6-7-10 Montpellier day 64

6-7-10 Montpellier day 64

there was a breakfast offered of sorts at the youth-hostel big chunks of bread and butter or jam, and a bowl of coffee..i've seen a few times now cereal size bowls being used in lieu of mugs here in france..well I like my coffee in quantity so it suites me fine. I got my stuff together...i asked the friendly receptionist if she could call the pilgrims place at this town which was a possible destination for me today if I could manage. She did call but was told by the lady that she no longer takes pilgrims because her daughter had moved back home...so the receptionist suggested I try the tourist office...and again still gimping I walked across town to the tourist office... there again much friendliness and attempts at helping me.. I showed them the route I was suppose to take and they too could not find any lodging info for me along that route within a manageable distance... so I decided to stay one more day in Montpellier since the little walking i'd done today did not feel good.. this was a hard time to find lodging in town, but they found a cheap room for me slightly outside of the old center..the youth hostel I already knew was fully booked that evening...they also gave me a bus schedule just in case I decided to bus the next leg of the journey since there was no midway point to stop at or so it seemed.. I kinda liked the idea of having my own room for the night...again I walked across town to this hotel... I had been encouraged to rush since she was only holding the room for me for a little while..so I got there, and yes I could check in and pay and leave my bag in the room but I could not stay...it was now 10.30 and I was told to come back at 3pm because she made it sound like the place was being scrubbed down from top to bottom...the woman did not seem very friendly but the room was kind of charming...and there was a garden area as well.. I tried to say my feet were sore could I stay in the garden... No!...okay so I left my bag and hobbled back out.. I went to the big cathedral and again got a credential stamp... then I sat in there for a while... running through thoughts and emotions.. having had to stay an extra day frustrated me.. the fact that my feet were worse again worried me... I knew I could not do this pilgrimage the normal or fast way... I just had to admit I had to go slower, and I had to extend my end date of pilgrimage longer than expected..basically I felt a bit discouraged.. I had also gotten a lot of information and advise and some of it was not integrated with what worked best for me.. After I had some of my angst diminish, I felt better and left.. I tried to go into these public gardens but they were closed on mondays..so I found a restaurant advertising salads.. so I had a giant meal size salad with baguettes and melted cheese in the salad.. the wait staff there was also super sweet.. then I walked back to another park area and found a bench under trees to while away the last hour of wait... finally I hobbled back to the room stopping at a little market for fruit to delay some more time...i arrived at the hotel 15 minutes early... and got kind of yelled at by this old dyke who spoke to me in german but let me come in anyway even though the floors were still wet...apparently they were dead serious about scrubbing down the floors... this place too had internet so for the rest of the afternoon I lay in bed resting my feet and intereneted...including a skype-phoning my mom a day early for her birthday and caught another friend too who I was able to do the video phone with via skype...so I got to see the ginormous pregnant belly she now sported...and her fast growing little boy...so it felt nice warm and cozy to connect with home like that... it was getting late so I hit the street again for dinner... I found a gyro place and had a real fallafle...again the guys there were really friendly... chatting with me a bit... then back for the evening.. the hotel lady asked me if my foot was hurt but it did not seem out of any form of compassion... she seemed to be huge exception to the friendliness in this town..even the little hotel dog was friendly … so I thought she was kind of funny... the room turned out not to have a real window..so it was a bit hot in the room and I did not sleep that well...