Day: July 25, 2023

Walked today: 6.7 mi Camino2023: 93.1 mi

Our walk this morning was almost totally surrounded by vineyards. Other than the relatively short, rocky ascent to Alto de San Anton, the walk was not a challenge for us.

According to legend, the large open field between Nájera and the nearby village of Alesón is the location where the French knight, Roldán and the Syrian giant (9ft tall, 440 lbs) Ferragut did battle to decide whether the Christians or the Moors would rule this part of Spain. It also allowed the French army under Charlemagne to move on to Santiago. Roland prevailed by stabbing the giant in belly button, his legendary weak spot, and went on to become known as the best warrior of Christianity.

We stopped for breakfast on the way into Nájera about 9:30 and texted the apartment we had reserved and were told we could not check-in before noon.

When making our reservations back in April, most of the previous places we had stayed in Nájera were all booked. None of them were that appealing anyway, so we opted for an apartment instead. It turns out that this morning we were eating breakfast only two blocks from the apartment.

To make use of our wait time, we scouted out the immediate area, searching for a grocery store. We found one and did a walk through, planning our lunch, dinner and snack requirements for the day, anticipating that the apartment would have a fully equipped kitchen.

We finally were admitted to the apartment at noon and after a quick inspection of kitchen equipment and any other supplies available, Jim walked to the nearby supermarket with our shopping list. He was also equipped with his prized purchase from Biarritz, over 2 weeks ago, a heavy duty shopping bag.

The shopping bag has already served us well so far on Camino2023, whenever we made purchases that were too awkward to carry in hands or arms, or pockets, like wine, bottled water, multiple small items for snacks, etc.

Jim returned shortly with a full shopping bag and we were all set with fixings for lunch, dinner and a snack sandwich for the walk tomorrow.

The rest of the day was spent napping and cooking and eating.

Tomorrow will be a long walk, so we’ll get to sleep early.

Walked Today: 8.1 mi Camino2023: 86.5 mi

We began walking at 6:10. It was still dark but the city lights made it easy to see our way. The temperature was a comfortable 61F, with a slight breeze.

For the first 45 minutes, we walked along city street streets for .75 miles, then another 1.5 miles through a nice park with high rise apartments on both sides.

As we reached the outskirts of the city the Camino entered a stretch of tree lined, paved walk/ bicycle/running paths with frequent benches along the way for nearly another 1.5 miles

Linda began chatting with Elena, from Southhampton, England. She had lived for two years in Logroño during the pandemic. She walked the Camino from Logroño to Santiago last year. She said the Camino had “called her back” to finish by walking from SJPDP to Logroño this year. Her dad is a college professor ( Chemistry) and had coincidentally, spent a year in Claremont-Ferrand, France on a sabbatical. Elena is planning to return to England to begin job hunting.

As Elena moved on ahead of us, the paved path then changed to dirt as it passed through a campground that included a lake, recreation area and, off in the distance, a golf course.

Some 2.5 miles later, after winding through an experimental agricultural project for tempranilla blanco grapes, we joined a paved frontage road that paralleled the expressway below us for another 2 miles into Navarrete.

On the edge of the town of Navarrete, (pop. 2952) we walked past a major bodega (winery) that convert the grapes growing on all the surrounding vines into delicious Rioja wines.

We relaxed in the town square while having a leisurely breakfast. Next we had a nice lady in the bar call a taxi to take us the remaining 4 miles to Ventosa, our destination for the day.

Señora Bonet, the owner was our host and also prepared and served a delicious dinner in her dining room.

Ventosa is a small village of 166 inhabitants. We’ve stayed at Las Aguedas three times before after discovering it by accident in 2014. It would rank among the finest B&B’s in the U.S. but cost 68€ for the two of us and dinner for two was 58€.

During and after dinner we chatted with Señora Benot about the possibility of returning to Ventosa via auto in the future and using Las Aguedas as a base for touring Rioja wineries. It would be an interesting way to return to the Camino again, but with a different format. Hmmm.

We’re apparently getting stronger because we were not as tired from today’s walk, even though it was one of our longer ones thus far. Our itching mosquito bites are still a nuisance, but nor a hindrance to Camino2023.