Recap of Pilgrimage 2021: La Ruta del San Salvador

 Hello, everyone.

It's been busy at Ye Olde Homestead, what with Thanksgiving Day and then prepping for Advent (at church) and Christmas (at home)--that last isn't done yet.

Returning to the pilgrimage, we woke up on October 8 at around 7:30 or so...it had been a very long day the day before...and because one of us (me) takes a while to get going in the morning we didn't get out until at least 0830...which was sunrise in León in early October. It was also around 8 degrees C. 

We put on all of our layers and started walking. The way out of town, which we had scanned a little the day before, was nice, only a little wandering in circles and a very friendly local pointed us the right way where the routes split, but after we got out of the subdivisions in the outskirts of the city, it got quite chilly.

Very pretty bridge, this was where we stopped and put on some more layers. Buff under the hood of the windbreaker, yes! And I even got out my gloves for a bit.

The way from León to La Robla is flattish for the first third, steeply hilly for the second third, and then flattish again into La Robla. Very pretty countryside.

We kept seeing other trail signs, all along the way, many saying "Via de la Plata" which confused us a little, but we knew to stick to our own trail. These VdlP signs invariably pointed to an extremely steep and difficult-looking stretch of trail when they indicated another way than our own.

We encountered a map of the overall trail.

There were a number of signs marked "Quatro Valles" showing the way.

This trail mark surprised me. I didn't expect to see the stacked rocks ("keep straight on") here in Spain.

When we got to La Robla, we asked a friendly lady for direction to a place to stay and she told us where to find both of the options. We elected to stay in the one at the exit of the town, very friendly folks, and learned that we were "chicos" (kids). At our age, being "kids" is fine with us.

We discovered that, probably because of lingering habits from the 'rona panic, it was necessary to eat dinner quite a bit earlier than we had thought was customary in Spain. Nonetheless, we found a restaurant that served dinner and ate. (DH told the waitress that I wanted "salad" for some reason, and I really should have spoken up and said, no I want meat and fat. I paid for that reticence the next day in spades.) Then we washing some socks and undies to keep up with our clothing usage. We had only brought enough for "wear one, carry one" and some layers for chilly mornings, so doing at least a little washing wasn't optional.

Recap of pilgrimage 2021: Leon

 Hello, everyone.

During our one partial day in León we did rather a lot of errands: we walked to the Oficina de Turismo and got a map of the downtown area. Then we walked across the bridge to the K2 Planeta store and picked up our (ordered in advance) poles. Then we went to the Benedictine alberbue near the French Way entrance to the city and picked up our San Salvador credenciales. And then we strolled around a bit and found the museum about the ancient Roman era of León's history.

The Centro de Interpretation, I think it was called, incorporates some of the ancient walls into the building. (Not the only building that does that.) This is a view of a part of the walls with some other remains. It's looking down from the walking space on top of the walls.

The museum also had an interpretation of what the Roman soldiers' quarters might have been like...give or take some curtains, pillows and mattresses, and electric lighting. It's not that dissimilar from a modern pilgrims' albergue in many ways.

As this was the first "puente" weekend in a long, long time, the folks were going in for some festivities. They had made a flower painting on the plaza next to the Cathedral.

They also had an outdoor festival of sorts, fenced in and with door-dragons making sure that everyone who entered the outdoor area of booths was properly adorned with a mascarilla.

When we sat down to eat, we had a tabla of charcuterie: various cured meats and some cheese, along with bread and red wine. 

After we ate, being dog-tired by this time, we went back to our room and collapsed into bed.

My Dirty Girls

 Hello, everyone.

Today I want to show off my wonderful sand gaiters: an outer layer that keeps rocks and sand from getting into your shoes.

This is one of my pair of Dirty Girls. There is a little hook, visible here, and a little bit of hook-and-loop, not visible, at the back of the shoe. The lady's shop has a number of different patterns in the fabric, I chose the Camino one as y'all can see. 

While on the Camino Primitive, we met a lady from Germany who also has Dirty Girls, in a black and red sort of splash or flame pattern.

They work. Aside from a couple of bits of weed that worked their way up the side once, I had no foreign objects get into my shoes. And there was a lot of dirt, sand, and gravel to cross! 

This is also a closer view of the Speedgoat 4 shoes that were written about in my last post.

The most comfortable shoes we have ever walked in

 Hello, everyone.

Today I want to talk about our shoes. We walked in Hoka One One Speedgoats. These were new, and we loved walking in them.

We had chosen them in the first place because (1) they have the Mega-grip soles and won't slip on wet stone, and (2) being trail runners, they weigh less than our previous shoes did. 

They also breathe--this was wonderful--at the end of the day my feet were not soaking in a puddle of perspiration the way waterproof shoes always worked out.

We had no blisters on the entire pilgrimage.

At the central milestone in Madrid, at the end.

At lunch time on the Hospitales portion of the Camino Primitivo. (Yes, that is a toppled marker stone being used as a bench. It was toppled when we got there!)

Winding up...

 Hello, everyone. 

The last post left off at the second day before our return home. The following morning, before checking out, we went to try the crepes place we had seen over near Calle Posta.

Two of the large variety of crepes on the menu.

We had thought that 8 Euro was a lot, until the server brought out these very full, plate-sized crepes. They had egg, meat, cheese...I couldn't finish mine!

They also had sweet crepes and assorted waffles (gofres) on their list.

After breakfast we went back and began loading up the packs. It went really fast and we realized that we were trying to get home sooner by packing faster! Obviously that was impossible. 

We walked the few blocks down to Atocha station and hopped onto the Airport Express bus. Then we waited until our appointment for the necessary rona test, waited a little longer until the results came into our email and took a taxi to our last-night hotel.

The next morning we flew out and eventually arrived home around midnight-thirty.

The days since we have been playing catch-up around the house and resting. Which is why this post was a little late.

After we upload photos into the computer there will be more discussion of this year's pilgrimage. 

Nineteenth update on pilgrimage 2021

 Hello, everyone. 

In these our last few days we walked over to the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, a really wonderful art museum in Madrid, and also to the Museo Arqueologico Nacional, a cultural-historical museum. We have visited both of these before. We discovered that the art collections at the Thyssen have been rotated and that part of the MAN is undergoing "obras" and not on display now.

This painting of the Visitation (second joyful mystery of the rosary) is unusual in showing the developing babies in their wombs. 

There were a lot of Dutch paintings on display, but most of the beautiful still lifes that I remember and liked were not on display. My personal favorite,  Christus Resurrexit, was still there and it was interesting to reflect on the difference between the actual, huge, painting and my somewhat smaller print. The real one just glows more. 

I learned that ostrich eggs were a thing with the ancient Phoenician colonists, that built ports in Hispania in the centuries before Rome moved into the peninsula in a big way.

We didn't spend tons of time in the MAN this time, as it was late in the day, but it was interesting and educational. 

Eighteenth update on pilgrimage 2021

 Hello, everyone. 

Yesterday we were still tired from our early train ride, and the aftermath of our weeks of walking. We slept as long as we could make ourselves do it!  And we presented ourselves, laundry bag in hand, at the laundromat at the head of Calle Cervantes the very moment the lady was open for business: 0900.

The washer and dryer took about half of the time my ones at home do.

We encountered the Parrochia del Sagrado Corazon, a beautiful church, in the afternoon. (Bonus: they have a bunch of pews placed in front of the door to the tiny adoration chapel.) 

While we took photos there, none are on the tablet, so they can't be added here just yet.

This morning we made ourselves rest until 9 and then walked to the Museo National Anthropologico, which is across from the Atocha train and bus station. 

Woven plant fiber mochila--backpack--used in the Philippines, especially in rugged areas like the Luzon mountains. 

The rows of fringe here are not a fashion element! This is the rain protection the Filipino ladies wear over the backpack. The fibers in the fringes are supposed to wick the rain water away from the contents of the pack.

I kind of blinked my eyes at that explanation and reflected on how different this system is from the waterproof ponchos or bag-covers that are used by pilgrims walking on the Camino. 

Seventeenth update on pilgrimage 2021

 Hello, everyone. 

Yesterday we took the 0630 train from Santiago to Madrid. We thought that buying first class tickets (after our Tarjeta Dorada discount, it wasn't super expensive) would be great. The description of the first class tickets included a power plug and wifi...neither of which was available on our particular (Alvia) train. So we sat there in our seats for almost 5 hours with a choice between sleeping and watching a no-sound movie on the TV screen in the ceiling. But we got into Madrid just after 11:00 and took the subway to Sol station, near where we're staying for the last few days.

A new dish, chuleton for 2, that we tried. It's a whole lot of beef, cooked medium rare to rare. Very tasty, but we think the "for 2" must refer to football players!