Espinosa del Camino to San Juan de Ortega

We headed out from our favourite albergue at our usual 8am. We had grabbed sandwiches and goodies from the restaurant. Yummy carrot cake for me. It  was only  2 degrees when we got up and by the time we left, a whooping 5 degrees. We had sent our bags on and Roz had sent big pink in her bag. I guess I should explain big pink. So one year when Roz and Wes were curling in Prague they didn't take brooms and Karolina supplied them with a big  wide brilliant pink broom. Of course you couldn't sweep with it so Wes became the user of big pink. Well Roz wears this bright pink hoodie. When she is wearing it I can easily see her. It is now referred to as big pink. Anyways, pink was off on a car excursion and Roz had only her vest, which usually is more than enough. At one point someone walked by her all bundled up and said "aren't you cold" and she said "heck no, I'm from Canada: to which he replied :you should be in a bikini then complaining about the heat!".

Sun coming up.

We have under 550km to go.

Sunrise on Roz.

And the surrounding fields. The first part of our walk was steady uphill with a small sharp hill to Villafranca.

Frost in the ditches.

What's left of a very old Hermitage of San Felix de Orca.

Coming into Villafranca de orca

Bird's nest in the belfry.

Starting our climb up what would be a very steep and rocky 5km.

Our first stop was at this picnic site which had a memorial to a mass grave of 300 people executed in the Spainish Civil War.

Someone went to a lot of trouble to make rock arrows.

Into the trees again.

A very long arrow.

And out of the blue was a food truck. Well he was kind of an eccentric fellow with a cape on and was extremely friendly, painting shells and selling water and juice. He had painted these signs.

Check out the types of pilgrims.

This is what remains of an area that had totem poles someone had painstakingly made. Some time in the past few years they have been vandalized. Such a shame. A lot of people go to a lot of work to make things pleasant on the Camino.

A nice gentle descent into San Juan de Ortega. It is a little hamlet with a population of 20. It has a church, a chapel and an historic parish hostel. It was one of the classic pilgrim stops in medieval and now modern times. It is also a place where tour buses come to see the church or pick up pilgrims doing a tour version of the Camino.

San Juan was a disciple of Santo Domingo and, like him, served to make it easier for the pilgrims. He built bridges, hospitals, churches and hostels. In this isolated area he founded an Augustian monastery in 1150 and dedicated the church to San Nicolas de Bari who he claimed had saved him from drowning on his return from a piligrimage to the Holy Land.

This chapel is where San Juan is actually buried. In a plain sarcophagus for a humble man. All of this is behind bars..

On the walls are paintings that depict miracles associated with San Juan.

Right at the end on the right side is our home away from home.

Stairs going up to the dormitory. 

The dormitory. There were 22 beds. Roz and I had a wonderful afternoon snooze even though people were coming and going. I had intentions of getting some good photos but there are no overhead lights in the room. When we came upstairs after having dinner with a couple from St Thomas, it was dark and of course you have to be out before the sun is totally up so this was the best I could do.

Leaving our albergue at sunrise.