Day 7 - September 11

Day 7: Atapuerca to Olmillos de Sasamon - until we realized the hotel was too far off the Camino and went another 5k to the adorable village of Hontanas.

Amy left the dinner table last night too tired to wait for dessert as the wife/hostess was busy all by herself in the restaurant clearing, taking dessert orders and trying to stay sane in an impossible situation. Christina and I waited patiently, both afraid that she would break down if we ran out and planned for our next day. When we made it up the two flights to our loft room where our three little beds were lined up in the rafters like the 3 little bears, Amy was fast asleep. There were seven guests in that little area sharing one bathroom so consequently there was always somebody going to the bathroom throughout the night and stirring everyone else. While Amy and Christina told me they slept well, I definitely did not! I decided to just get out of bed at 5:30 thinking I might as well use the bathroom before the other 6 queued up.

Christina arranged with the husband who was in charge of breakfast to meet earlier than the 7am scheduled time. She understood he woke up at 6am so I figured I’d give him 10 minutes to get himself together and as I walked into the kitchen he was there. He grunted at me and said something I couldn’t understand. I asked for “cafe con leche” and he grunted again and walked over to make me one. Amy arrived a few minutes later and she got the same treatment except he didn’t want to give her a coffee. He finally relented. Christine arrived and the man started yelling at her. I asked what was going on?! She replied that she had mistaken his “waking up at 6” with he could serve us coffee at 6 and we were late. So much for “customer is king”! Sadly, as we cross Spain it does seem that the hospitality workers are over worked and generally not friendly or even happy. Perhaps COVID has changed things or the system is strained.

We left the Auberge at 7am under a fool moon. Sun rise in Spain isn’t until 8am so as we left the village up into the mountains, the moon lit our way to the top where we stood amongst the wind turbines and found a cross at the top.

Later, the temperatures rose into the mid 90’s and it became the hottest day so far and by the looks of the forecast, the hottest to come. The trail was fully exposed to the sun as it ran along the high plains, dipping every 10km into villages located in the valleys. Today was a tester as well as doing more distance than planned because the availability of lodging is driving our daily endpoint. As a result, we can either have a shorter day tomorrow to get back on schedule or keep up the mileage and get to the end sooner. This will be the topic of our daily planning meeting.

Our daily routine is settling as get 30-35km done in the morning and find a place for lunch where we look for our new sodium fix: peppers, olives and anchovies slathered in olive oil that every bar and restaurant have. Amy didn’t like anchovies but when the body needs salt, it craves thing we normally wouldn’t touch. After lunch we may do the last 20km or find a place with gazpacho to get our second fill of sodium - see picture below.

We arrived in a beautiful little village that dropped out of the high plains in the last kilometer where we couldn’t see a thing. Two restaurants, a few Auberge’s and a small, pristine church that had the best display - see picture below.

Off to dine at one of the two restaurants and hope to recover well for tomorrows journey.

Cheers,

David.