Day 4 Obanos

Funny how quickly this has become a luxury! Carrying only a couple changes of clothes is great for the back, but there is a downside, for sure.
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The road from Pamplona to Obanos goes over the famous Alto del Perdon, a "mountain" at 790 meters (Pamplona is at about 450 meters.) Along with a wind turbine "farm" there are a number of carved metal sculptures of medieval camino walkers along the ridge at the top.  It took me so long to get there, the mountain looming ahead like a giant obstacle about 15 km out of Pamplona.  Along the way, I listened to my "walking songs" iPod playlist, amazingly enough, the Marine Corps "Five Miles, Every Day" cadence played as I trudged up the steepest slope.  I laughed out loud to hear the drill instructor say, "One more mile, you know you can, I know you can.  Going home now, one more mile..."

This lovely place for only €20! (Me in my only non-hiking clothes.)
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Almost to the top I saw Pierre from the Auberge Orisson, back in the Pyrenees.  It seemed so long ago, but it was only a few days since all of us had crossed the muddy pass.  We took photos with the carved metal "pilgrims" and began walking the long downward slope.  At Obanos, we could go no farther.  I had walked about 25 km, Pierre about 30.  And the Obanos Albergue for Pilgrims was full....

Fortunately, an "angel of the Camino" saved us, this one in the form of a man in the restaurant/bar, who knew a lady who had a house that she rented rooms in.  What a gorgeous place, after the mountain, the mud memories, and even Pamplona´s simple pension.  We washed clothes (this is hard to accomplish when one walks all day and arrives in a place only to sleep and wake and walk again.) Senora had a drying rack on the patio, and the clothes more or less dried overnight.  We are a long cry from automatic dryeres with ten settings.

Night street in Obanos, after dinner
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Dinner was at a local bar restaurante, and it seemed that all the local Obanos townspeople were there.  Kids, grandmothers, old men and women, eating dinner and drinking wine.  Suppertime in Spain is about 9, which is fine if you don´t need to be up early.  (The main meal is in the afternoon, when virtually everything shuts down for three hours.)

The next morning I stopped at a "Farmacia" to buy some benadryl for the hives that had developed on my legs; I must have an allergy to long walks -- the same thing happened once after walking around Rome all day.  Hopefully, this will not plague me on the camino.

On my way out of Pamplona...
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The next day´s plan HAD been to make it to Estella, but considering I had not reached Puente La Reina, Estella seemed out of the question.  Still, hope springs eternal, and off we set.  Pierre and I walked together, which was really convenient because he speaks English and Spanish as most Californians do.  He walks faster than I, which was good for me because it kept me from slowing down.  (Maybe not so good for him because it kept him from speeding up!) But we made it to Lorca, about 16 - 18 km from Obanos.

On the top of a high mountain - Alto Perdon
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We had never planned to stop in Lorca, but ended up there three times the next day.  But that´s another story.