Llanos de La Larri – Parzán

Beautiful pale blue morning. Perfect temperature. Tired after yesterday’s big day. Made frothy cappuccino on my stove. Sat tucked in sleeping bag enjoying the view and getting ready to pack up my things. A blonde cow had ambled closer and closer. She wasn’t grazing and stared straight at me the whole time. Oh no missus, not anywhere nearer my $650 tent. I put down my coffee in the vestibule and lunged towards her, flapping my arms and yelling “SHOO”. I expected her to swerve on her hind legs and bolt away from me the way any other herbivore would. She didn’t. She lowered her enormous head clad with 20 cm long horns and charged.

I screamed and threw myself out of the way, catapulting Ferdinand out of his bivvy bag. The cow tripped over my taut guy lines, kicked over my coffee cup, and almost fell on her face before she regained her balance and came at us again. Now, you might not think that Kristin (171 cm & 62 kg) was any match for Bessie (145 cm & 600 kg). But nobody, and I mean nobody, gets between a thru-hiker and their tent.

-        “FERDINAND!” I roared. “SAVE MY TENT!”

Ferdinand looked completely stunned as he grappled with what was happening, but he grabbed his bivvy bag and flung it at the cow like a matador. She charged at him with full force, this time he dodged her horns by barely a metre.

-        “KEEP GOING!” I wailed, yanking my tent plugs out of the ground. I flung open the metal door to the old stone barn, gathered my tent containing all my belongings and threw it and myself inside on the cold stone floor. Ferdinand dashed around the mad cow, flinging himself in and smashing the door shut behind him with a deafening bang.

Good fucking god. I looked sheepishly at Ferdinand, recounting his question about cow safety last night. Well shit. If I had been alone I would have been done in, or at the very least be without accommodation for the foreseeable future. I stared at the tangled mess of gear on the floor in exasperation. And my damn coffee was gone too! Ferdinand politely looked away while I changed and stuffed everything in my pack. All of a sudden I just wanted to be gone, far away from livestock and other people. We checked that the coast was clear before exiting the barn, the cow was nowhere in sight.

-        “Well, goodbye then, strong solo woman.” Ferdinand smiled kindly. “A goodbye hug?” He looked so sweet and friendly, standing there with arms outstretched, tousled hair, sleeping bag draped over his shoulders. But I couldn’t. I made an excuse about my t-shirt being stinky and awkwardly darted off towards the trail junction. I don’t really know why I refused his embrace. I regretted it on the woodland climb up from the valley.

My mood was sour as I plowed my way through about 60 spider webs on my way up through the dimply lit pines of Cuesta de la Rivareta. Not only was my caffeine addiction truly real, I had also just been within an inch of seeing £2000 worth of hiking gear trampled to dust. A truly horrific wake up.

The sun smashed into my face as I came over the ridge onto the Plana Es Corders plains. The first half of my day would trace this flat mountain shelf which ran parallel to the crest I had traversed yesterday. Three fat marmots ran ahead of me on the trail as I wearily eyed another pack of cows grazing on the hillside. Darn it, I just wanted to hit replay and do the morning all over again. I sat down on the grassy edge of the mountain plain in the company of too many flies and made another coffee. So there, Bessie.

I walked. Mountains on my right. A green corridor of lush grass and wildflowers, pines. Filled water in a cow trough. I felt like I was stopping every five minutes to apply sunscreen, get a snack out, drink. I felt nauseous. I was two weeks in, and already energy bars had lost their appeal. A quick climb led me up to Collado de las Coronetas (2,159m), the only col of the day. Below lay a hanging valley strewn with large boulders, purple flowers, and at the bottom, shiny reflections of cars in Plan Fonda car park. It was so hot. My head was spinning with snippets of conversations from the last year - voices of people I knew and had known so loud I almost couldn’t hear my laboured breathing and frantic steps racing down the hill.

“…you’ll always be the girl with mended glasses…”

“…I’ve never told anyone that I loved them…”

“…come here little pixie…”

“…feel like we’re capped at 80 per cent…”

“…would you rather know the what if even if it disappoints you…?”

“…for us because we made it here despite everything…”

“…we were meant to meet and write this together…”

“…who am I if I’m not your daughter anymore…?”

“…so girly…”

I almost didn’t see the river Real before I nearly waded into it. I heaved a single dry sob, peeled off my clothes and lay down in the liquid crystals. The shock of the cold water knocked my breath out, taking all consequential thoughts with it. A thru-hiking commandment: always swim. These moments are the whole point. I lay in the river until I couldn’t bear it anymore and wrung my clothes back on. My head felt like cotton. I was out of food and used my last phone battery to listen to the Tough Girl podcast along the 12 km of dirt road into the village of Parzán. I walked fast and mechanically with only the thought of lunch and rest in mind. The road descended gently until I has lost all the altitude of the mountains and once again entered forested valleys.

I look back on my time in Parzán as an ode to hiker trash vogue. I walked into the big, air-conditioned grocery store with my panties hanging off my pack to dry. Beyond the Haribo aisle, I walked around aimlessly and stared at items impossibly far removed from my current circumstances. Condoms. Hair masks. “Por cabello seco”. I felt pretty damn seco all around in the 30 degree heat. As if that wasn’t enough… My top pack pocket was open and my bag of almonds had emptied inside it – meaning that as I bent down to place my shopping cart items on the scanning belt, a shower of almonds cascaded down my neck and all over the floor. The groomed-looking family standing behind me in the queue stared with their mouths hanging open in disbelief. The cashier probably thought I had stolen them and asked to look inside my pack, wrinkling her nose at the dirty mess of that morning’s mad cow packing. I ate a giant peach in the car park and walked over to a lunch-looking bar by the gas station. Hello protein, come to Kris. The two men at the table next to me had stared wide-eyed as I ate my way through lamb chops, sides, and the entire breadbasket. When my job was done, the oldest slowly extended his arm to offer me what was left of theirs. I’m not easily embarrassed, but what an absolute parody of a hiker trash moment.

I snagged a strictly unnecessary hotel room at the only hotel in town. I needed to charge my phone and was just too overcome with heat and fatigue to climb two hours to find a suitable camp spot. Lying on my stomach on the bed, I called G. He’d wanted to join me for my final two days but had gotten the dates mixed up. I was indeed alone. “It’s Friday here in the city you know”, he chuckled. I imagined buzzing London in late summer, the Southbank walkway along the Thames brimming with people enjoying golden sunsets together. Hanging up, I felt truly lonely, like I was the one missing out despite being here on this great adventure. And the thought which had plagued me on and off for the past 2,5 years… why can’t we seem to love the people who are good for us?