Walked today: 4.9 miles
Walked Camino 2019: 87.8 miles
We’ll start off with an update on the dangling-in-limbo-photo of the Croatian couple, which was thwarted from its intended recipients and abruptly returned to us from cyberspace. While waiting to get into our room yesterday morning, Jim re-looked at the rejected email address which appeared to be missing the @xxxxx.com. So, he took a wild guess that the couple might use Google like the rest of the planet and maybe even gmail, and attached @gmail.com to the original e-mail address and pressed send. Unlike the first e-mail, we didn’t get a rude message about invalid e-mail. Consequently, we figured it must be someone’s e-mail address, but was it our fellow pilgrims from Croatia? At 9:30 last night, we received a reply from the couple, thanking us for sending the photo. Incredible, huh?
We left Los Arcos at daybreak this morning to beat the 90F+ forecast for today. It was a short walk, so Linda decided to carry her full pack.
On the outskirts of the village we passed a cemetery with a strange inscription over the gateway.
Translated it reads, “
“I once was what you are, you will be what I am”
We scurried by the cemetery, quickly, and entered the fields again on a nice, flat, straight, dirt, farm road which lasted for about 3 miles.
we left the dirt road for a paved one just outside Sansol
We stopped for a break at a modern albergue/bar in Sansol then walked on to Torres del Río.
walk up the hill into
Torres del Río
We stopped by the unusual 12th century Church of the Holy Sepulchre, with its octagonal floor and eight sided architecture including an octagonal lantern on top of the dome… the only structure of its kind. Its sculptors were Mudejar (Muslims) working in the service of a Christian master builder. Its construction and initial use are assumed to be the Templar.
Our walk for today concluded, we then worked out plan B.
We originally planned to stay in Torres del Río tonight, but everything was booked. Sansol also was booked. So we called ahead and found a place in Viana. We arranged for a taxi to take us to Viana (35€!) and decided to skip the section from Torres to Viana, which is a pretty difficult walk, having walked it twice already. We’ll booked San Pedro(50€) for two nights to use as a base for our walk to Logroño tomorrow, then return via bus from Logroño (~2€) then get a cheaper taxi to Logroño the following day to continue on. We’ve booked places to stay for the following 4 days to prevent another plan B adjustment.
Our original choice to stay tonight:
Soon after we arrived, we walked along main street in Viana at lunchtime. Iglesia de Santa María de Asuncíon to the left, is known for being the burial place of Cesare Borgia (1475-1507), a Navarran military hero. It also is supposed to have a beautiful Santiago retablo, but until tiday, we had never seen it because the church is closed except for mass.
But tonight at 7:30, after pintxos for supper,
we noticed the church doors were open so finally we got to see inside.
At 8:00 we called it a day and headed back to our room.
Jimandi 