Day 4

Today was definitely a challenge. It started out great though. We woke up in our hostel and were pleasantly surprised to find breakfast waiting for us. Hot chocolate, toast, and cookies. Simple, but wonderful. 

We left about 7:30 and walked to Carrión de los Condes. It was only 3 miles or so there. 

It was a larger city, so some stores were actually open when we came strolling through. This meant one very important thing. Chocolate. 

Did I say one? I meant two. 

Mark had a donut, which he claimed was the best donut in Spain. So we already liked Carrión despite the cold. 

The church was also pretty great, but not open I unfortunately. 

We stopped in a pilgrim's shop and found some necessities: a new towel for me (since I lost mine after the first night. Whoops!) and our pilgrim shells. 

As I've mentioned before, the scallop shell is the symbol of St. James and the pilgrimage to Santiago. So traditionally, pilgrims distinguish themselves as such with a shell. So official. 

Like I said, it's everywhere. 

On our way out of town we passes San Zoilo, an old monastery tuned luxury hotel. I thought it was a nice looking building. 

You are probably wondering what I found so challenging about eating chocolate napolitanas and walking past luxury hotels. Well, nothing. The challenge started once we passed this building. 

We started on what we thought was a 7 mile leg of our journey that would take us to the next town. We walked along a road, carefully watching for cars. 

From that road we eventually turned onto a gravel path.  By eventually I mean about 3 miles later. 

It was at this point that we realized we were just then beginning the seven mile section with no towns in between. Seven miles down this gravel path with, albeit beautiful, but non-changing scenery. 

We walked and walked. And the. Walked some more. Our legs hurt; our feet hurt. But we just kept going. I'm thinking that is partially the point of the camino. You have to keep walking if you want to get where you want to go, but you can choose how to pass your time. We picked smiling. At least for most of it. 

But I was very happy to see a little town emerge in the distance and even happier to sit down on a bench outside the albergue. I was less happy to do my laundry by hand, but hey. I'll be happy to have clean clothes in the morning. 

Day 3

First off, last night I slept so well. Mark had to wake me up at 7 am, after most of the pilgrims were on their way out. A great improvement from the previous nights waking up around 3 am. A big thanks to ear plugs and audiobooks for that. Oh, and melatonin. 

We left the town around 7:30 am, once again walking along the camino. 

We walked about 5 miles before stopping in a little town for breakfast. The place we stopped at said it had a "tropical garden." I was not disappointed. 

The garden was right by the town's church. 

The path after we left the town was along a river. The view was gorgeous!

The river guided us to a town called Fromista, where we saw this church, Iglesia de San Martin. 

Finally a church that was open when we arrived, so we got to go inside. 

We decided to continue on, but not without a snack! Olives stuffed with tuna. Not our first can on the camino. 

We had lunch on the go. A bocadillo de jamon y queso. So good. 

We passed through another small town several miles later. 

The last leg was a long one. But the sky was beautiful. 

After some 18 miles, we made it to Villalcazar de Sirga. 

Where I dined with St. James. 

Jk. But we did have a delicious dinner. 

Can't wait to see what tomorrow brings! 

Day 2

We left the hostel in Hontanas at 7 am. 

About 4 miles in we passed an old convent. 

Mark tried doing a little geocaching. 

But was unsuccessful. 

We passes under the arch of the convent, which was quite pretty. 

The scenery was once again beautiful. Everything is so green!

Onward. 

And upward. 

Maybe 7 miles in we had to tackle a huge hill. You can see the path winding up it behind me. 

The view was pretty spectacular though. 

But it was even better going down the other side. 

As we were walking, this Australian man started chatting with us. 

He was excited that we all had the same brand of backpack. Also, he was shocked that we were american because he thought all Americans were obese. That's mostly what he talked about. 

Eventually we arrived in Iterro de la Vega after about 12 miles of walking. We are looking forward to a good meal and some sleep. 

Day 1

We left our hotel in Burgos at 6:30 am to start our journey on the Camino. The first part of our walk was through the city. 

But we quickly made our way to the edge of the town. 

The camino is marked by a series of yellow arrows painted along the road, signs, and walls. So you have to keep your eyes peeled or you could stray from the path.

There are also signs with a scallop shell and an arrow that mark the route. 

Or sometimes there are both. 

Initially we had planned to walk 21 kilometers to a town called hornillos. But we arrived there by noon, so we grabbed bocadillos for lunch and then decided we could walk a little further. 

5 kilometers later, we discovered that the next stopping place was actually the tiniest albergue (pilgrim's hostel) in the world. It looked like a barn next to some trees and that was it. Since it was only around 2 pm, we didn't know what we would do with ourselves for so long in such a tiny place, so we continued on for another five kilometers through the green rolling hills of Spain. 

This brought us to a small town were we decided to stay, bringing out grand total of kilometers walked for the day up to 32 (some 19ish miles). 

Needless to say my feet are happy to be out of the prison that was my trail running shoes. Thank you tevas!

The albergue we are staying ha consists of multiple rooms with 5 or so bunk beds in each room. Hopefully we won't have any bad snorers in our room. Fingers crossed. 

After a shower and some laundry, we are set for maybe a nap and some dinner before heading to bed. 

Our Camino is off to a great start!