Tag Archives: Hiking

Camino Day 12 – Santa Domingo to Belorado. Easy walking, tricky weather

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Monday 28 August 2023 – Since we had a slightly longer walk today – about 23km – it was convenient that the Molino de Floren offered an early breakfast, from 0630. This might be “only” a hostal, but it is well-organised and we had a comfortable night and the breakfast, while fairly simple, featured home-made yoghurt and preserves and very large receptacles for tea.  So we were in good spirits as we left at 0715, having had a chat over breakfast with Phil, a solo peregrino from Maine, in the USA, who is doing the Camino despite having artificial knees. It’s good to know that the technology will stand up to this kind of usage.

As ever, if you’d like to see a short summary of the route and photos, you can watch the Relive video.

The weather promised to be pretty much the same as yesterday’s – breezy, cool, even cold (it was 16°C as we left the hotel), and with the strong likelihood that we would get rained on. As the saying goes, “Red sky in the morning – shepherd’s warning”,

and that turned out to have some merit during the day.

The fields hereabouts have got quite a sophisticated irrigation system

which is sometimes fed from available surface water but also every so often by (noisy) pumps if required.  We saw yet another style of Camino waymark

and we passed Phil (who had started out before us) at a large cross,

Cruz de los Valientes, which marked the site of a dispute between the town of Santo Domingo de la Calzada and its neighbour, Grañon, over the ownership of a meadow. We read that relations between the towns was disharmonious, and this particular fight was decided in favour of Grañon. Phil seemed to know the chap sitting there, and, it being at the top of a bit of a hill, decided to rest up whilst we carried on.

We were walking into the teeth of a stiff Force 4 gusting 6 wind, and this meant that the light kept changing over the scenery, sometimes in sun, sometimes not.

To give you some idea of the chageable nature of the weather, I recorded this short hyperlapse later on in the day

which reflects one minute’s worth of cloud movement. Very soon after I recorded it, by the way, it started raining.

The cold wind meant that we were glad to see Grañon when it hoved into view in the distance

and before too long we had arrived at a refreshment stop.  It wasn’t too sophisticated

but the setting was nice,

the service was very friendly and efficient (and gave us large cups of coffee), and it had couple of quirky decor touches beside it.

The town itself was a little larger than I expected and a deal more interesting. It had a fine town hall building,

more of those ants, this time on the side of a building in the main street,

a nice way of combining a manhole cover with Camino signage,

and, at the far end, a mirador, a viewpoint with some fine views over the area

including sight of a crop which was neither wheat nor sunflowers, and which was being copiously watered.

We couldn’t see what the crop was at that point, but later on in the day passed a similar setup where the crop was dwarf beans.

The landscape continued to be alternating wheat and sunflower crops, which gave us some nice pictures.

Patterns in the sunflower sowing

Cyclists actually on a path appear to be cycling through the field

Jane pointed out that this was environmentally sound graffiti – the florets were about to fall from the seed heads, and all it needs to create a pattern is to brush a finger across the head – because it disappears naturally after a time wthout any harm having been done.

Very soon, we came to a subtle reminder that we were entering the region of Castille and León,

which means that by this stage we have walked across the whole region of La Rioja from left to right.

The route for the rest of the day followed, and for large amounts of it bordered, the road between Burgos and Logroño, the N-120. It’s a pretty major route and not too rewarding to walk beside, but at least we had a segregated path for those segments. It also meant that we passed through a succession of villages, four of ’em, before we reached our destination for the day, Belorado.

The first of these was Redecilla del Camino,

which, like Santo Domingo, the town we visited yesterday, has a rollo, the site for administration of justice and, possibly, death.

Seeing this means that yesterday’s example wasn’t our last Rollo.  Thank you. Thank you for listening to my joke.

The town has some handsome buildings (with balconies and armorial crests, much to Jane’s delight),

and, of course, a church – this is a pilgrimage route, after all.

The church is noted for having one of the best examples of Romanesque baptismal fonts in the province of Burgos. Shame the church was locked tight, then.  As consolation, there is, outside the church, a picture and some text expatiating on it

and a sculptural representation.

which is better than nothing, albeit not by much.

The next village/town is Castildelgado.

It’s just this village, you know?  Church, Ermita, some attractive buildings among the other, somewhat neglected ones. The whole place had a vibe of stagnation and slow decay.

A bar is promised

but we ignored its siren call and moved on.  The next village is Vilamora de Rioja,

where we had planned to stop for coffee at the Albergue, but it was closed – and there didn’t appear to be another source of refreshment in the whole village.  This was a shame – it’s a strikingly pretty village, with a very much more cared-for vibe than Castildelgado, and it’s maybe a bit surprising that such a place has just the one albergue and nothing else.

Then again, Vilamora de Rioja’s claim to fame is that it’s the birth place of Dominic de la Calzada, who later became Santo Domingo de la Calzada and founded the eopnymous village.  Maybe its religious significance is why it’s (a) well-maintained and (b) not got a thriving bar culture? Anyway, it was nice to look around.

One of the buildings even had a device on its roof witch tells you the wind direction.

The house where Dominic was born is noted by a plaque (the house on the left here)

as is the church where he was baptised,

outside which there is a statue of the man.

We spent a little while here, as it was so pleasant, but then it was time to move on.  The next town is called Villamayor del Rio, which is misnamed on three counts: it’s not a villa, it’s not major and there’s not a river.  Apart from that, it’s all good. Well, to be honest, there was only one decent photo be had there.

And there was a coffee stop just outside it, too, which was welcome.

That left us with a stomp down the home straight into Belorado.  Ahead of us was a group of peregrinas from – I’m guessing, here, but with fair confidence – Korea. I was amused by the hat of the one in the lead.

If a hat I was wearing was doing that I would take it off.  We had a small battle with one of the group, a short lass who was poling along in a determined fashion between the lead two and the trailing two.  Our natural pace was faster than hers, but as we drew level, she accelerated, I don’t know whether this was conscious or not, but it was very noticeable.  We in turn upped our pace, as did she, but our legs were longer and eventually we completed the overtaking manoeuvre and surged ahead. Of course, being British, this meant that we had to stick to this increased pace for the rest of the walk into Belorado, as it would have been just awkward to be passed and then have to re-pass, and so on.

Belorado is a delight, with all sorts of colourful and interesting quirks.  As you approach, there is an albergue which greets all passers by who are tired

or flagging. Unlike the other towns today, which you can see from miles away, you just turn a corner and

there you are, really.  Our walk to our hotel gave us a good flavour of the idiosyncratic nature of the town, with a whole series of murals greeting us at practically every turn.

There are many attractive buildings

and near our hotel is a litle parklet where they have crocheted the trees and seats

as well as the railings.

Many of the buildings are lavishly decorated,

and the church has stork’s nests on it.

There are caves behind the church – some fitted out with windows!

Generally, the place has a genial, bonkers feel to it – it’s delightful to wander around.

We had a satisfyingly late lunch at a restaurant near the hotel called Garain. It was a nice lunch, rather than a Nice Lunch – we had the menu of the day rather than a slap-up meal with silver service and that – and we enjoyed being in the back room of a bar, troughing it with other locals – the first time we’d had this kind of meal.  Good food and half the price of the Nice Lunch we’d had yesterday.

After it, we went for a walk. Obviously.  Many of the things we saw I’ve described above, and we also went into the main church, Santa Maria.  By and large, it’s just this church, with churchy stuff inside it

but there are a couple of things of note.  The first is a pair of effigies of saints on their processional mounts. The more interesting one is San Vitores, a patron saint of Belorado, who was decapitated, as you can see from his statue.

The other point of interest is an altar and retablo in a chapel which is carved in stone rather than fashioned in wood.

It depicts St. James – Santiago – as both the slayer of moors (above) and pilgrim (below). An interesting piece of workmanship.

This completes the story of the day.  Despite several rain showers whilst we were out walking, it’s been a good one, with a decent distance – 22.9km – covered comfortably (and in rain jackets against the cold).  This brings our total to 239km exactly, just over 148 miles. Tomorrow, continuing the trend of ever-increasing distances, we have to get to San Juan de Ortega, which is 24km with something of a hill in the middle. The weather prospects continue to be for cool, breezy weather for the next couple of days, which, frankly, is fine by me – we have so far been able to cover this kind of distance without discomfort or even needing to take lots of water with us, which saves on pack weight.  It will warm up eventually and our approach will change accordingly; but for the moment, we’re looking forward to another day’s peregrination.

Come back soon and find out how it went, won’t you?

 

 

Camino Day 11 – Nájera to Santo Domingo de la Calzada. Dogged by Poor Weather – rain, 10:10*

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Sunday 27 August 2023 – It seems appropriate that on a Sunday we should be travelling to a place called Santo Domingo. “Domingo”, after all, means “Sunday” in Spanish, which means that the famous (and now infamous) operatic tenor Placido Domingo would be called “Quiet Sunday” in English.  This is just one of the many examples when Foreign Is Better Than English:

  • Giuseppe Verdi – Joe Green
  • Ferrari – Smith
  • Maserati Quattroporte – Maserati Four Door
  • Le mot juste – erm…let me think…

Anyway, back to the walking thing, Walker.

If you want to see the summary of the route and photos, you can watch the Relive if you’d like. Alternatively, read on…

The forecast hadn’t changed significantly overnight, but cool temperatures were expected and the probability of rain had increased. We hit the hotel’s breakfast room at 0730, its supposed opening time, to find several peregrinos already stuffing their faces, so we could clearly have been earlier. No matter, we discovered that there were large mugs in which we could infuse Twining’s finest Earl Grey, which meant that the day got off to a good start.

When we actually started walking, the temperature was 16°C or thereabouts, which would have been fine, but it was somewhere between breezy and windy, which kept things on the cool side of comfortable, actually. There was a hint of rain in the air, too.

As we went through the day, the sun came and went, and gave us a great variety of scenes as its patterns flitted across the landscapes in what became really more a wind than a breeze.

There was ever the threat of rain in the air.

The road wound along

past vineyards, mostly.

We encountered our first village along the way after just 6km – Azofra.

There was a cafe called “Bar el Descanso del Peregrino” – meaning “The Pilgrims’ Rest Bar”.

It would have been rude not to stop (and in any case the next bar was not for another 10km), so we popped in for a coffee. They also sold Kit-Kats, so we had one each, which wasn’t as pleasurable as it might have been; whatever they do to make the chocolate in this country ain’t the same as it is in England, regrettably.

For a large village/small town, Azofra punched above its weight as far as points of interest is concerned. Jane is into armorial crests and so this building

scored heavily with her. There was a style of waymark which we hadn’t seen before,

an intriguing bit of junk statuary in someone’s front yard,

interesting decor idea for park gates,

some eccentric construction,

and a medieval rollo.

This (now heavily-restored) column originally functioned as a judicial and administrative marker and was where executions were held. I don’t think they use it like that any more, though.

Our luck with the weather ran out eventually. Rain at 10:10 was sufficiently hard that we donned our rain jackets. (So that explains the headline, you see*.)  Actually, this was a blessing in disguise, as the wind was making us both cold and our rain jackets protected us, so we kept them on all day, even when it wasn’t raining (which was most of it, fortunately).

Other points of interest that we passed:

Sunflower fields, in some cases with some plants still in flower

and in others giving passers-by the opportunity to have some fun with the seed heads.

We knew that the track would eventually go uphill towards a town called Ciriñuela. It wasn’t immediately clear whether this would be the left or right of two possible tracks,

But it soon became clear that it would be the left one, which was a long ascent – not too steep, but enough to raise the pulse somewhat.

Notice, also, a distinct shift in the agriculture, as the main crop changes from grapes to wheat.

Ciriñuela is a weird place.  On its outskirts is a mass of newly built houses,

with very little sign of life.  There is still building under way.

The centre of it all appears to be the Alta Rioja Golf Course

whose catering team need to change their marketing agency.

 

When you do get to the old town,

there’s not a lot of it left as, according to one book Jane has read, much of the original building has been pillaged by the neighbouring towns.

The place is not without interest (apart from Bar Jacobeo which provided us with coffee). There are some interesting Camino markings and other statuary,

and, on the road out of the town, hops – not something we have seen anywhere else so far.

The road wound on after Ciriñuela

and eventually we could see our destination – Santo Domingo de la Calzada.

The former of these two photos shows that the town has a considerable industrial presence, presumably to deal with all that wheat, and the Camino winds past all of this, including this inexplicable vignette.

One wonders about the owners of this: what are their Crate Expectations?

Thank you. Thank you, again, for listening to my joke.

We found yet another Camino decoration in Santo Domingo

and then we were into its old town

which we passed through to get to our hotel on its outskirts.

It was originally the town’s water mill and is officially a Hostal, so not the height of luxury, but our room is comfortable enough and they serve an early breakfast, which could be material for tomorrow’s plans (see later).

We had set off at 0800 and we arrived at 1330, having covered 21.6km (22km including the detour to Bar Jacobeo). This brings our total to 216.1km, which is a smidge over 134 miles. We have covered more than a quarter of the total Camino distance, then!

Our arrival nicely chimed, once again, with Spanish restaurateurs’ opening hours hereabouts, and so we were able to go for a Nice Lunch, which we took at Los Caballeros.  Its name had been bandied about in the Spanish gabble between Jane and the lady who manages the hostal, and I thought they’d been discussing the location of the gents’ loo on my behalf.  I was wrong. Los Caballeros is a very good restaurant and they sorted out a very fine lunch for us.

Afterwards, once again to shake it down, we went for a walk. Obviously.

The town is named for its founder, Dominic de la Calzada, who was something of a country bumpkin and who was rejected for the priesthood by his peers.  Undeterred, he built a bridge, hospital, and hotel here for pilgrims on the Camino Francés. He began construction of the town’s Cathedral, is buried within and it is dedicated to him. So, clearly we had to visit the cathedral.

Which is massive. I mean, just look at the portal, for God’s sake!

Inside, there is the usual churchy bit

and several large, detailed and opulent pieces of statuary, altarwork and other woodwork. What particularly appealed to me was the selection of modern-style stained glass.

The cathedral is also the site of the miracle of the “hanged innocent”, a pilgrim wrongly accused of theft. The witnesses for his successful appeal, a pair of beheaded, supposedly cooked chickens who miraculously came to life, are represented by their descendants, a pair of whom are kept at all times in the choir loft of the cathedral.

There are cloisters

and the tomb of the saint himself can be found in the cathedral.

The cathedral has a separate bell tower

which one can climb, if one wants to deal with 134 quite chunky steps. This gets you up close and personal with, erm, the bells

and gives you a nice view over the roofs of the town.

On our walkabout, we also visited the Santo Domingo bridge,

started in the 11th Century by the man himself, and variously altered in many ways since – the middle section dates from the 18th Century, for example. To finish the walk, we headed back to the hostal via what remains of the old city walls,

and that was it for the day.

Tomorrow features a walk that is longer again than today’s – some 23km. The weather conditions are likely to be similar to today’s, possibly wetter – in any case the moisture we will have to deal with will be rain, not sweat.  Since the hostal offers an early breakfast, we might be able to get on the road promptly and get to our destination, Belorado, in time once again for a Nice Lunch.

Let’s hope so.

 

* The headline is a laboured joke. “The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin” was the name of an American children’s TV series from the 1950s about a boy and his German Shepherd dog. Originally, (I now learn), Rin Tin Tin was actually a famous German Shepherd dog used in silent films.

 

Camino Day 10 – Navarrete to Nájera. Cool day, cool place!

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Saturday 26 August 2023 – What a day it’s been! The fierce heat of the past days has subsided to the extent we almost got rained on, what I thought would be an unexceptional walk provided some interesting moments and the destination was unexpectedly awesome.

The Posada Ignatius somewhat let itself down with a very disappointing breakfast experience. We’d asked for breakfast at 0730, but the restaurant staff clearly didn’t get the memo. Someone turned up several minutes after we did and rustled up some “toast” that was still soggy (from being frozen) in one corner, with a little butter and jam – and we provided our own tea bags. A shame, after such a stellar lunch the day before.

No matter; we were on our way at 0800 in cool, cloudy weather – about 19°C and a hint of rain in the air.

After the fan-oven experiences of the previous days, this was very welcome, and the whole walk, some 16km, was conducted in comfortable temperatures. In fact, we did the whole thing in one hit; there was a possible detour for a refreshment break, but we both favoured keeping going. The path was decent for almost all of it, and there were almost no gradients steeper than gentle. I was a bit surprised by this, as the course profile looked like this:

so I had my poles at the ready from the start, but really only got any benefit from them for about 100m in the middle.

Items of interest on the way included: the (presumably reconstructed) portal of the San Juan de Acre church whose excavated site we saw yesterday, now being used for a cemetery;

a different, and much older-looking style of marker post for the Camino;

several rows of vines with their grapes lying on the ground;

(this puzzled us, particularly in light of other rows which had obviously been picked by machine but with no discarded grapes.

The mystery was solved by a friend who explained that production has limits placed on it, to maintain supply/demand/prices, so overproduction is simply discarded and left to rot);

some decent views, although often the scenery was Too Big To Photograph;

a formal viewpoint, accessed by steps

but still clearly a Work In Progress, as they hadn’t provided the info board;

Guardaviñas de Alesón, a shelter, originally built for vine farmers or guards

but now finding more regular use as a general shelter for pilgrims;

Poyo de Roldan, a platform marking a “David v Goliath” style battle between the knight Roldan (possibly Roland, leader of the Franks?) and the giant Ferregut

now doing service as a platform for a telecoms aerial; a poem on a wall;

(“Pilgrim, who calls you?” – put your phone on silent, I say); a couple of charming offerings to pigrims, one from Paulino

and the other having, as a backdrop, the very considerable industrial outskirts of our destination town, Nájera. The cadence of the town’s name is the same as the word “knackered”, not that we were.

This shows that we were nearing our destination, which at first blush is not a prepossessing sight

but the modern exterior soon gives way to the old town at a very clear boundary.

We crossed the river, and this gave us a nice view of the distinctive red stone cliffs which form the backdrop to Nájera.

More of the cliffs later.

Our hotel is the Hotel Duques de Nájera. Our room wasn’t ready for us, which gave us a good excuse to go and find coffee and a sandwich. Yes, and a beer for me. Well, two, actually. I wanted to make sure I staved off dehydration from not having had any water during the walk today. Yes, really.

Having taken possession of our (nice, large air-conditioned) room, we found that, for the second day running, we had managed to synchronise our need for A Nice Lunch with the local restaurant ecosystem’s circadian rhythms. At our first restaurant, we arrived at exactly the same time as another couple. Not wanting to be impolite and rush in, we let them go first – and they took the only remaining table. Hah! Fortunately, by the riverside, there are lots of cafés and restaurants so we still had a good meal.  Then we went for a walk. Obviously.

Once away from the humdrum outskirts, Nájera is a quirky place.

They also have this

which the Powers That Be label thus

but I think there’s tree of them. Thank you.  Thank you for listening to my joke.

Jane, as ever reading around and ahead, had identified two sites of interest – the monastery, Monasterio Santa Maria la Real, and a cave city in the cliffs.

The Cave City, constructed by an ancient civilisation as a defence capability, consists of a series of linked caves in the red stone cliffs behind the town.

It is only possible to visit them on a special guided tour, meaning we couldn’t get close.  But I had my drone back in the hotel room, didn’t I?  So I went and got it.

Since I had it with me, I also took some aerial footage of the monastery.

The monastery, as well as being huge and as impressive inside as it is outside, also has considerable historical importance in its role in the development of the various kingdoms of Spain.  The first construction on the site dates back to the 11th century, it has had various bits fall off and be redeveloped, and was declared a national monument in 1889, since when its fortunes have been assured. Wiki has good information about it.

As you can see from the video, there are several areas, prime among them being the cloisters

and the church, which is lavishly appointed.

The church extends back into the cliffs, with a cave, in which was discovered an image of the Virgin Mary

which was fully restored in 1948. There are many other exquisite things in the monastery, too; too many, really, to share to do it justice. You’ll just have to visit yourself – it’s worth it. If you’re into that kind of thing, of course.

That just about sums up the day – another good one. After a start which saw us walking alone with no other pilgrims in sight, we have started once again to note some familiar faces in the pilgrims we do encounter. We chatted briefly to a Dutch chap called Henk, who joined us in our post-walk refreshment before moving on to his destination.

Generally, the superpower I have whilst cycling seems to have manifested itself whilst walking, too.  On a bicycle, all I have to do is to note to myself that I haven’t been overtaken for a while, at which point a faster cyclist materialises behind me. I mentioned to Jane as we walked out through Logroño’s outskirts that no-one had wished us “Buen Camino”, at which point the next three people we met did just that; and today I ventured to remark that there were no other peregrinos around, and one materialised behind us immediately.  It’s uncanny.

Today’s stats are that we covered 16.4km, bringing our total to 194.5km, just about 120 miles. Tomorrow continues in the vein of ever-longer walks.  We have to get to Santo Domingo de la Calzada, some 22km away, via an overall uphill route which I’m sanguine shouldn’t be too arduous. Accuweather, which seems to have been pretty much on the money here, asserts that the temperature will peak at 21°C, with the possibility of rain after 2pm. Oh, and thunderstorms. It’ll be a longish day and I hope we can avoid the rain.

Let’s see how it turns out, shall we?