Goodbye Navarre
…and Hello Rioja
Out of my first Spanish province and through the pleasant university city of Logrono. Logrono will, for evermore, have a special place in my heart as it was the first place I have come to Spain with an open Post Office. I was of course sceptical – surely it must be another day off for the special festival of San Parcelo, or a day off for industrial action or maybe just shut for second breakfast, early lunch etc. But no, the Correos was open. And it was brilliant. I got to the counter, opened my rucksack and started putting stuff in two untidy piles.
The chap behind the counter was completely unfazed. We worked out we could converse in French and he took over. He found a box to send stuff to England and another one for the stuff for Santiago. He filled in all the forms with me, took my money and then wished me a Buen Camino. Logrono was friendly – even a road-sweeper stopped what he was doing to redirect me onto the right path. I quite liked the shout of “oi, peregrino!”
Today’s walk, although long at 40k, had some interesting highlights. On a fence that ran alongside the busy autoroute, thousands had stopped to thread crosses of bark through the chain link fence. I added mine to this unlikely shrine. One would have looked sad; the volume of individual efforts was somewhat inspiring.
In my intense eagerness to get to the post office, I left Viana without having any breakfast, assuming I’d find somewhere along the way. I walked 15 k before I finally found somewhere and had a curious breakfast of coffee, croissant and a Magnum. The plan was to have lunch at Navarette (which had the most amazing Romanesque arch, see below) but that didn’t work as I didn’t see anywhere I fancied. At any event, the croissant and the Magnum kept me going for 31k until I found a bar where I could have a late lunch. The bar was quite large but somehow still completely filled by just four people from Ireland. Unlike me, they had spent a long time having lunch and were filling every stereotype by not being too steady as they left. We had a great chat and they told me it was a massive mistake to have married an O’Sullivan – and an O’Sullivan Beare at that. They were all from Limerick and regarded people from the clans to the south as rather uncouth.
It was a good day for meeting people today: sweet J from Brazil who had wanted to do this for 16 years and, while she enjoyed the walking, wanted to be with her husband and three girls every night; the two Canadian sisters I had dinner with last night; the crazy gang from Limerick; F from Holland, who I’d met four days ago and was now nursing a cracked rib from slipping in a hostel shower; and a charming French group from Bordeaux who I shared dinner with and found that we agreed on virtually everything. Herve and his wife are doing the Camino in stages – one week a year – and he was completely laid back about staying in the municipal albuergue – 96 beds in one room and two toilets. I didn’t share that I had a jacuzzi bath in my hotel room, it would have seemed somewhat crass. I finished today’s chatting with a lovely Peruvian girl at the hotel who asked me why I was doing the Camino. I said to spend time with God. She thought that was an ok reason!
Tomorrow I hit Santo Domingo de la Calzada with its very famous holy chickens. Stay posted.
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