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Book ahead for the holiday if you are able! I do follow with interest as I am interested in the various Camino del Cid stretches and stages after retirement next year.Two years ago the tourist office in Soria gave me a brochure "experimenta el camino en Soria". One of the suggestions was for a Camino del Sur. Not the one I walked last year from Huelva, but an ancient one largely following the Roman road linking Zaragoza and Astorga. I thought I'd give it a go.
Having been moving steadily downstream on the río Jíloca for several days, I'll now be going up the Jalón for 100km or so from Calatayud. The two rivers go through very different countryside - the Jíloca fertile and populated, the Jalón arid and largely deserted. Quite a lot of today's walk, especially after Ateca, the countryside was completely abandoned, with broken irrigation channels and dead trees. The walk follows the Camino del Cid, which was fortunate, as it's very well signed, but even so I nearly got lost on overgrown and rarely travelled paths.
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Alhama de Aragón, today's destination, is a spa town, bustling with holiday visitors. I had somehow booked myself into a very luxurious spa hotel whilst I was in Calatayud. Luxurious but surprisingly not expensive (I've paid more for a Travelodge in Nottingham).
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I was soon enjoying the baño del moro, with water coming out of a spring at 32°C, and sauna and an outdoor pool which I had to myself as everybody else found it too cold (?20°). I had to fill in a health declaration, and one of the conditions I had to say I didn't have I didn't understand, but was assured I was quite unlikely to be pregnant.
I had hoped to stay two nights from tomorrow in a retreat at the monastery of Santa María de Huerta, but the apologetic fray hospitalero told me that all 17 of their guest rooms were "completo" for the puente. Very chatty, he was, as trappist monks often are, in my limited experience.
Ohhhh. Very old roads are right up my alley. So I really look forward to this thread's meanderings.an ancient one largely following the Roman road linking Zaragoza and Astorga. I thought I'd give it a go.
Now you're talking. The vias verde are behind you, the old road's ahead, and a thermal bath? Perfect. No doubt you'll pay the piper later with far less sumptuous accommodation. But for now...ahhhhh.I was soon enjoying the baño del moro
Mine too. Limited opportunities, no doubt.Very chatty, he was, as trappist monks often are, in my limited experience.
Very well: he has a new best friend, Wilf the dachshund. Here's the two of them doing a pastiche of Landseer's "Dignity and Impudence".how is Huba?
please keep it going.
Revisiting my notes about this incredibly interesting pueblo - did you see the beguinage? A strange place for that I'd have thought.I was soon enjoying my first sopa Castillana in Castile before wandering around town. The arcaded Plaza Major is very lovely, especially if you can avoid thinking about burning tar balls.
Ah, North towards Soria instead of West to Sigŭenza. The landscape on my topo map looks interestingly crumpled where you are. So I went to the geological map, and it's a fascinating mix around there, getting younger as you go North.Blocona
?bustards, vultures, golden eagles.
Yes, it is a gem! @peregrina2000 arranged a side trip from our Lana to visit San Baudelio. She'll be along soon to rave about it!A mixture of joy at what survived and depression at what has been lost.
Well, I don’t want to disappoint @C clearly, so let me gush a little. Many of the original frescoes of this church are in the Museo del Prado. When I was a study-abroad student in Madrid in 1970, I took a History of Art course that had one hour per week of small group Prado visits with a tutor. Those frescoes must have been the first Romanesque paintings I ever really paid attention to, and they just grabbed me. I had wanted to visit that church for years and years.Yes, it is a gem! @peregrina2000 arranged a side trip from our Lana to visit San Baudelio. She'll be along soon to rave about it!
I've been waiting for this. Where will you cross the Duero this time?A km before finally arriving, I crossed the Duero once again - my ninth crossing point, from Soria near its source, to Porto, close to where it joins the Atlantic.
Ah. So that's who opened European eyes to them. I just learned this:discovering the Galapagos islands,
Well presumably they would already have been called that?In 1570 the Galapagos Islands were included in a world atlas by a Flemish cartographer Abraham Ortelius. He named the islands 'Insulae de los de Galapagos'.
10?!The marquesses of Berlanga apparently destroyed 10 romanesque churches in the town, replacing them in 1530 with the monumental colegiata de Santa María. It's large and airey and gothic, but I think I'd have preferred to have seen the earlier ones.
It's closed at the moment. .The people at my nearby casa rural think there might be a Ukranian family staying there, but weren't sure. It looked very nice. Although why there is a (Santiago) albergue there is a mystery to me. Having said that, I saw a couple of yellow arrows and a shell in Caltojar yesterday, which seemed just as implausible.Did you stay in the Albergue in Gormaz?
The implication was that Fray Tomás named the Galapagos. He only got there by accident, his ship on the way to Lima being sent off course by currents.Well presumably they would already have been called that?
Is it on the El Cid? Maybe that's why.Although why there is a (Santiago) albergue there is a mystery to me.
I was wondering if you could still see it. One of the best things about the camino is to watch dramatic features of the landscape appear and then dissappear behind us as we walk over, through, or past them. In some places the view behind is as interesting as the one ahead.What will almost certainly be my last sighting of Moncayo.
Yes it is, you're certainly right.Is it on the El Cid? Maybe that's why.
That's how I keep sane in the lambing shed in March, thinking of autumn on the camino.fruits of what must have been an enormously complicated planning process!
You'd have a hard time beating this year's record. What's your all-time favorite so far?My last bridge over the Duero.
Oh to be a fly on the wall. One speaking Castiliano, the other English. Would each have known anything of the other, I wonder?And of course Burgess imagines that Shakespeare and Cervantes met during the embassy. It could have happened.
I think the riverscape at Zamora has to win the prize.What's your all-time favorite so far?
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