Barranco de los Azares

What a beautiful walk today. Since we had gone up to the Tetas yesterday, we got straight on the Camino and headed for Trillo. It was very nice, all off road. And Trillo, what a beautiful place to stop. There’s a bar right on the river, which is cascading down over rocks in a picture perfect scene. We also visited the church, where mass was ending. We had a nice chat with the priest, who is from Ruanda, and has been in Spain for about 14 years. He has been in Trillo for four years and is in charge of seven or eight other small towns, where he goes to say mass. Misas relámpagos m, they are called.

The path from Trillo went through a few towns, through a lot of ag lands, off and on near a river.
Aman stopped and gave Clare a big bag of unshelled walnuts. I would’ve said no thanks, but Clare dutifully took them and carry them for 3 km into town. She is now sitting outside the albergue on the steps, cracking them with a rock.

When I got to town, I went straight to the Bar Salmeron, the place where I had been told to go for the keys. Guess what, the bar was closed. As I was trying to figure things out, a Guardia Civil car came by and I flagged it. After a few calls, they got in touch with the Mayor, who told me to go to the Townhall. Once there, after about a 15 minute wait, the woman in charge came with a map to explain how to go pick up the keys—at the Bar Salmeron! It took a few more phone calls to learn that there was supposedly a set of keys on the windowsill of the little building where we are supposed to sleep out at the football field. I am glad I asked for a phone number because when we got here there was no key to be found. The mayor himself came out and showed us where the key was. If anyone had explained it clearly, we could’ve easily found it, but oh well. I was really glad that this mayor had won reelection yesterday, because if he had lost, the new mayor today would not have had a clue!

4 th night in a row in albergues. This town has a couple of reasonable pensiones but they are all full because of the huge work crews coming to work on the nuclear power plant. According to one hotel owner, every room is booked for 100 Km around. That may be a slight exaggeration, but in any event, there was no room for us in Cifuentes. Thank goodness for the albergue. It’s very basic but has hot water and blankets which are the top two things on my list!

We have taken a walk through the historic center, which has some very pretty Churches and plazas. We even walked up to the castle and then onto the supermarket. Another really good day, I feel so fortunate.Read more