Hornillos del Camino

A wonderful day of walking, Amr says it was 21.82kms. But it was cold! We left Burgos a little after 8.30 in our usual blue and cloudless sky, bracing but lovely…but have to admit that soon fingers ached a bit, and it was a bit too cold for comfort, and my blue Lululemon pants seem to feel more breezy…I think it was about 7° but a cold breeze.

An easy walk out of Burgos, and then an easy, but not picturesque section walking back and forwards to get through and under many main roads and motorways leading in and out of Burgos. But after that it all became spectacular…the amazing greenery of the new crops, the new spring growth in the trees, undulating vistas.

We paused at a dear little Ermita where we had our camino passports stamped, and were blessed, that we remembered from before. And we stopped for a break at a spot just off the track where there were picnic tables, and suddenly we realised this was where we had gratefully paused last time as an oasis to escape the heat from the very exposed track we had been walking along…SO different, now we wanted protection from the cold (which it didn’t give!)…

But being cold puts a spring in your step just to keep warm, and it was a great day. The cloudless sky had become scattered with puffy clouds which a couple of times had produced 3 drops of water…but the breeze never let any cloud stay overhead for more than a minute, and the sun shone intermittently. We all remembered that you walk along a plateau with nothing in sight but fields (this time green) and then there is a fairly steep descent and Hornillos, a small village, appears. This time it was magical…a sweet town amongst green fields…in September it was a clump of houses in the middle of nowhere!

So we arrived, at the little place we stayed at in 2018. But this is May Day and a public holiday here, and everything quiet…our place was closed, with a sign saying “completo” but the door was not locked, so we went in and found a table with keys on little notes - one with Rachel Higgins, and one with Rosemary Marzouk, and room numbers (I think we were the last to arrive and collect our keys!) and found it is self serve today…got to our rooms, bags there, all perfect…except Amr says the shower doesn’t drain well and I’d better have a quick shower so it doesn’t overflow. Also the note said we had a voucher for dinner at a restaurant up the road between 7 and 9 (dinners are included for the next few days) and gave us the breakfast times…so all taken care of and we are very content. R and R have the exact room we had last time, with a sloping ceiling and a skylight!!

We went for a walk up the road to find where we would be eating, and as we walked along, feeling even colder, some drops started falling and this time we realised that they weren’t raindrops but snowflakes!! They only lasted a few minutes too, and after checking the restaurant, which had a delicious smell of roast chicken, we went back to a closed bar and all had a celebratory drink. Now still cold, with every layer on, but hope they will turn on the heating at night!

Oh dear, bad reception and difficult uploading..will remove pics and just do words, add photos later…Read more