I've been on the receiving end of this problem, when a group of five of us were probably dubbed as "peregrinas from hell" by the hospitalero in San Vicente de la Barquera on the Camino del Norte. We had heard good reports about this place, and indeed the hospitalero is very much "into" all things Camino. It's a nice place, has a good Camino feel, but somehow things went wrong.....
Our first mistake seemed to have been when we (politely, we thought) declined to eat lunch and dinner with the group. This is one of those albergues where people pitch in to help out and eat together, an experience we have enjoyed on other occasions. But not today -- no lunch, because we had already eaten our sandwiches/fruit/etc right before arriving in town, and no dinner because we had planned a special goodbye meal since one of our group had to return home to Switzerland on the bus the next day.
The hospitalero promptly started to grumble about how some walkers just abuse the system, don't really want to be a part of the camino, just want to use it as a place to sleep, etc. As the primary Spanish speaker in the group, I tried to change the topic, and we promptly left the building for the rest of the day, returning only after dinner that evening.
The next morning, the hospitalero started in on me again, saying I looked very sad and maybe it's because people like us are never happy no matter where we are. I tried to be polite, said that if I looked sad it must be beause one of our group had to go home. And then, out of the blue, or so it seemed to me, he told me he had always thought that we Americans were incredibly arrogant, but that it wasn't our fault, but rather due to the hegemony of the American empire, etc., etc. Now, I've been criticized as having many faults, but arrogance has never made it onto the list. I really didn't want to have a fight, so I just said that I was very sorry if our behavior had led him to label us as arrogant. He seemed maybe a bit disappointed that he couldn't get me to react (or maybe I'm just imagining that because I was feelilng so unjustly accused!). I was tempted to respond but finally thought it just wouldn't accomplish anything. But I left very confused and not sure exactly how we had gotten to this.
So my point here is only to say that those people who dedicate their lives, or at least a large part of their lives, to providing for pilgrims, like all of us have their own personality quirks. And who knows what it is that sets some of them off. I'm not trying to say that the criticism of Michelle (whom I've never met) is unwarranted or warranted. Just that personalities have a way of combining/conflicting in strange ways and that is probably what accounts for the variety of opinons expressed here about Michelle and her albergue. I'll bet a lot of people have a very good opinion of my friend in San Vicente de la Barquera, and maybe the next time I walk I'll try it again, but it certainly was an unpleasant experience in an otherwise beautiful little place.
