alansykes
Veteran Member
- Time of past OR future Camino
- Except the Francés
Over a couple of caminos, I've got as far as Puente Duero before turning off on to the Levante or Surest. This time I left from Valladolid, wonderful city, and hope to complete the rest of this camino.
Leaving in the dark, possibly for the last time in a while, the surburbs going out of Valladolid to the west are far longer than those coming in from the south, with seemingly endless car and discount furniture stores, before finally getting off the main road, and finding coffee, at Zaratán.
Soon after that, out into open flat meseta and on to the official Camino de Madrid, and back with the reassuring yellow arrows after a fortnight of busking it. Bliss. Although my apanthropic heart sank when I saw a rucksack-wearing figure studying a noticeboard ahead of me in the distance. Curiousity struck in when he didn't appear to move for a while - must be a really fascinating sign? Then got closer and realised it was a steel statue of a pilgrim.
After a couple of hours of flat skyline and the path ahead leading to the vanishing point, I was beginning to wonder "where on earth is Wamba?" when a sudden depression in the landscape appeared, and with it the visigothic king's town. And its glorious early Romanesque church, with horseshoe arches and famous ossuary. I'm not that into piles of human bones, but I did like the carved capitals. And the primitive 12th Century stone palm tree - although after the one at San Baudelio two weeks ago, it was inevitably an anticlimax. But so glad that I caught it in one of the seven hours per week that it is open.
Peñaflor de Hornija, today's destination, is reached after crossing a mini-Grand Canyon depression - only 50m down and back up, but it must be a struggle after a hot day. The town has a Calle General Franco, and a Travesía José-Antonio: so it goes. The albergue is my first since leaving the mediterranean over four weeks ago. And it's a belter: in the former priest's house, wide beds, with washing machine and fully equipped kitchen, all for 5€. A pilgrim parador.
Leaving in the dark, possibly for the last time in a while, the surburbs going out of Valladolid to the west are far longer than those coming in from the south, with seemingly endless car and discount furniture stores, before finally getting off the main road, and finding coffee, at Zaratán.
Soon after that, out into open flat meseta and on to the official Camino de Madrid, and back with the reassuring yellow arrows after a fortnight of busking it. Bliss. Although my apanthropic heart sank when I saw a rucksack-wearing figure studying a noticeboard ahead of me in the distance. Curiousity struck in when he didn't appear to move for a while - must be a really fascinating sign? Then got closer and realised it was a steel statue of a pilgrim.
After a couple of hours of flat skyline and the path ahead leading to the vanishing point, I was beginning to wonder "where on earth is Wamba?" when a sudden depression in the landscape appeared, and with it the visigothic king's town. And its glorious early Romanesque church, with horseshoe arches and famous ossuary. I'm not that into piles of human bones, but I did like the carved capitals. And the primitive 12th Century stone palm tree - although after the one at San Baudelio two weeks ago, it was inevitably an anticlimax. But so glad that I caught it in one of the seven hours per week that it is open.
Peñaflor de Hornija, today's destination, is reached after crossing a mini-Grand Canyon depression - only 50m down and back up, but it must be a struggle after a hot day. The town has a Calle General Franco, and a Travesía José-Antonio: so it goes. The albergue is my first since leaving the mediterranean over four weeks ago. And it's a belter: in the former priest's house, wide beds, with washing machine and fully equipped kitchen, all for 5€. A pilgrim parador.