This was an easy day. We only had 8km to walk to get from Molinaseca to Ponferrada. We woke late, took a leisurely breakfast alongside a pretty river in an open air cafe just as the pilgrims who had already done a few hours walking arrived in the town for their first break.
We strolled slowly to Ponferrada, smelling the roses and listening to the sweet chirrup of the crickets in the summer grass. I don't even remember any hills.
I hate hills. Ponferrada is surrounded by honking big mountains, we walked across them to get here, it hurt. I know that we have to walk across them to get out, it will hurt again. But today was bliss, a gentle stroll through the Spanish countryside.
Ponferrada is home to a massive castle. El Castillo de Los Templars. The Castle of the Templars (knights). A few days ago we were in Hospital de Orbigo, founded by the Hospitalier knights, today we are in Ponferrada, founded by the Knights Templar. All very historical, all very cool. I am loving knights at the moment, desperately looking for a sword shop to procure some acoustic weapons to have shipped home and added to my collection, can't find one. We are in Spain though, Toledo and all, something will come up.
I have added some images of our walk into Ponferrada and the castle. We have a rest day tomorrow, I will not blog about that per se but suffice to say we will be catching up on some laundry, attending to some ailments of a blistery nature and generally getting our strength back up (and the kid's who though irrepressible need some serious sleep).
If I had to summarise six days on the road I would say two things.
A. Its just what I thought it would be like. Brilliant.
B. I thought I would be skinnier already, still have my pot belly. Beer at lunch will do that to you even when you walk for hours in the heat apparently.
Bummer.
This picture says it all really.
Buen Camino Peregrinos
No comments:
Post a Comment