Rioseco to Laredo

We leave Mar this morning, and wish we could take her with us, but we know her 98 year old mother needs her more than we do. Our first path today is along side the road on a designated walking track, once we get to our second town for the day this changes dramatically, we encounter the steepest climb thus far, along a dirt track that reminds me of the overgrown motorbike tracks leading down to Styx River. We can actually hear motorbikes in the background as we climb this beast but can’t pick if they are headed our way or not 🤷‍♀️. When we are 3/4 of the way up this hill, a guy with his two dogs comes casually walking up behind us, as he overtakes us he lets us know that we are nearly at the top and then it flattens out, this is music to my ears. Once at the top we sit for a few minutes and have a drink, that climb took it out of all of us. We take off again and meander down the next hill. The countryside we pass through today is absolutely beautiful with lots of cows, horses and the odd donkey. The towns are small, well kept and pretty. We get to the last town before our destination and we have options, we choose the blue (recommended) route, it takes us up behind some rural houses, on the fringe of a forested area with rural views overlooking the farmland, we have excellent shade which drops the temperature considerably and we enjoy our walk. We eventually come out of this though and then it is uphill with no shade, but the views are stunning, it’s a hard slog with the constant climbing. The next phase of our walk today sees us weaving our way along a goat track lined with brier bushes, dodging rocks, prickles and people, this track seems to go on forever, then out of no where, when we turn onto a road that just heads down at a steep decline, we drop into Laredo. We take a seat at the very first bar we find, it’s time for drinks, it’s hot, we are buggered and our hips, knees, ankles and toes are all aching. We eventually get back up, and hobble on, we find a supermarket to get some food to make a late lunch, we then locate our accomodation, shower, change, make our lunch and head to the garden area, we have a great barmen, who looks after us and we settle in here for the rest of the arvo.Read more