Camino: Cirueña to Villafranca Montes de Oca

This journey of 25-mile distance with a 2,100 feet climb was my plan today and I was starting a bit later than usual, at 5:45am.

Cirueña has many thousands of fancy looking apartments and most seemed empty and forlorn. I later discovered that Cirueña has many golf courses and people come in better weather to stay there and to play golf.

As I left, I took a picture of the blue house, my Albergue, that my French roommate had liked so much and which reminded him of his favorite French song.

It was very cold and pitch dark, a bit foreboding. I walked diligently and by 7AM, reached the big historic city of Santo Domingo de la Calzada hoping to find a nice strong coffee.

I saw several interesting metal sculptures, but no coffee, as everything was closed.

I passed the Catedral de Santo Domingo de la Calzada, founded in the 12th century.

The church was very ornate and I admired it, waiting in the square for a bit.

It was 8AM by now and the bright light due to sunrise revealed the neighboring town of Grañón raising my hopes for a coffee.

As I approached the town, I crossed a highway bridge with interesting graffiti encouraging the pilgrims to walk strong.

Grañón was an ancient city as well.

The church at the center of the Main Street had a stained glass window with the shell on it, the symbol signifying the Camino.

As I proceeded to Redecilla del Camino, I enjoyed the similar views of the farmlands, mountains, trees and the open space.

I had come across a South Korean couple earlier in the day and they said they had been living in New Jersey as of late. At one point, I took a wrong turn and this couple noticed, they screamed and screamed, got my attention and prevented me from going too far in the wrong direction.

Having walked over 10 miles, I was ready for another break.

A metal sculpture commemorated the pilgrims in the central plaza.

I continued my journey after having more coffee and came across a farm, this time with a cauliflowers plantation.

The dense farmland contrasted with the ancient buildings and looked very special.

The next few miles were full of the scenery that typifies this Castillo y Leon region: mountains, farms and trees.

I had walked 18 miles and reached my initial goal, Belorado, for the day, a goal I had set up yesterday. As it was only 1pm, I had decided to walk 8 more miles because it would allow me to reach the very big town of Burgos tomorrow which is 33 miles away. Burgos has very good restaurants, so it was an added draw.

The cathedral of Santa Maria from the sixteenth century was in Belorado and it looked quite magestic.

There was a huge mural of a pilgrim covering the entire wall of a house.

I was hungry and Belorado had a good restaurant which served the 'Menu Del Dia' and I chose the bacalou, i.e. cod, which I had grown to like a lot.

A sign showed that 550km still remained from reaching Santiago de Compostela.

The yellow and white wildflowers made the area look very pleasing. Then unexpectedly, it started raining. I reached in my backpack and put on the rain jacket.

It was about 5 PM, with the rain still going strong, I finally reached the Albergue for the night. It was a very big one, offering 60 beds to pilgrims and was pretty clean.

Dinner was served at 7 PM in a very ornate dining room. For a €18 price, they had a very good spread, including freshly baked bread, bottled water, a full bottle of La Rioja red wine, paella, a whole baked mackerel and tiramisu for dessert.

The bicyclist couple I had seen from the prior day had also made it to this hostel, and I got a chance to greet them.

Another person I encountered was British and he described himself as a drifter. He had lived in India for 20 years, in all different parts, Himachal Pradesh, Goa, Chennai etc.

I asked him if he knew any Indian languages, and he said he tried to learn but could not, and was very happy that Indian people can speak English very well.

I asked him the kind of work he did, and he said he did any kind of work he found. He works only when necessary. However, with the widespread use of computers and his age disadvantage, he seemed like he was in his 60s, he was not able to find work as often. Nevertheless, he had eternal optimism. He said that anytime he needed something, things just worked out. I was in awe of his attitude and did not know if I could live with this amount of faith and uncertainty. But it seemed like it was working for him because he had walked the Camino three times and had lived all his life in different countries and environments.

I saw a Japanese person from Chiba city, near Tokyo, with his laptop. He was the only person besides me carrying a laptop with him on this whole trip.

I was too tired and it was too late. I called it a night. More adventures awaited me tomorrow.