Feets Do Yo Stuff: Day 4: Cizur Menor to Puente La Reina

Dave's journal

Up and at’em after a good (I.e.,) air conditioned night’s sleep. Shoulders and hips aren’t perfect, but it’s a short mileage day across only one tough hill (as always, it’s the steep descents that are slowest for us, the slippery slopes) with a recommended side trip to a 12th century octagonal church, old enough that it could double as a fortress if necessary (it usually was).

There hasn’t been much talk of churches thus far for a simple reason: virtually every village has a Saint Someone (usually Mary) of Something or Other. That Mary really impressed a lot of people. And, being Europe, old buildings stay up forever – haven’t these folks ever heard of gentrification? Bulldoze the old stuff and whip up something modern, multicultural, multi denominational, and multipurpose, a place for prayer that doubles as a velodrome. Okay, there are lots of churches.

Today our route is across both pasture and farmed land, young wheat it looked like, with the long early climb culminated at a wind farm. We cross the local main road – the N135 – many times. It’s usually just two lanes, so no sweat and we’re far enough out in the country that traffic is light. Cars are mostly French with a few Germans and Japanese in the mix. Very few U.S. makes. Have yet to see a Prius or any Hondas. It’s a little odd to slog into yet another silent village to find new BMWs parked on the empty streets. Signs don’t seem necessary. As peregrinos, we’re mostly walking through “old town(s)” so very, very few open businesses – Pamplona was the exception – just places to get beverages and snacks, and usually only one of those per town.

This afternoon, we reach Puente de Reina, population 2,500, so large by Camino standards. Our hotelier greets us with glasses of cold lemonade. Delicious! Though we’re a small part of a flood of pilgrims, our hosts are always nice – though not so skilled at giving directions across languages and cultures – and do their best to be accommodating (though not so far as serving dinner at the early hour we are used to. Getting an early breakfast is a challenge, too.) Today, for example, at 3:15 PM, we’re probably stuck waiting til at least 7:00 PM or living on chips and Coca Cola. Not very pilgrim like.

Most of the pilgrims we’ve met are nice as well. More French and German than anything else. A few are on bicycles, quite a challenge on the steep and rocky paths. The norm is to catch up with someone, share a word or two, or chat for a moment, then move on, the one going at a faster pace ahead. We’ve leapfrogged a lot of folks two, three, or four times in a day. Glomming on to some simpatico someone (like in the Martin Sheen movie) takes effort due to differences in starting time, pace, length of rest stops, etc. For us, we haven’t seen the people we chatted with on Day One since Day One. Perhaps that’s just as well and may serve as another Camino metaphor.

For you scoring at home: tonight makes it a total of one – uno – hotel with A/C. The good news is, our laundry dries faster.

As previously whined, an early dinner is hard to find in Spain. Our hotelier, however, knew that Tito’s was open. Not a promising name, perhaps, but a good place to eat. For $10€ (I.e., $11) we each got a mixed salad (greens, tomatoes, olives, onions, hard-boiled egg, tuna salad and a spear of asparagus, none of which had been served to us in any previous meal here), a bottle of red to split, a bottle of charged water, bread, three chicken legs, Spanish Fries, and a Nutty Buddy for dessert. Plus pleasant conversation with the server, who’s in a Basque band called Txotx, which is pronounced… We have no idea. Still a good server.

After dinner – and still in heat near 90 degrees, we amble to the supermercado. Two bananas, two apples, a box of (ahem) high fiber cookies and a liter and a half of water for (drumroll) 2.49€. Then back to our garret where half of our laundry (socks and bra included) is dry and our chances of sleeping as peacefully as last night are nil even with an episode of “The Naughty Maid and the Vicar.”

Deb/Scout t voice

So, yesterday I was able to post three days worth of walks thanks to a fabulous internet connection. This afternoon, not so much. Not that anyone cares, but I'm dealing with four devices: my IPad - which I use for blogging through an app called Blogsy (an interface to blogger that has more bells and whistles) and for sending most emails; Dave's iPad mini which he uses to write (it also has Blogsy); my Samsung Galaxy 5 phone, and a MotoG phone. I use the last two devices to take pictures, since taking them with an iPad is too cumbersome. But, it does create problems: To blog, I need the pictures to be on the iPads (Blogsy isn't android comparable). So, I email them to myself (which requires the Internet/wifi) or try and send them via Bluetooth which the iPads don't seem to like. So today, I was able to get on the Internet pretty quickly, then it konked out. I'm hoping when Dave and I return from getting something to eat that things will be better. Ok..back after an early dinner of chicken (yes , I ate chicken), a great salad (first in 6 days or so), a bottle of wine, and ice cream dessert for...wait for this...10€ each. (Yikes...duplication of Dave's journal...so sorry!). Now, back at the hotel and the idea of a bad internet connectIon and not being able to download and then upload pictures doesn't bother me so much. Wine will do that.....Maybe tomorrow........really, we got some great photos today! I'm only patient enough to post two...hopefully, more tomorrow from a bigger town....yes, 12,000 versus this one's 2,500.

Total miles today similar to yesterday at about 15.

Pics of church of Eunate.