Back to the roots: pilgrimage

Our family and friends know the story how Radek went to a pilgrimage just for one day (to visit me on the route) and stayed till the end with only one pair of spare socks and briefs. Ach... good ol' days!

Anyhow, it's been 7 years since that memorable event and we decided to make a small tribute to that this year. We have no time and motivation to go on a full pilgrimage to Częstochowa, so we joined the group just for one day: Szczecin - Stargard (which is 27 km). A lot has changed in this time, but the pilgrimage spirit is definitely the same!

This year we were lucky or unlucky with the weather... It rained and it rained pretty heavily. OK, let's face it - it rained cats and dogs! This is unlucky, because there is no worse thing than rain when you have to march. One gets soaked, demotivated, cold... But then you think: "I'm doing it for a reason, so it's even better if it's tough". And in this sense it's a positive thing.

Here are some photos from the day... We started as always at 7.00 o'clock with the mass in the sanctuary of Mother from Fatima. Then two groups formed and set out to Stargard -first through the housing estates, then through the forest. The first stop was after 10 km and this is when it started to rain.

Then we marched another ~10 km in the rain. Gosh, that was extreme. It took us twice as long to get to the lunch stop which was in Kobylanka. Fortunately, when we reached the village, it stopped raining. That was really good news because there is no sense in having pauses when it rains. In Kobylanka we had some time to change clothes to the dry ones and use the hospitality of the parishioners who prepared food and drinks.

Last leg of the route was Kobylanka - Stargard and came rather quick. All in all we did the distance of 27.02 km in a 6-hour-march (pauses excluded). Here is the route tracked by Endomondo application.