) I need to throw in at least one Fight Club reference. Just be thankful I didn’t go with the whole “ass or crotch” on a plane schtick, or “ A dildo, never YOUR dildo”, like I normally do.



Survivor
    As I may have mentioned at some point, while hiking the Camino people end up spending a lot of time, arguably an unhealthy amount of time, deep inside their own head. Which, personally, I found led to all sorts of peculiar and unsettling thought patterns. Lizards, classic