It wasn't the Camino, but it was my Camino

While I was in NY, my bestie finished her trek on the Camino de Santiago. I didn't ask her permission to show the photo/s of her smiling at the end, I'll let that be her story. But my pride in her was exquisite. She checked in with me often (God bless the fact texting exists, and the fact I wake up between 3-5am to go to the bathroom and saw her messages hours ahead of our time zone). 

I have thought about hikes like this, mostly wanting to do absolutely flat ones. In the past, I've walked from midtown Manhattan to the southern tip and back (college days) and I feel like I can for sure walk incredibly long distances until some motherfucker puts a hill in my way, and some other motherfucker puts a pint in my hands around lunchtime. 

God, no hills, yes beer. 

So I was super proud of C, and her trip, and her accomplishment. And hell if it didn't inspire me while I was schlepping around manhattan over the last four days. "C did 20 miles, I can do... two." 

Doug and I were talking about her trip on Camino and he said "yeah, Manhattan is a Camino where you can duck into any Irish pub, have a pint, a glass of water, go to the bathroom and head out again until you feel like stopping at another pub to do the same." 

He's right. 

We did something similar a few years back, of a camino of sorts to pubs. 

Doug plotted out the oldest bars in Manhattan and a walking tour of them. I can't find the entries, I swear I wrote about this. It would have been maybe 10 years ago now. But hell if we didn't walk all over hell and most of Manhattan visiting places like The White Horse Tavern, McSorley's, Fanelli's and The Ear. 

White Horse was full of hipsters so we didn't go in. You couldn't get into McSorley's at all. Fanelli's was equally crowded, but we managed a squeeze in. The best stop on the tour was The Ear. Not just because we got in, there was good food and enjoyable libations, but because it was just fucking cool. 

Anyway, here's some evidence of me having done a lot. Vegas was a lot, according to my fitbit, drilling back to the dates there, June 1st was just under 10 miles. In Vegas heat. Ugh. 

Seriously, I could have done more a couple of these days. But it's still something. 

Pass the Tylenol, please.