Day 10. Simon sporting his ‘dragged through a hedge backwards’ look.

Long shadows and late finishes

Going commando again today – but taking the socks out as the chaffing was bad. Si took the picture but I looked like a tango’d eunuch so we’ve left it for later.

We left at dawn – its much easier to see. We had the sun at our backs for 10 minutes and then it just shifted slightly. Its hard to describe the beauty in being just in the shade. The real beauty was the shelf of cloud – 200m to the right basked in the sunshine but as far as the mountains in the distance we had the cloud – behind us and ahead – such is the way of the camino

Simon’s search for that soul sister continued today and received a promising omen when we heard of the Brazilian girl who had met her German man on the camino two years ago and were now on their honeymoon. I’m busy thinking that result against France was awesome but these kids have never missed a world cup final between them.

Tricky choice if the kids can play though. Do you commit to the sound of the samba or efficiency of the Germans. Either way your bound to win some medals, if you get a game.

We passed through Rioja Alto today. I presume it stands for Rioja Heights – but looked more like Rioja empty. It did have a brilliant looking golf course – which we didn’t get to play but did get a cup of hot chocolate in the club house to go with our patatas omelette.

How do you describe this hot chocolate though. It was like a cup of nutella. I reckon in future we must say con leche – with milk – otherwise its like – pretty strong – rich – bogging – roughly in that order.

We were doing our *** ratings for the albergues and the one we were in last night was definitely ****, although today is probably 3 1/2 stars. We walked a bit further so after the golf course town Ciruena with 2000 condiminiums up for sale and some terraced mock tudor couple of streets borrowed heavily from Blackpool, Portsmouth or Willesden, we went to Santo Domingo de la Calzada, and then onto Grannon, but we didn’t stop there – we went on to Recedilla del Camino – that’s Si and the race!

Here we have everything we need – food – sun – water machine – and bar with Champions league! Si’s even just helped our Korean friend to check in. She’s been stalking him for a while – she’s in her 60s – but at least its a love interest for him

We’ve now done 223km so we’re getting along just dandy. We hope to make it through Atapuerca by Friday which will be 1/3 of the way. So 12 days to do a 1/3 means 5 weeks 1 day to do the lot.

That’s quite a cheery thought as we will hit Burgos on Friday now not Sunday and we’re getting much more time at the end if we are struggling with injuries. At present the only injury I’m nursing is my bitten fingernails as Real Madrid held on last night.

I’ve no idea why I started biting my nails but there you go. We passed a lot of plaques today. There was a cracker just outside Santo Domingo, “I can see for miles and miles” P Townsend said this in 1966 the year he walked the camino. When it appeared as a song on the Who’s, Meaty Beaty Big and Bouncy Album in 1967 members of the band were flown in to see the view. it was a clear sunny day today and we could see 20 miles to the mountains in the north easy. I think Simon said he could see 50 miles but I just nodded. If I’d brought my telescope too I could probably see as far as Pete Townsend, but let’s not make it a competition, please.

A bit later in a cafe in Granon, there was a plaque and poem on the wall. Allegedly the great Magonagel had written

“There was a coo sat on that hill,”

And then gone off to the toilet.

When he came back he wrote

“Its no there noo it must’ve shifted”

The countryside was extraordinarily dull today but the mountains and the clouds looked fantastic. We crossed the border from Rioja into Castile y Leon and left the wine for the patatas. There were some funny looking plants growing amongst the tatties – the flowers looked a bit like Nicotiana, the tobacco plant, but they little spiky balls that looked like poor man’s conkers.

I’m sure there’ll be someone writing in to the Beechgrove Garden, Gardeners question time, whatever as we type.

Enough of these fascinating asides – back to the Albergues.

First night – St Gien – definitely the pits. Unfortunately we found all the new toilets and showers after we’d packed our bags. Had we known – or been shown around – it’d been ** but * is all it gets, especially for 7 euro.

Roncesvalles – the first and only really large 120 bed dorm. 2 showers per sex meant ** tops but for 5 euro what’d'ya expect.

Zubiri – private albergue – 8 in our room – and she did my service wash for 5 euro – but problems swinging the cat ** 10 euro each was a bit steep.

Pamplona – *** hotel – seems about right, breakfast was Superb and France gifted Scotland 3 points. At 120 euro perhaps a bit pricey – but pampered in Pamplona was what we got!

Puente la Reina – a big swimming pool, 3 showers each sex, decent pilgrims nosh, unlimited quantity of chilled San Miguel, lots of space for throwing things at each other. Rucsacs are clumsy things and when its clumsy and clumsier who are wearing them it pays to have a big space to let these big units lighten their load. 8 euro very reasonable although the 9 euro for the nosh would’ve been excellent value if we’d chosen pint of wine, not glass of beer.

Estella – where we met a love Spanish girl on the door who was all over us like a rash when we showed her what was under our kiltsm yes indeed, the passport that tells them we’re from Escotia, specifically Edinburgh where she’d just finished a year – living in Slateford road – so we didn’t do football chat. At 5 euro we expected little and were not daunted by the mixed showers. We got a lucky bunk from our pal, but there were lots of bad ones * I’m afraid.

Los Arcos was the cheapest so far 3 euros. When you got in you realised why. To be fair – we all arrived at once so the 3 showers were quickly used up. * is fair.

Navarrette was super. 10 euros but there were only 4 of us in the dorm for 12. Plenty swinging rucsac space and lockers for your valuables. 3 euro for the service wash, hmmn you guess it *** it was also a real mattress

Can it get better than last night – Azofra.
I doubt it! ****

Tonight we give the place *** – but the food’s not been served yet and after sleeping on the beds you kinda change your vote!

Cheers

Al

Thanks Robin

Day 10 Azofra to Recedilla del Camino

Firstly, thanks for all the messages. Its always good not only to hear from the ´regulars´but also some new ones today! Dont worry Barry it´ll all be over in a month!

Today we left around 7.30am. Daylight just. The first hour was spent dondering along rows and rows of vines eating bread and drinking water. This is Alan´s new diet regime – Just Water and bread, like the original pilgrims. I wonder how long it will last?…..
At 9.30am we reached Ciruena. A strange place. One beautiful golf course and a lot of newly built but empty houses. The nearest you can get to a posh ´ghost town´. Alan waltzed into the Club house at the golf course. Would he get thrown out?. Nope!
Alan new diet hit the rocks. We had hot chocolate and this time it really was like a bar of chocolate had been melted and put in a cup. Talk about sweet!! we had to water it down in order to drink it. Oh we also had Spanish omlette so that bit was also buggered.
Kinda odd to have all this luxury and no-one around to enjoy it.
We carried on to Santo Domingo. We had originally thought about staying their but today we were on a roll. The wine fields change to spud fields. No we didn´t go sample these. Rioja land was over. We were now in Tattieland.
We stopped briefly in Santo Domingo for juice then carried on. The going was pretty straight forward. A bit undulating, but the sun wasn´t to bad.
Next stop Granon. Small refuge and a queue to get in. Would we wait. Naw. Another drink and on we went.
At 2pm we go to Recedilla. This was us. Again a small refuge, but no queue. In fact no-one. There is now. The small Korean lady we helped get lost yesterday has just walked in. Gulp..
Am going to siesta now. adois amigos.