Month: July 2023

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.

Walked today: 6.6 mi Camino2023: 78.4 mi

We stopped at Iglesia de Santiago Real on the walk into town to get our credentials stamped, but no stamps were to be found in the church, so we continued on.

We stopped at a restaurant on the main street of Logroño for a slow breakfast before getting to our hotel.

We got to our hotel at 10:00 and waited an hour before our room was ready. This was not a problem today because the lobby was cool and a comfortable place to get off our feet. And the wifi was good, so we had plenty to occupy our time as we waited.

After getting into our room, we got showers and then went out in search of pintxos for lunch, a specialty of Logroño.

After a couple of wrong turns, we discovered the section of Logroño where 20-30 pintxo bars are located. After a brief reconnaissance run, we selected a bar, then selected 4 different pintxos and then shared them along with a copa each of red wine.

After lunch, we stopped at a small market and bought some snacks and bottled water for tomorrow, then returned to our room.

The rest of the day was devoted to reading, blogging and napping. We had a light snack supper.

We also treated some mosquito bites due to some voracious insects who apparently invaded our room last night and did some snacking, no, had a banquet (Linda=20, Jim=30+) on both of us last night.

Walked today: 5.2 mi Camino2023: 71.8

We began walking at 5:45! It was still dark so we used a headlamp for the first mile or so, until first light made the lamp unnecessary.

The path was very straight, flat and monotonous for the first 90 minutes, making it easy to walk, as if still asleep, which might well have been the case.

our first hill and a slight wiggle in the path

Torres del Rio is the end of our walk today. Otherwise we would need to walk another very difficult 8 miles before the next stop. We did that walk in 2014, 2017 and 2019, but skipped it in 2022 as part of our modified Camino and again today.

We plan to catch the 11:25 bus from here to Viana, where we have reservations for tonight.

To occupy the almost 3 hour wait, we had breakfast and then camped out in the patio and lobby of La Pata de Oca, where we stayed in 2017. Our bus is scheduled to arrive at a stop only a few minutes walk away.

As we were waiting, we struck up a conversation with Stephano, from Italy. He completed a degree in economics then worked for a financial firm during the pandemic but realized he wanted something different. So he quit his job to give him some time to think about who he was and what he wanted for his future. He saw the Camino as tool to decide what direction he wanted his life to take. He started out walking too fast from SJPdP, treating it like a race and by the time he had reached Estella, he had a painful leg injury. After conferring with his doctor back home, the prognosis was to continue, but at a much slower pace to allow the injury to heal naturally. He said the last few days, taken at a slower pace had already given him new insights and perspectives. Our interesting chat on a variety of subjects made the time go by much faster for our wait and we also picked up some suggestions for his choice of Italian red wines.

We walked down to the bus stop at 11:10 and waiting in a nearby shady spot until it arrived at 11:30.

The bus dropped us off a couple blocks from our hotel in Viana. On the short walk to hotel, we noticed more than the usual Sunday crowd and many were dressed in typical festival red and white.

We checked in at noon but our room was not ready for another 30 minutes. We inquired about the apparent festival and the desk clerk confirmed the festival started yesterday and will continue through Wednesday. He also said that the 2:00 running if the bulls would pass under our hotel window.

We decided to leave our day packs in the hotel lobby and go out amongst the festival celebrants and partake of the free flowing wine and countless pintxo offerings.

After 30 minutes of bull running, the celebration continued with families and locals nearly all dressed in white shirts and bottoms, red bandannas and an occasional red sash… sitting together at tables along the main street, drinking wine and beer and munching pintxos for the rest of the afternoon until no pintxos could be found only drinks and people talking and laughing and enjoying each others company.

We ventured out at 5:30 for a ice cream bar for dessert and observed setups for evening music and entertainment in the main square. It appears that the festival will continue into the evening and hopefully we’ll sleep through it!

Viana has always been a town of surprises and today was among the best.

Walked today: 8.1 mi Camino2023: 66.6 mi

Even though we didn’t start until 6:30, the temperature was 49F and along with a nice breeze, the sun was only a minor issue. Of the 8 mile walk, nearly 6 of the miles were in the open fields with little or no shade and no rest stops.

Linda employed her portable shade generator as a precaution and gained additional confidence of it’s future value once we get to the flat, open plains of the meseta of northern Spain in a week or so.

We reached Los Arcos (pop. 1300) at shortly after 10:00. We parked ourselves in the town square and had our typical breakfast of toast and cafe con leche.

At 11:00 we walked a few more steps to Hostal Suetxe and were pleasantly surprised to be admitted to our room… which turned out to be spacious, comfortable and a real value at 65€.

We walked a few blocks to MAVI Bar/Restaurant and had a delicious main meal at 1:00.

After some downtime in the room, we ventured out at 5:30 to visit Iglesia de Santa María, one of the largest churches in Navara with beautiful examples of Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque styles.

The forecast for tomorrow is sunny and 100F. So, we’ll try to mitigate it by getting to sleep early and starting earlier in the morning to get to our destination before the heat of the day.

Today was a good one, tired from the walk but good recovery this afternoon.. after an 8 mile confidence builder.

Walked today: 6.22 mi Camino2023: 58.5 mi

The first 2 miles were uphill and only took us to the edge of Estella. Fortunately, with our early start and a cool breeze of 59F it was very pleasant.

We stopped at the “fountain” at the Irache winery and Jim took a sample “for the road”, since we were walking, and not driving.

We walked on pavement for a half mile or so alongside a huge, multi-sport camping facility then walked through a shady forest then along the edge if wheat fields.

An imposing, conically shaped mountain, capped with the ruins of a medieval castle/fortress presented itself shortly after leaving Estella and is clearly the destination of today’s walk.

As we got closer to the mountain, we could see the base was surrounded by vineyards and small, local gardens, revealing the apparent origin of our destination’s name, Villamayor de Monjardin.

We’re staying in an apartment called Markiola. We discovered it in 2019 while staying at the albergue in the village. We stayed here in 2022 and wanted a repeat visit for 2023.

Markiola is relatively expensive at 128€. But for us it’s a “pilgrim paradise”.

Markiola consists of two floors: (1) a living area/kitchen and (2) bedrooms/ bathroom.

It comes furnished with a variety of breakfast, lunch and dinner fixings for an enterprising self-catering pilgrim. It has a fully equipped kitchen and adequate amounts of dinnerware, silverware, glassware and utensils, pots and pans, a toaster and expresso maker. The full sized refrigerator is stocked with whatever you need and a nice bottle of wine from the nearby winery is provided. There is also a modern washing machine in the kitchen, so you can leave the next morning with a backpack of clean clothes.

The beds have firm, comfortable mattresses, the bathroom includes a generous sized shower and there are plenty of spaces and tables to put your stuff.

For dinner Linda had a yogurt from the fridge and Jim made a sandwich on a leftover baguette from lunch with sliced turkey and havarti. We made bocadillos of scrambled egg and cheese and stored them in the fridge tonight to take with us tomorrow morning for breakfast.

Our washed clothes are all dry and repacked.

So, with this last entry in today’s blog, we’ll call it a day with the creation of another great memory of today’s walk and our stay in this pilgrim’s paradise.

Walked today: 5.7 mi Camino2023: 52.3 mi

We started walking earlier this morning, at 6:00. It was also a cool 61F with a nice cool, dry breeze all the way.

We stopped in Villatuerta for breakfast.

then continued on to Estella, reaching the edge of town at 9:15.

Linda’s reading glasses broke on our last night in Obanos, but today was the first opportunity to find a “farmacia” to search for a replacement. On the way into town, we stopped at the first pharmacy we saw and quickly got her some new (red) glasses for 16.90€ with the patient assistance of the pharmacist.

We walked on to the Plaza de los Fueros and found a comfortable place to sit, ordered a glass of OJ (Linda) and cafe con leche (Jim) and waited for our room to be ready.

At 10 o’clock we rang the bell at Hostal Cristina and were admitted. We quickly checked in and began enjoying our Estella home for the next 20 hours.

Estella is a charming town that has become a favorite for us. We have stayed in Hostal Cristina every Camino (2014, ’17, ’19, ’22 and 2023, staying two nights and using taxi service in 2019 to advance to the next village when rooms were not available.

For us, it’s a town of positive surprises. By mere accident we have stayed here during Estella’s annual festival on two occasions. These festivals included thousands of revellers, giant dancing puppets (gigantes) and running of the bulls, marching bands, etc. And today is the second time we have stayed here on a Thursday, the town market day, which has been a routine for 900 years.

At mid-afternoon we had lunch at a favorite local restaurant on the town square.

Last year we chronicled the Thursday market in our blog. Today, we took a photo of the aftermath of the market after a miraculous 1 hour pack-up and disappearance.

After lunch we returned to our room to nap/relax and blog and to give our full stomachs time to settle.

Even with a late setting sun, our body clocks were winding down and so we called it a day, another enjoyable day for Camino2023.