Day 17 - Castrojeriz to Fromists

We had supper last night with Richard from California. He is Camino friends with Jack et al and we know him well. He is a very interesting and well educated person and we had a wonderful conversation. He recommended some hikes in New Zealand we will have to follow up on.

This morning we got off to a late start, 8:30, as breakfast at the hotel wasn't until 8:00.  We ate with Richard again. It was an okay breakfast, mainly bread and cafe con leche, but there was yogurt, and Richard extracted bananas from a basket in the dining room he had noticed last night, a very important part of a pilgrims diet.

The problem with the late start was that we were missing the cool weather at the start of the day.  It was going to be a very hot day.

We didn't walk with Richard. He has an injury, problem where the foot/heel meet, now on both feet, so is rather hobbling along, but determined to persevere.

On the way out of town we met Pat and Ian from Burlington. They had already walked 11km from Hontanas this morning. We walked with them our first 11km to Itero de la Vega.

In the words of Gomer Pyle " surprise, surprise", the first thing you do is climb a hill.  A 12% slope that took you up 100 metres. Ian thinks this is the hill that made Jane Christmas  (author of 'What the psychic said to the pilgrim') quit the Camino (although she did come back and finish it). The climb was hard but the view back over the valley was incredible.

That brought us up onto the mesa again, think Saskatchewan.  Rolling hills, stubble where grain was, later corn and sunflowers, and some kind of leafy root crop we still can't identify.  But few trees.  The view, for a flatlander, was magnificent.

Lynn had a great chat with Pat. It turns out she was at first married to an alcoholic, and they had four children. I told her about my situation and said I had learned so far on the Camino that it was not going to be a matter of letting go so much as learning to live with grief. At first she disagreed, but as we talked we decided that living with a spouse that was an addict was much different than coping with a child that was a addict. At least 50% of marriages today end in divorce. At least partner decides they don't love their spouse any more and leaves them, forgets them, and moves on. So, if you find yourself married to an addict, you let go. But if your child is an addict, you can't just stop loving your child. As it says in 1 Corinthians 13 verse 7-8, 'love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perservers. Love never fails.' The parent of an addict needs to learn not to protect their child from the the full consequences of their addiction. And not to enable them. It's very hard. But most of all, you don't want to lose hope.

We have been using the Michelin guide for our walks and for some reason, today the distances to the various towns were wrong.  We can do about 5km per hour and to walk 2 hours and then be told you only did 6.6km, hmmm, there is a problem Huston.

We stopped at Itero de la Vega for our cafe con leche and commented on how we had only walked 6.6, and were quickly corrected and told, no, we had covered 11km.  Ahhh.

Lynn was having a major problem at the break, feeling weak and dizzy. At one point everything got blurry and I almost passed out. Ian and Pat left, and Richard arrived. We talked to him for a few minutes and left. I think I was primarily dehydrated. I'd been engrossed in conversation with Pat and hadn't been drinking enough water.

We then just walked, looking for things in the distance to walk toward, and avoiding the Spanish bicycle groups that would sneak up behind you with no warning.

Further up we crossed the rio Pisueurga, dividing Burgos from Palencia provinces.

In the distance we noticed one or two bodegas, or wine cellars, dug into the hills.  The guide books say there are several but we found them hard to spot.  Perhaps the perigrinos are taking a toll on the wine?

We tramped into Boadilla de Camino, where we intended to find a shady place to have lunch.  A danish couple we have talked to along the way called to us to share a shady spot along the side of an  albergue, the clincher for Russ being the mug of cold beer he held up.

Russ noticed that Lynn was shaking like a leaf cutting the tomato to put on our cheese baquette and pulled out an electrolyte tablet she put in her water and drank down. She was finding the going very tough, by now the temperature was 31C.  The electrolyte tablet picked her up after a bit.  We later concluded that this was why we were eating so much of the salted snacks, our bodies needed the salt that was being lost through sweating.

6 more, only 6km more to the hotel in Fromista.

Our vanity as being super fast was smashed today. We were being passed many times by both younger, fitter hikers and people our own age. One fellow that passed us said he and his buddies were trying to do 40km a day to do the mesa in 4 days. All we could say was, good luck.

We left Boadilla and within a km or so, we were walking parallel to the Canal de Castilla.  The canal runs for km, providing water for the farmers, and some trees planted alongside much appreciated shade for the perigrinos.

The canal was built in the 18 century and provided transportation of the farmers' produce as well as power to turn the corn mills.  There is a plan in place to restore the canal system with it's 50 locks, perhaps it will join the Rideau Canal as a World Heritage site?

Our hotel today is 400m off the Camino and Lynn figured it had to be really good to justify that. We were not disappointed. Air conditioning - and a very lovely modern hotel with an excellent dinner menu. Just what a heat stroked, dehydrated pilgrim needs.

Summary - a nice day hiking, more great views. The toll of the mesa is starting to be felt, very hot and little shade.  Tomorrow may be interesting as some forecasts are calling for rain.  Rain is needed as where there is no irrigation, the leaves on the trees are turning very brown.

Distance today - 27km
Distance total - 362.5km