Pontassieve

Staying at Sosta al Capitano
20.86km 348m
We wake up early, Ann is not feeling the best today, but is going to soldier through. We leave our accommodation at 8:20am and head to George, he is going to sort his luggage transfer out while we have a cappuccino and a ham, cheese and tomato croissant. We then start heading out of Florence on our first walking day. We go via the Santa Maria Croce, and get a pilgrims stamp as this is the beginning point of the Way of St. Francis. Our walk today is one of the flattest on this Camino, it is 18.9km to Pontassieve and although our backpacks are heavy, we are pretty excited. The novelty wears off by the time we get to our first town/stop, I have my first glass of 1€ Vino Rosso and half a ham and cheese toastie. We then get back on trail, from here it is our first climb and boy o boy I am feeling it! There is no where to rest or sit between here and Sieci and by the time we get there, Ann and I are both pretty broken. Our packs are not sitting right or don’t have enough padding and we still have nearly 5km to go. We head out of town and have a lovely dirt road to walk on for the next little while, but then we come to some roadworks that will take us of path and divert us up through the end of a vineyard, we all end up with muddy shoes. By the time we make it to Pontassieve, I can barely walk, everything is arching and I just need to get to the end point for today. We finally arrive, we book in and then shower and rest for a while before meeting George for some dinner and wine at a local pizza joint. Dinner does not disappoint, our pizza’s are full of flavour and the wine goes down a treat too. We walk back to our accommodation and fall into bed, exhaust and buggered, we shall sleep well tonight. Good night all!Read more