Iglesia de Santa María de Palacio

Hi Everyone,
Today was quite an easy day in comparison with those past so far. After about an 8km steady incline and a steep pinch into Villamayor, I enjoyed about 12kms of undulating pastures and vineyards on my way to Los Arcos.

Not long after leaving Estella, I came to a well-known stop for souvenir hunters at an open ironworks. The ‘smithy’ was at it early and a lot of pilgrims were stopping to watch him and buy some of his wares. I pressed on a little further to the famous Irache bodega fountain where you can get a sip of wine, directly from the tap in the wall. 8:30am was too early for me and during past visits I’ve seen people drinking directly from the tap, so it’s not the healthiest place to take a sample.

As I started to get into the hillier parts of the first section, I was wandering through low forest and it was very pleasant walking. Through Azqueta and up a steep climb to Villamayor, I was hoping to see some of the local population but, again, no-one to be seen. I did, however, pass quite a few locals out walking along their section of the Camino and was invariably greeted with a cheery “buen Camino.” Above Villamayor, straddling the peak of Monjardin, are the ruins of St Stephen’s castle. I met a guy later in the day who had been shown the ruins and he said the views were spectacular. As it was, they were pretty great from my point of reference at ground level too.

From here, the path opened up and was exposed to the warming weather with no real opportunity to walk in any shade. I took the opportunity, about 7kms from Los Arcos to stop at a mobile food truck that is a prominent marker on the Camino. The owner is a Canadian guy who has lived in Villamayor for the last eight years and this is his business. He has to pay a rental fee to the Villamayor town council but business was brisk, even on a relatively quiet day so he must be doing well.

A little further on I passed a guy who was taking photographs with some serious camera equipment. We walked together for a while and introduced ourselves. Hamish is an Australian who left Perth to go and live in the ski fields of Canada about 20 years ago, but would come back to Melbourne where he grew up if he ever came back to Oz. He is taking short stages of around 10kms per day but is here to sort out a recent event in his life that hit him pretty hard. Everyone is here to find themselves, discover something, achieve goals, letting go, or a hundred other reasons, and their stories are very interesting and, in some cases, quite sobering.

Eventually I reached Los Arcos and spent some people watching time over a beer before settling in for a shower and a clean up. Tomorrow, I’m heading to Logroño about 28kms away. The path is, again, quite exposed and the temperature will be in the mid twenties so I’ll need to be well watered along the way. I’ll also be leaving the region of Navarre and crossing into Rioja, a major wine growing area.

Buen Camino

Click below to see Efren’s walk from Azqueta to Torres del Rio which is about 8kms past my overnight stop at Los Arcos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKR7EOVwiwI&amp…

Distance today: 20.7 kms
Total distance travelled so far: 133.8 kmsRead more