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Ever safety-conscious, Belen gives us a demonstration of proper helmet use and sun protection.

Astorga to Cacabelos

Camino de Santiago

Where's our arrow?

First, the numbers: 399.24 miles pedaled so far. Four more days to Santiago. 146 pictures taken today. 47 miles biked today, including 3772 feet of climbing and a whopping 5029 feet of descent.



We had a long and relatively steep climb up the Montes de Leon where we encountered the Cruz de Ferro. Those who have seen the movie The Way will recognize it. This is the place where pilgrims heap stones (representing the weight of the sins they are carrying) at the base of the cross. We each picked up a stone early in the morning to leave here.

This was another windy day, but fortunately we avoided rain. Philipp, the guide who went out early and marked our route today, was not so lucky. He encountered heavy rain.

Our descent after leaving the Cruz de Ferro was quite difficult because of the large amount of sand and gravel on the road (due to recent repaving), and the heavy winds. We all made it safely, however.

I mentioned the movie, The Way(theway-themovie.com/) Along our "way" today, we met an older man who

Guy with movie star

had a bit part in the movie (he claims). He was selling small wooden shells that he had carved. We all bought one from him.

We have a group dinner tonight, so I will let the pictures tell the story of our day..

Guy, Edda and "Siggy"

Ringing the church bells

Stopping along the way

Leon to Astorga

We awoke this morning to find the Plaza Mayor in front of our hotel converted to the weekly (or is it twice weekly?) market. The entire square was filled, primarily with sellers of fruits and vegetables, but also a rank ot trucks with fresh meats, cheese, and fish. Since we were not going to start cycling until 10 am, we had time to explore the market and take a few photos.

Pimientos frescos

The ride today was almost like another rest day. We did only 40 miles, with very little climbing, almost no wind,  and lots of cloud cover. There was one fairly long stretch as we finished our crossing of the meseta with almost nothing but trees, and then the remainder of the trip was a series of villages all very close to each other. Along the way I saw several fields with a crop growing on strings attached to very tall poles. I think this was probably hops -- it looked just like the hops fields in the Yakima Valley in Eastern Washington. (Much of the this trip has reminded me of Eastern Washington, especially the wheat fields.)

We did have a very pleasant coffee stop in Hospital de Orbigo next to the medieval bridge (sombe original, some reconstructed) across the Orbigo river. This bridge figures in the Don Quixote folk traditions of Spain. It was quite cold today, so we had our coffee and croissants indoors.

We are in the town of Astorga, staying at an excellent hotel/spa. Since I have a massage scheduled in ten minutes, I will pick this up later.

The massage was wondeful!  Too bad that we don't have this option every day. For half an hour she worked on my habitually painful shoulder, as well as the quads. I feel great now, if a little tired.

Back to Astorga. It is not clear why this town sports a new and well-appointed spa hotel such as ours. This is the first time that Experience Plus has used it, but it seems great. The room is ultra modern -- it took me several minutes to figure out all the controls on the shower!

This town has another of the Gaudi buildings outside of the Catalan region. This one is a bizarre "Bishop's Palace," built for a local bishop. The locals so disliked Gaudi's design that the controversy brought construction to a halt for over 50 years. It was finally finished in 1963 and today houses a fascinating museum dedicated to the Camino pilgrimage route. There are an astonishing number of paintings and statues dating back to the 12th and 13th centuries. Next to the Bishop's Palace is the Cathedral with its own museum. I had time to visit both before returning to the hotel for the massage.

In Astorga

Another Pilgrim in Astorga

It is almost time for our evening meeting and then we are on our own for dinner. Last night's dinner was a welcoming dinner for our new riders and was a marathon affair. We got the restaurant to seat us "early" at 8:30, and the food was still coming at 10:30. Just one delicious course after another. I have a feeling that I will be very unhappy when I get on the scale at home. But until then, life is great....

Rest Day in Leon

I slept in until 8:30 this morning, and it really felt good. After a leisurely breakfast in the hotel, I caught up on email and so forth until it was time for our guided tour of the Cathedral. We had a local guide who gave a very detailed and fascinating presentation on the Cathedral as well as the  Church of San Isidoro and a Gaudi building which we also visited.

The Cathedral in Leon is the greatest in all of Spain in terms of its stained glass, and second only to Chartres in France in this respect. Some of the stained glass is currently being cleaned -- a project that began in the late 1990s. To clean the stained glass, it must be removed temporarily from the Cathedral. At this point, no one knows whether there will be enough money to finish the entire cleaning. Other restoration works are in progress as well. It is hard to believe that the entire Cathedral was built in less than a century.

After a visit to the nearby Church of San Isidoro, we passed by one of only three buildings outside of the Catalan region designed and built by the architect Antoni Gaudi. (Kathleen and I had visited his famous Sagrada Familia (still unfinished) and Gaudi apartments in Barcelona on an earlier visit to Spain.). Here you see the building, now occupied by a bank, as well as me sitting on a bench with Gaudi himself.


The city is very quiet now, since it is siesta time (generally about 2pm to 4:30pm). The streets are nearly deserted, so I took advantage of the quiet to come back to the hotel and catch up on this blog. Who knows -- I may even take a nap before our evening meeting and dinner.

A word about the passport that I have mentioned in many of these blog entries. At the completion of the journey, a pilgrim who has walked or ridden on horseback at least the last 100 kilometers, or bicycled at least the last 200 km, receives a certificate or "compostela." The proof of completion is the passport which you can get stamped along the way at principal churches monasteries, alburgues, as well as many hotels and cafes. You need at least one stamp a day, but this is not difficult. As you can see, mine is nearly full.

Carrion de los Condes to Leon

Once again, an easy winner for the photo of the day. (Doubly easy since I didn't take many today). When we began the tour, we were each given an Experience Plus hat. Our objective is to find someone along the way to give the hat to -- someone who would enjoy it, who would share a special moment with us, and who would pose for a special picture. The recipient of my hat today was the adorable proprietor of the small cafe in El Burgo Ranero -- she was just full of life and really enjoyed serving us a memorable lunch of tapas (the sardines with onions were great), olives, and french fries!!


Our first coffee stop was at Sahagun. They were barricading the streets, in preparation for the running of the bulls. I think we were all surprised to find that Pamplona is not the only place where this tradition is carried out.

The ride will be memorable for a long time because of the wind. Philipp, who has done this tour many times, says that it was the windiest that he has ever seen it on this stretch. It was a long stretch, too. We rode about 66 miles with a headwind or strong side wind for the entire distance, except for one quarter of a circle as we went about a roundabout. Because of the wind, we rode in a close pace line almost all of the day -- not for speed, but to protect some of the riders from some of the wind some of the time. No one would mistake us for a breakaway from the Vuelta de Espana, but we got the job done, arriving in Leon around 5:30pm. On the way in, we passed the Cathedral -- another magnificent edifice -- which we will tour tomorrow. In the meantime, we have checked into another great hotel.

Hotel NH Plaza Mayor, Leon

As were about to set out for dinner, we met two of the riders who will be joining us for the second week of the tour: "Siggy" and his daughter Edda  from Iceland. They joined us for a pleasant dinner at El Llar, where we all shared first courses of Serrano Ham, crogquettes, and baked potatoes stuffed with mushrooms. All were excellent. For a main course, I had the specialty of the house which was a dish of codfish cheeks with mushrooms, red peppers and small potatoes. It was superb.

And now, at 11:30, off to bed. Thankfully, tomorrow is our rest day, so I can sleep in.

Burgos to Carrion de los Condes

No problem choosing the photo of the day. Bob stopped to take a "green door" break and found that Spain has thought of everything for the pilgrim traveling the Camino!

You will notice the wind turbines in the background (Sure you will.). We have seen them everywhere in Spain, and today was proof that they have been a very great investment for the people of Spain. We had strong headwinds all day, except for the last fifteen miles or so when we had strong side winds. The ride was  almost exactly 100 km (62 miles) with about 3200 feet of climbing. Fortunately the climbs were not steep at all, but the wind added to the level of difficulty. Nonetheless, we all finished together in reasonably good time.

Our hotel is a converted Benedictine monastery that dates back at least to 948 A.D.! It is very well appointed and has some beautiful commons rooms, such as the dining room where we had dinner tonight. Philipp, one of our guides gave us an overview of the history and architecture of the monastery and the church that is here.

We left the province of Burgos today and entered Palencia (not to be confused with Valencia, an entirely different area. For a good part of the day, our route was the same as, or parallel to, or criss-crossed the route used by the hiking pilgrims, so we saw many of them. We also saw our first pilgrims doing the Camino on horseback. Many of the peregrinos do not stay in nice hotels as we are doing, but in "alburgues," which are simple and relatively inexpensive shelters. Because of the large number of people doing the Camino, there is a priority for obtaining one of the available spaces in these shelters -- first the walkers, second the bicyclists, and third those on horseback. (In many cases these are not feasible  for those with horses because of the need to shelter and feed the horse.) Many of the shelters fill up early in the afternoon, so we see far more hikers in the morning.

We stopped twice today -- once for coffee in the morning at Hontanas. While there we saw an interesting phenomenon (which we also saw a couple of other places). A vendor of a certain type of food -- a butcher, or a vegetable seller, or a person selling bread and eggs, will enter town in his small truck, with his horn blaring to announce his arrival. Because these villages are too small to support a full time grocer, seller of fruits and vegetables, or bakery, people will come out and buy from the mobile seller. So, in Hontanas, for example, we saw a woman come out with her egg carton and buy 10 eggs, the owner of our cafe came out to get butter, and another cafe owner came with two large paper bags to lay in his store of bread.

The second stop was originally planned as a very quick "see if we can get our passports stamped" visit, but we ended up buying a few sandwiches and tarrying a while before heading back into the wind. Fortunately we had good cloud cover all day, and the temperature was actually quite cool. I did not take my jacket off until 1 pm -- it was simply too cold (especially with the wind) before that.

514 kilometers to go (more or less)

Tomorrow's ride is another long one -- 110 kilometers -- that will take us to Leon. We will have our only rest day after arriving there, and will also pick up and additional four riders who will be with us for the remainder of the Camino.

Santo Domingo de la Calzada to Burgos

Enrico

We need to start today's entry with a photo of Enrico -- he got squeezed out of yesterday's group photo at Cafe Suiza.

Now, to the chronicle of another superb day. The ride was 56 miles with 3763 feet of climbing.  I took off a little before the rest of the group and spent the morning riding solo and simply enjoying life. To borrow a phrase from my friends from Fort Collins, I found a "happy gear," put my legs on autopilot and just enjoyed the ever-changing scenery. For the most part, we were cycling through wheat fields although we passed extensive acreage devoted to peppers and other crops. Since we had a stiff breeze, all day, I gained a new appreciation for the phrase "amber waves of grain." Of course, at this time of year, they are green, but the breeze blowing through the fields created the beautiful illusion of waves.

As we entered the province of Burgos, I was struck by the immediate change in the quality of the road. We went from superb pavement with good shoulder to relatively bumpy road with no shoulder, and then to a stretch of construction for a few miles. After that, the roads improved considerably.

First stop of the morning was the town of Belorado where I got my passport stamped and then stopped at a small market for a chocolate bar and some bananas which I intended to be my lunch. Next stop was the small church of San Juan de Ortega. I got another passport stamp, took some pictures and was about to eat my meager lunch when I saw the rest of our group who had brought along a substantial picnic (also purchased in Belorado). My chocolate bar was now chocolate soup, and I was glad to join them for a lunch of varied meats, cheeses, breads, peppers, olives, and fruit.

After lunch, we had less than 20 miles of gently rolling road to Burgos (except for one short and very steep hill). The entry into Burgos can only be described as spectacular, as the cathedral came into view. It is a real treat to have a hotel room with a window facing directly onto the cathedral. After showering, I toured the cathedral which is simply breathtaking.

The entire group convened in front of the hotel for a quick briefing on tomorrow's ride (even longer), and then adjourned to La Mejillonera for some appetizers of mussels. This was a fun adventure. We sampled mussels prepared in several different ways -- simply steamed with lemon, "marinera" (with a garlic sauce of a creamy texture), picante (with a spicy red sauce), and with vinegar, oil and chopped peppers.

Pat and Larry