Najera to Granon - May 17

Today was a longer walk, 28.6 km and my feet are telling me not to do this to them too often. The day has again been cold and very overcast - threatening rain at any moment, so it seemed just as well to continue with my trek. In any case, I had wanted to stay at Granon if I could - more about that later.

 

Breakfast was in a small village Azofra after a walk of nearly 2 hours. I slept lightly in last night's dorm room of 90 folks and of course there were about 20 people or so who were rustling their bags packing up starting at 5 am and I gave up at 5:30 and got up - so I was walking as the sun came up at 6:30ish and captured the picture which starts this blog.

After my breakfast - a tortilla (which in Spain is an egg and potatoe sort of omelette) and pan (bread) and cafe con leche I was well fuelled to carry on.

The fields of grape vines gave way to wheat, oats and garden crops and I enjoyed the next 15 km or so watching farm workers in the fields as I walked to the next town.

There was a kind of rhythm of the I passed the 200 km mark of my journey of walking the trail up to a ridge, then walking down to the valley beyond - then of course doing it again and again and again. But today my stride was strong and seemed like no time until I was at the next town Ciruena.

Ciruena seemed to be a golf resort town - at least the part we walked through. I didn't stop but headed to the next town straight away, having decided to carry on to Granon.

I have caught up with my cohort and left some of them behind at Santo Domingo De la Calzada a pretty town of nearly 7,000 with a beautiful large cathedral and lots of restored heritage buildings with information signs to fill you in on the buiildings history. The term "Heritage Building" has a different meaning here.

 

Once I got to Santo Domingo I had a coffee and then immediately set off for the final 6ish km to Ganon.

It was very interesting to see the irrigation system they have in place here, I am sure first built by the Romans.

 

 

I was interested in staying at the the parochial Albergue in Granon because I had heard so much about it from my Camino buddies back in Canada. It is in the church in the upper Loft. I will do a separate Supplemental blog tomorrow to chronicle my experience there and post this one in themeantime. Just a hint: we are sleeping on mats on the floor and we will be cooking community dinner together and spending the evening together.

 

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