Day 38, April 6.

I got up early to see if I could handle going with Amanda who had organized a local team for the 6-hour Mirador Challenge walk-hike. I was totally psyched to do it.

But wisdom said, “Jack, you must be kidding!”

Jack: “But it sounds so great! I would absolutely love to do this.”

Wisdom: “Aren’t you trying to recover from an illness, and you have your last weekend of your Extended Professional Training coming up that you must be healthy for?”

Jack: “Yes, but–”

Wisdom: “JACK!”

So I didn’t go. But I did decide, if I felt up for it in the early afternoon, to join them as they walked through Javea and on up the elephant trunk mountain for the last 2-hour leg of the Challenge. And I did, and I loved it.

Amanda and her team set a mean pace—walked way faster than I would have, and they had already walked 4 hours when I joined them.

But as it turns out it was a big mistake for me. Even that was overdoing it.

In the night I relapsed, back to coughing and now my nose was also running all night long, just as Tammy’s had. It was not a pleasant night at all. So tomorrow and the next few days I’ve resolved to just take it easy.

Got a call from my friend, Walter Crockett today. I think he is the greatest unknown songwriter in the world. He wrote a song  after his wife died of cancer, called “Hard Times Comin’ On” that I haven’t been able to get out of my head this entire trip. Then within two years later his daughter died of a brain tumor (he wrote another incredible song about that.) And many of us think we’ve got problems. Walter is a testament to human resilience.