Hontanas to Fromista

The sun would not rise for another two hours as we packed our bags in the hallway. Someone else from the other dormitory had the same idea, and added their stuff to the mess. We finished our morning routines and headed down the stairs.

There's really only one thing that can stop you from getting an early start, and that would be a locked door. Thirteen days of walking to, and sleeping in, various places. You'd think that we would have learned to ask what time the doors open. After some exploring we found our escape through the kitchen door, and around the back of the building.

With head torches aglow we headed up into the hills and out of town. There’s not much to see when it’s dark out, and you walk so much faster without the heat pressing down on you. Our small group for the day consisted of Bianca, Crissi, and Maddy (the pilgrim who joined us in the hallway) from the UK.

The rising sun filled the sky with a beautiful pink as headed towards Castrojeriz. Up ahead a massive structure begin to take shape. It was the Convento de San Antón: an old pilgrim hospital which was started by the Order of St. Anthony in the 11th century. All that's left now are the ruins of it, but the road cut right through the middle of it.

Arches toward above us as we walked through the ruins. The pink stone arches of this once massively tall structure framed the road perfectly as we continued towards the castle on the hill in the distance.

The road took us through groves of trees before crossing a small river. Castrojeriz was in full view as we took the exit off of the small country highway and towards the town. The church seemed so large when compared to the houses around it.

Oh, and did I mention that there wasn't a single cloud in the sky today? Talk about beautiful.

Bianca showed us her coffee skills as we rested at the cafe across from the church. She competes in the Olympics of coffee making, and gets to work with it all day long, for a living.

Up the stone road we went, taking a detour around the southern side of the castle on the hill, and in doing so nearly stepped on a praying mantis! The little guy was standing as stiff as a statue in the middle of the street. But he was kind enough to let us take some pictures of him.

Ahead of us lay an old Roman road which led to the big elevation gain for the day: Alto de Mostelares. Maddy and I were in the power walking groove with our trekking poles, and we didn’t flinch as we hit the incline. It took us about 10 minutes to get to the top, and holy shit were we out of breath when we reached it. I don’t think I was this out of breath when we crossed the Pyrenees.

The walk down was hard. My poor knees…

Flat ground awaited us on our way to the next oasis. The power walking didn’t ease up either. Maddy and I arrived at the Fuente al Pioja about 40 minutes later and chucked our gear aside. We probably spent close to an hour resting here. The sun was shining bright, the clouds were absent from the sky, and the shade felt damn good. Plus, there was a snack stand set up with food. Fruit please!

We came to the San Nicolás Chapel. It was a barebones place with no electricity which means, gasp, no wifi. But the thought of staying there was tempting, just to disconnect from it all for once. Once over the bridge which crossed the Rio Pisuerga we entered Palencia, and the Tierra de Campos region.

The headphones went in, the music was turned on, and I beat the shit out of that gravel path with my trekking poles. The heat had turned up, and I wanted to get to some shade, which was still 6 kilometers away. Maddy had the same idea, and she kept in time with her music, each of us using the beat to power walk. We matched tempos and were soon making great time.

Itero de la Vega was the next town, and it was calling out to us for lunch. The sandwiches were served hot, the beer cold, and I fell backwards into my chair as I tried to stand up. Maybe I need to slow down a bit. Gently rolling hills outside of Itero de la Vega greeted us for the longest stretch of today. No water, no shade, good music, rolling hills, what more could you ask for?

With beast mode turned on it took Maddy and I about an hour to get to the shade and stop for the day at Boadilla del Camino.

During our speed walking, we realized that Crissi and Bianca had fallen far, far behind. We waited with the most friendly of cats at the park on the edge of the village for an hour, but they never showed up. It was too early in the day to call it quits and, oddly enough, we were aching for more walking.

Bad idea.

The walk from Boadilla to Fromista was nearly just as long as the previous stretch, and along an old river canal (Canal de Castilla) that looked like it was no longer used. We were very relieved when we entered town at three in the afternoon. Today came close to 10 hours of pure walking. Not bad. But we both knew that it was going to start hurting soon.

Happy to be at another large town, we checked in at the closest place to stay and settled in. The World Cup was going on while we were in Spain, and Maddy’s Camino friend Luis was staying at the same Albergue, so we joined him at night for the game.

It was officially decided that we shouldn’t have pushed so hard today. But hey, second longest day! Crissi and Bianca did indeed make it to the previous town at Boadilla after we had left, and decided to camp there for the night. But we'll see them tomorrow in Carrion, the town just before what I would later learn is called The Wasteland.

With a name like that, I'm not looking forward to it.