Every parents nightmare- losing your kid in a foreign country

Have you seen this boy?

"Cooooooooeeeeeeeee"

Anyone going through Boente today was shown a picture of Morgan and asked if they'd seen him behind, or if they see him in front to tell him to stop and wait for us.

I need to say right now that we have proceedures in place for when 'something' goes wrong, and that Morgan is a sensible kid. He also had a phone ( albeit only connected when there is wifi) and enough money/ resources to get him a plane ticket back to Australia... Though I had his passport. But I knew he wouldn't starve and could get hold of someone... So on that front not concerned.

Todays start was a little stressful to say the least. 

I won 't go into the traumas of mornings with Lilly who, after 49 days of walking still struggles with the concept of having everything ready and packed in the bag, so mornings are easy...... 

Suffice to say, I was losing my calm, so Morgan, who had been dressed and ready for ages, left the room and went downstairs to where I presumed he would wait in the bar.

When Lilly and I got there, the bar, and outside benches were empty. The barman shrugged and pointed at the door; so again, I assumed Morgan had put  his music on and started walking. He knew we had a lot of ground to cover today and that it was going to get really hot, so we were keen to get miles under our boots. 

We were a good ten mins behind him, so we walked as quickly as we could. After half an hour of walking and no sign of him, Lilly and I had to agree that we were not likely to catch him if he has his groove on. We also had to come to the realisation that he may have stayed behind, or gone down the wrong track.  Though the last one was unlikely, given that the track was very well signposted, it had still to be a possibility. One I didn't want to think about was that he may have been kidnapped or taken.

It was a real insight into the collective mind of pilgrims and the blessings we continue to receive.

We stood for about an hour on a bend, cooing for Morgan and asking people if they had seen him. Alot of the pilgrims were folk we had bumped into along the trek at some point or another. Most people promised to look out for him. There were only a few who refused to acknowledge us (I understand if they didn't speak English - I did ask before I went into my request) and one in perfect English told me to go away and not bother her.  I guess she was in the zone.

Our phones were not in a service area - given the mountainous terrain - and I know as soon as we got into a place that had a cafe, that Morgan would have left messages on facebook or imessage for us.

It was a hard decision whether to go forward to where a cafe or bar may be and try to contact him, or to go back to the bar we were in for breakfast and contact him there.

I finally decided to go back as I knew there was internet within 40 mins walk and was unsure where the next bar was ahead.

I was very proud of Morgan; given the stressful situation he was in. For reasons unknown, he had gone downstairs and sat around the corner - one that was not in the main thoroughfare. After waiting for us, he followed our procedure and stayed put. After a certain amount of time, and he had messaged us with no reply; he messaged and called Michael in Australia.

I am so thankful and grateful for Michaels presence. He dropped everything ( he was at work) and kept Morgan on the phone, calming him and making sure he was ok.  On the verge of him calling the police in Spain, we walked in.

It was  a pretty tearful reunion on all parts and I remain grateful for Michael and Morgan following our procedures.