Day 21 through 23, Three long days . . . one hung over

Granon church steeple
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Day 21 through 23, June 7^th through 9^th

Santo Domingo to Belorado, to Ages, to Burgos

511km to Santiago, 441km from start

Distance: 24km, 27km, 24km

The trail ahead
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We were feeling stronger which was good because these were three tough days. Sunny and hot, long, hills, and lots of travel along the highway.

Started out the first day cool under blue skies and warmed up soon. After the first hour, we left the Rioja province into Castile y Leon. Similar landscape to start, but wheat fields soon replaced vineyards. For the first half of the day we went thru very nice country-side and every few kilometers were interesting villages. The second half was a gravel side road along a busy highway favored by trucks. It had really heated up by then and the remainder of the walk into Belorado was a grind.

A pilgrims menu
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In the past, Belorado was heavily into leather. It lost most of that industry and has seen better days but the government was putting some money in so things were starting to look up. We checked into our hotel, had tapas at a nearby bar, and got our Credencia stamped at the tourist office. It was a good one (more government) and the person mentioned there was an evening pilgrim mass. Two reasons for going to the mass: (1) always good to meet fellow pilgrims, (2) we had to stay at an albergue tomorrow . . . 58 beds, first-come-first-served  . . . and Marie wanted to size up the competition. We liked what we saw . .  enjoyed our 8 euro pilgrim menu, headed to bed early.

The church at Belorado
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The second day was a tough one. We left at 6:30am to make some progress before it got too hot. We didn’t make enough. The second half of the trip had two big hills. We got to a village at the foot of the first, refilled our bottles at a church fountain, and headed up. It was one of those hills where you could never quite tell where the top was and around each curve you thought you might be there. Not true.

We made it to the top and headed back down for the next hill. This one wasn’t as long but was very steep. Got to the top and hiked along a ridge with little shade that stretched out for over an hour. Eventually,  headed down into a small valley to the Monastery of St. Juan de Ortega. We’d planned to stay there but the only albergue was part of the monastery, it wasn’t going to open for several hours, and we’d heard that the showers don’t always have hot water. We decided to try the village of Ages about 4km further that had two albergues.

St Juan de Ortega monastery
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This turned out to be a good decision. The one we chose, El Pajar (the hay loft) was a newer place very clean, organized, and with good facilities. We were one the first people there, got good bunk bed assignments, and showered before the crowd arrived. Over lunch and during the afternoon, we met several great folks: a retired Australian couple, a group of Spaniards that we’d been walking around with for several days, a couple of med students on bikes from Finland, and three German ladies. We hung out all afternoon and had a gas. The wine was local (I mean from right next door) and 3 euros a bottle. We polished off an embarrassingly large number of bottles (my family knows what that means).

Village of Ages
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We really enjoyed it but re-hydrating with wine after a long day hiking . . . has a price. I was hugely toasted by dinner and we were in bed before nine.

The next day into Burgos was another big hiking day and I was pretty hung over. Most of the asprin I took was for my head not feet, it rained then got hot, and at the end there was a long walk thru an industrial area before we got into downtown Burgos. It was a drag.

We found our hotel quickly and after a shower felt well enough to head toward city center. We hoped that we’d see another Logrono style Saturday afternoon pub crawl and we weren’t disappointed. Then we visited the Cathedral (one of the best in Europe) and headed back to the hotel to attend to our normal housekeeping activities and a good nights' sleep.

Our spanish pilgrim friends
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Villages: Santo Domingo, Granon, Redecilla del Camino, Castildelgado, Viloria de Rioja, Villamayor del Rio, Belorado, Tostantos, Villambistia, Espinosa del Camino, Villafranca Montes de Oca, San Juan de Ortega, Ages, Atapuerca, Orbaneja, Castanares, Burgos