Day 12 - Monday, September 9, 2019 - Rabanal to El Acebo - Cut the Downhill in Half - 10.35 miles.- Total Miles to Date - 136.86

One of the things Sally and I have admired about the Camino is the lack of people trying to profit from it. All the merchants we have met along the way, with the exception of a few, have provided wonderful services at incredibly cheap prices. 5€ beds, inexpensive meal options, bag transport services and more. There is really no advertising. We use our guide books and web sites to see what others think of a place and use their judgement to guide us. I think of where we stayed last night in Rabanal. Super clean in all aspects. Wonderful food. Tidy, comfortable and well decorated courtyards full of flowers. Immaculate sleeping room. 5€ for a bed, 11€ to feed us both dinner with leftovers for breakfast. This experience is remarkable. There has been a huge increase in the number of albergues, cafes and restaurants along the route, and it is a good thing. There are now so many people walking the Camino that hundreds of beds are required in the popular towns to accommodate everyone. With those beds come food requirements in the form of groceries and eateries. Many of the small towns have adapted to accommodate all the walkers. They have done a good job of including these services without sacrificing the native feel of the small towns, adapting existing stone buildings to these purposes.

At the end of our hike today (more on that later) we walked into El Acebo, the town where we had decided to stay and stopped at the first red chair. I went into the albergue/cafe to inquire about a pop for each of us and met the owner/operator Mike. Mike grew up in Texas, followed a woman to Spain and has been here for 10 years operating this cafe/albergue.  He insisted on bringing our order out to us, which he did, then stayed around for a while discussing politics, life in Spain and the Camino. He asked where we were staying, adding “I hope not that monstrosity with the pool at the end of town!!” We confessed that was our destination. He went on a bender about profiteering on the Camino, how the place did not fit at all with the spirit of the Camino, how he hired Philipinoes at slave labor wages and houses them in “brothels” (maybe the last part is a bit of an exaggeration on his part).  He chastised us for staying there and we agreed and would have changed now that we understood the circumstances, but we had made reservations, had my pack shipped there, and frankly we wanted to experience all the aspects of the Camino, even the bad ones. So, today was our first introductions to profiteering on the Camino. Details in a minute.

We were up and out by our standard routine and on the road by 5:55am. As always, it was dark with a capital D. We headed out of town, following the signs posted along the road and the GPS. The roads climbed steadily uphill. In the dark it was hard to tell, but the roads appeared to be freshly graded, exposing the red dirt without a hint of gravel as a topping. This went on for most of the way, although at times it would shrink down to a single track trail through what appeared to be small oak trees and other low lying vegetation.

We saw the town of Foncebadon above us when it was still a mile and a half away. In the dark it was hard to tell distances because we couldn’t see the outlines of the buildings, only the street and porch lights. This town was once completely abandoned, but with the rebirth of the Camino, it has been reborn, including a new store/restaurant/albergue that is top notch. 

We walked up the steep newly paved cement road into town and heard someone yelling, “Americanos!! Hey over here!” In the half light we could not make out who it was, but soon Renault emerged from the doorway of an albergue and into the light. We laughed and shook hands, talked a bit and then he was off. We got to the store/restaurant/albergue and took our required seat in one of the red chairs outside. It was still dark, but the sun was beginning to brighten the eastern sky. I got Sally a Coke from inside and a bag of mixed nuts for me. While inside we noticed bags left to be shipped to the next destination. We had hoped to send mine, but had been too late last night. Now we had a chance. We filled out the envelope, slipped in 5€ and put it next to the one already there.

Our backs lightened, we headed up and out of town for the “pass” and the monument at the pass. As we gained altitude slowly on this gently climbing road, the sun made an appearance over the horizon.

We gained the “pass” and saw the famous pile of stones with the pole and cross. To many, arriving here is an emotional moment. To fully participate in the Camino you are to bring a stone from your home and deposit it here, hence the growing pile of stones. To me, it was a telephone pole with a cross on top sticking out of a mound of dirt and stones. But, I am not one to judge, so I quietly circled the pile, took a few photos of those that are moved by this monument and quietly went on my way.

The trail oscillates up and down for about 3 miles as we run the ridge top, then plummets 4000’ downhill to the town of Molinaseca in about 7 miles. We worried about the strain on Sally’s knee doing that much downhill in one shot, so we made plans to stay at the afore mentioned albergue halfway down. The trail was fairly steep as trails go, full of dirt and rocks-a typical trail.

We entered El Acebo, met Mike, then wandered down to the hated hotel just outside of town. It was a magnificent piece of modern construction with wonderful materials and artfully designed. Sally was disappointed to learn the pool was closed-something she was counting on. We registered for our beds and were shown to a room with 4 bunk beds. Each had two outlets and a light mounted a few feet above the bed on the wall. Very convienient for charging devices. The bathrooms were large and spotless. The lights in the hall were motion controlled with a short timer. They turned off 15 seconds after you left the area. From our room to the bathroom there were three separate motion sensors turning on three separate lights. Very modern and energy efficient.

I wrote and napped. Sally napped. We walked back up to Mike’s at 5:00pm to visit as he invited us, yet when we got there, he no recollection of meeting us. He introduced himself, fed us the same lines and responses to questions from the morning. Weird. But, he sees quite a few hundred people a day, so no big deal. One of his workers tried to drive home but her Volkswagon would not start (what a surprise). Mike and her had no idea about cars what-so-ever. I helped a little, then had her try to compression start it as she went down the hill. The road descended 2000’ without a break, so she had lots of room to try to get it started. We ate dinner at Mikes and got two croissants for breakfast, then returned to our room and called it a night. The wind was howling most of the day and especially about 2 in the morning when I got up to walk that well lit hall to the bathroom.

The building was amazing, the people running it, not. They never smiled. They seemed put out every time we asked for something, like milk for a cup of tea. They were obviously not trusted with money in the least. Each exchange of money had to be taken to the front desk to be deposited in a central till and change was brought back. Usually a 3-5 minute process. Mike might have been right. 

Sally’s early morning caffeine stop at the red chair (grey in this case).

The monument at the pass. 

On the descent with Ponferrada in the valley below. We will hike thru and past it tomorrow

Mikes terrace 

El Acebo main (and only) street

Mike’s place

Mike from Dallas not living in El Acebo, Spain

Day 11 - Sunday, September 8, 2019 - Astorga to Rabanal - Into the Mountains - 12.31 Miles - Total Miles to Date - 126.51

We have been walking across the Meseta, or Mesa, since we started walking in Burgos 10 days ago. The way has been nearly flat, with the occasional dip and short climb into a river drainage. We have been surrounded by fields of grain stubble, withered sunflowers and occasionally corn. Although you might think this country less than desirable to walk through, for me it has been a delight. I have never walked through this type of topography, so my interest was peaked by this new experience. The mesa is just below 3000 feet in elevation. But, today we will climb into the hills west of this mesa. We will gain about 1000’ today as we climb to the village of Rabanal. This is over a distance of about 10 miles. Pretty gentle terrain. 

It is interesting hiking with crowds of people that have never really hiked before. There is an anticipation about “climbing” up this “mountain”. Of course, the guidebooks have documented two deaths that occurred on the trail. This has put a touch of fear in more than a few as to the treacherous conditions of the route ahead. We were told that tomorrow when we go over the top (elevation 4900’) we should not travel in the dark of morning because of the dangerous path. Checking the map I see the path parallels a road the entire way so I am doubtful of the perceived difficulty, but I think my background in mountain travel is a bit more extensive than the average traveler on this pilgrimage.

There were about 115 people in the albergue last night, about 20 to a room. There were about 5-6 albergues in the Astorga, plus innumerable hotels. Just speculating, but I bet 200-300 people will walk toward the pass today. We will traverse through 4 towns on our way to Rabanal. There is one town further up the hill, Foncebadon, but we will stop at Rabanal.

We were up at 5:00am this morning and snuck out of the room, hopefully not disturbing the 18 other people. We moved to the kitchen downstairs, had hardboiled eggs and bread for breakfast, fixed Sally’s feet and headed out the door a little before 6:00. While in the kitchen we saw Karen and Tanya, Raquel and about a dozen other early risers. Tanya’s foot is sore, she tripped on it yesterday, and walked all through this amazing town, putting additional strain on it. She will walk today, but if it gets too sore, she will take a cab to the next town.

The morning was again glorious. It makes getting up early a delight, knowing we will have the trail way mostly to ourselves with the stars above and the cool air all around.  We called Andy (6:00am here is 9:00pm back at home) and talked for a while. 

We stopped at the first red chair, still in the dark, but went inside and found a delicious piece of what we would call potato quiche. 1/6 of a pie split between us. 1.80€. Wolfed it down and out the door in about 3 minutes to the dismay of a Swiss, German and Swedish trio at the table next to us.

The way soon left the town and followed a two track dirt road steadily, but gently up. We stopped at Santa Catalina de Somoza at the second red chair of the morning. I was carrying a Pepsi we found in the grocery store. Sally enjoyed that and I purchased a Diet Coke from the cafe. Inside I found Karen and Tanya having a bite. Tanya’s foot was again to painful to continue on, so she was taking a taxi to Foncebadon. Karen would walk there. Outside Sally and I were sipping our drinks, watching the parade of pilgrims walk past. Soon Regina and Sandy came by and we had a chat. We left before them. They waited for the taxi to pick up Tanya, then continued their walk. We made it to El Gonso (great name) and found another red chair. Now, it was a long dry spell to Rabanal, 4.3 miles away. We walked and talked with a variety of people along the way. André and and his wife, of South Africa were a hoot. He is a retired  anathesiologist and travels the world now. I met Larry, from Tacoma, a retire Special Forces vet doing his 7th Camino with the goal of doing 10. 

The way actually became a trail, and fairly steep for a short portion before wandering onto the road for a piece, then a trail again before it entered Rabanal.

Rabanal is a quaint, cute little town, totally dependent on the Camino for existence. There are 3 or 4 albergue housing over 100 pilgrims a night and a hotel or two. All these are housed in old stone buildings, so the quaintness of the village is not lost. We picked the Nuestra Señora del Pilar Pilgrims Hostel for the night, based on the profusion of flowers and the excellent reviews. We were not disappointed. It was spotlessly clean, had great food, a great courtyard and plaza.

We wandered the town and met a 59 year old woman named D’Ann who is doing the PCT next year. We talked with her for 45 minutes about it and other topics, getting to know her. She was the national logistics director for Toyota, based in Dallas, Texas, retired 6 months ago and was traveling and doing the things she dreamed of while working. We agreed to meet her at the church at 7:00 tonight to hear the Gregorian monks sing their prayers.

Our original plan of eating lunch was so delayed in our search for the “right place” (three choices) that it was now nearly 2:00pm. We returned to our albergue and ate there. It had the best rated food in town. As we ate, we decided it was well deserved.

After lunch we retired to our bunks. I wrote, Sally napped. At 6ish we prepared to go listen to the monks. The church is an old stone building that should be condemned. Stones had fallen from the arching ceiling overhead, there were cracks in the walls and ceiling everywhere and there were signs of emergency shoring up to keep it standing. But, we seated ourselves near the back and prayed it would make it through the service. About 60-70 people packed the place and the monks performed their songs beautifully in Latin. Luckily for me, it only lasted about 20 minutes. About 10 minutes in D’Ann came in. Lucky for her we had saved some space on our pew and she slid in beside us. 

Afterwards, we talked with her for another half an hour about her upcoming PCT experience, then parted company. We walked back to the albergue, prepared our bags for the morning and climbed in bed about 9:20pm. 

We decided that maybe it would be a good idea to have one pack sent forward. We checked about the possibility, but found we needed to email and give notice before 9:00pm. We were too late. We would be carrying our packs up to Foncebadon in the morning, and over the “pass”. We only had about 1100 feet to climb, over 5 miles, so again, not steep.

People continued to sneak quietly into the room and climb in bed, but I was asleep and oblivious to it all in just a few minutes.

In Astorga at 6:00 in the morning. 

Walking through Sunrise

Red chair coming up. Must be time for a break. 



Karen and Tanya of New Zealand. 



Regina and Sandy



Chuck on the way 

Red Chair Sally

A line of pilgrims approaching Rabanal

The bunk room on Rabanal

The courtyard in the albergue

Careful inspect the ceiling and walls. “Danger Will Robinson”. Good acoustics for Gregorian chants. 

Day 10 - Saturday, September 7, 2019 - Leon to San Martin de Camino to Astorga - A Ride and a Walk - 14.24 miles - Total Miles to Date -114.20

We got to wondering. 1200 years ago a pilgrim is making his way to Santiago de Compostela on his pilgrimage to assure his place in heaven.  As he is walking along through the open fields of northern Spain an ox cart comes rolling up behind him. The driver asks if he would like to ride in the cart for a bit and rest his weary legs. If the man accepts the ride, is his place in heaven forfeit? Does a pilgrimage mean one must walk the whole way, or is catching a ride for some of the distance okay? 

Although we are not faced with questions of entrance to heaven, we found a diesel powered ox cart this morning and rode it for 14 miles of our pilgrimage, from Leòn to San Martin de Camino. This ride saved us walking down busy city streets, through suburbs and along business lined highways. It was just enough to get us out of the big city. 

We found the ox cart was big enough to accommodate quite a few pilgrims. As we gathered at the ox cart station we met over 6 other pilgrims riding on the same “ox cart”, getting off at various locations, most of them further along the road than where we were departing.

It is interesting that someone made up a “rule” for the Camino de Santiago. If you start your pilgrimage 100 kilometers from Santiago, walk the distance and get 2 stamps from each town as you approach, then you are worthy of a certificate saying you completed the Camino de Santiago. This ruling makes the walking we are doing superfluous if our goal is entrance to heaven. However, if we just like walking, meeting people and seeing the Spanish countryside, we are meeting our own requirements and do so with enjoyment and satisfaction.

The bus dropped us off on the highway in San Martin de Camino about 9:30am and roared away down the road. This is about 3 and a half hours later than we usually get started. The sun is up, yet thankfully, the air is cool. It was 39º when we left our room this morning and has now risen to 48º, perfect for walking.

We had a bit of a scare this morning. Yesterday as we planned our ox cart diversion we were checking bus schedules and found a 9:00am bus that would take us to San Martin de Camino. This morning when I checked that same schedule, that bus did not show up. The first bus to San Martin was at 8:20pm. What?!? We considered how this would affect our plans and how we could adapt. Maybe take a taxi? Take the later bus? We decided to walk to the bus station as we had planned, to arrive there at about 7:30am and see if we could get on our 9:00am bus. We thought perhaps the website did not let you buy bus tickets without a 12 hour notice, or maybe the bus had been sold out and there were not seats available. First hand inspection of the situation seemed in order. 

The city was cold, quiet and dark as we walked across town on this chilly morning. We arrived and found no one was manning the ticket booths yet. We went to one of the ticket dispensing machines, entered our desired leave time and destination and “poof!” we acquired two tickets. Now we just had 80 minutes to kill before our ride. While sitting and sipping a Coke, we met Mike from Ireland and Tom from Ukraine, two older gentlemen riding the bus due to leg injuries. We saw Ed and John again, riding the bus due to injuries and a need to move the journey ahead as they were running out of time. In all, we saw 10 people we had met riding our same bus.  Good company.

From San Martin de Camino the way followed the highway for the first 4 miles. The road was busy this Saturday morning and we found the experience unpleasant. The path was adjacent to the highway and safe enough, but the noise was annoying.

Thankfully, the high temperature forecast was only 73º, and that temperature was not to be realized until 4 or 5 in the afternoon, otherwise our afternoon hike on gravel roads devoid of shade would have been unbearable.

I do have to say, we have had 10 marvelous days of fall hiking conditions and a forecast of 10 more coming up. Cool mornings, bright sunshine all day long, and for the most part comfortable walking all morning. Earlier on our trip the afternoons were unbearable hot, but now they are too warm for walking but enjoyable non the less.

Sally has created a mantra to guide her walking day, “Never pass up a red chair!”. We have noticed that nearly all outside seating at cafes and bars we pass have red chairs. When we see them, we are compelled to stop and have something to drink. It has proven to be a good way to travel. The towns come about every 3-6 miles, about perfect intervals to take a quick break. I still carry water, but I am beginning to wonder why. We consume nearly all our liquids for the day at these “red chair” stops. The thousands of Camino walkers keep these small towns alive. Without them, there is no income.

Our path took us through four towns today before we arrived at our destination, Astorga, a beautiful town accessed by a tough, steep climb of a few hundred feet off the plain below. At the top of the hill is a 146 bed albergue run by the city. These are called “municipal albergues”. The cities, years, decades or centuries ago realized that if they subsidized the housing of pilgrims, they would stop and spend their money in town. We stepped in the door and registered, as we have many nights before, for a bed each. The cost? 5€ each. It is so ludicrously cheap. This includes toilet facilities, showers, a kitchen to cook in and in this case a wonderful deck overlooking the plains. All are spotlessly clean. We love staying at the albergues because every night is like a family reunion. We meet all the people from the nights and days before, talk about the walk, share ideas and information and sometimes go out to dinner together. It makes the traveling fun.

As soon as we had our beds I slipped into my Teva’s (you take off your traveling shoes upon entering and put them in a designated spot to keep from tracking dirt all over the albergue) and walked to the supermarket to get lunch for tomorrow, this being a Saturday and not sure how late it would stay open. We didn’t arrive until about 5:30, so we were quite late. I found this small city enchanting. To get to the supermercado, I traversed three plazas linked together with wonderful shops and architecture. 

Groceries secured, we moved to the deck for soda and potato chip appetizer, then prepared to go out to dinner. We found Sandy and Regina, Karen and Tanya and realized this town had a famous Gaudi designed building (the Episcopal Palace) next to the town cathedral. We postponed going out to dinner to walk briskly across town to visit this famous building, but arrived about 15 minutes too late to gain admittance. We did, however, tour the cathedral and found it amazing. Many of the chapels have ornate alters 30 feet high or more, totally plated in gold. After seeing this fixation with gold in so many chapels we have visited and wondering how they could afford so much gold we came to realize we were looking at gold looted from the Aztecs and Incas.

Back on the street we headed to the grocery store to buy makings for a salad. As we had traversed the squares we realized it was Saturday night and some kind of celebration was happening and the cafes were full. Getting served dinner would be a time consuming affair. We purchase bagged lettuce, a preprepared salad with croutons, apples and such, tomatoes, avocado, carrot and olives and headed back to the albergue. We had a delightful dinner on the deck where we met Allison from Wisconsin. We also reconnected with Raquel who gave Sally a glass of wine.

Dinner done, we prepared our bags for slipping quietly out in the morning and crawled into bed about 9:45pm. Sally was instantly asleep. I found myself not sleepy and lay awake listening to other pilgrims slipping in from town and quietly getting to bed in the dark. About 11:00 I finally settled down and fell asleep.

We got away with hiking in the afternoon today, but just barely. The heat plays havoc with Sally. If not for the moderate high temps and cooling afternoon wind, we might have found ourselves in trouble. But, it worked well, and we are back on the Camino. 

Thomas, Mike and Sally getting on the “ox cart” in León. 

Driving the Camino 

Wonderful small Spanish towns

Red chair event

Trail side way station with fresh fruit. 

Municipal albergue in Astorga with statue outside

One of Astorga town plazas

Gold plated layers of Spain

Day 9 - Friday, September 6, 2019 - Zero day in León - Exploring Leon - 0.0 Miles - Total Miles to Date - 99.96

Leòn is an amazing city and today we planned to explore it. A kind of a Nero day. We got a pretty good look through it yesterday afternoon and liked what we saw. Today we got a chance to really explore. 

We were up and out late, about 9:30. The town was very quiet, like an American city on a Sunday morning at 6:30am. It was cold, about 40°. We walked up the street the Camino followed stopping for a pastry and a soda, then stopped at an outdoor shop that had just opened at 9:45 and bought Sally a sea shell necklace. The seashell is the symbol of the camino. It is silver.

We wandered around a bit, ending up at the cathedral again, then began a Rick Steves’ tour. This was not an audio tour, but a tour you read from his book. He led us to some of the highlights of the downtown area, which we enjoyed.

We stopped for lunch to get a hamburger, our first of the trip. Unfortunately, it was not made from ground round. It was some kind of processed meat. Sally did not care for it, so I ate the burger and she ate the fries that came with it.

We decided to follow the route of the Camino through town since we missed it coming into town, having rode the bus, and would miss it going out of town tomorrow as we planned to again ride the bus to the outskirts to avoid walking through the streets. We walked about a mile of the route through town, weaving in and out of the streets, hitting the major churches and the old pilgrim hostel first built in the 12th century.  It was gorgeous and amazing. After completing the walk through town following the Camino we weave and wove back through town on another route to our room and took a break. Sally took a nap. I performed my duties for a zero day and did absolutely nothing. Well, I wrote in my blog and wrote a Thomas the Truck story for Robby, but I didn’t get my butt out of bed for a good number of hours. 

For dinner we walked back to the cathedral and stopped at an Express grocery store and picked up groceries for a magnificent salad for dinner.  Back at our room we prepared the salad, then stepped out to the Plaza de Santa Maria to sit on the border/bench and eat. The food was as good as the atmosphere.

Dinner done, we called it a night and returned to our room.  What a wonderful city! Narrow streets. Wonderful people and shops. No traffic. Little tourism so not big crowds of tour groups.

The Camino de Santiago runs up this street. 


Sally looks over the shoulder of architect Guadi 



Typical marking on the street to show pilgrims the way

Day 8 - Thursday, September 5, 2019 - El Burgo Ranero to Mansilla to Leon - The walking is getting easier - 11.63 miles - Total Miles to Date - 99.96 miles

We are definitely getting stronger. Yesterday, Sally talked about how easy a day she had after walking 11.4 miles. Today, we did about the same and the result was the same.  We are talking about upping our distances just a bit. Of course, a few more miles tacked onto a day might might turn them from “easy” to “hard”.  We will find out going forward.

As in all adventures, iPhone apps play a big part. Up to now I have been relying on Guthook and Gaia to navigate, but two nights ago as we were talking with Gotfried, I noticed he was using a different app “Buen Camino”. I downloaded it and began playing around. It has some wonderful features to help us plan how far to walk and what is at the end for accommodations. Combining all three, along with Google Maps, has given us excellent tools to plan our days. We also use iBooks to access “Rick Steves’ Spain” and our guide to the Camino “Walking Guide to the Camino de Santiago” along with communication tools “WhatsApp”, “Messages”, “Mail” and “Google Translate”. As always, the phone is an indispensable tool.

Today we were up at 4:55am and downstairs by 5:05. In the kitchen, I reheated some soup from last night for my breakfast. I cut a nectarine for each of us and laid out two hard boiled eggs for Sally. As we prepared and ate, half a dozen pilgrims joined us in preparing to get underway. We were not particularly quick and it was 6:05 before we were out the door.

It was another spectacular morning. Stars. Cold temperatures. Quiet. Beautiful. We had a long stretch by Camino standards to the first town, 7 miles. We had over 4 done by the time the sun rose. The ground was flat but for a dip into, then out of small creeks every mile or so. The dips dropped about 70 feet over a quarter mile, rising at the same rate.

At 7 miles we entered Reliegos. A new albergue had been built on the outskirts of this Winlock sized town and we stopped from a morning Coke. We had considered going further into town for our morning repast, but it was a good thing we did not because this was the only stop on the route.

We only had about 4 miles left for the day and were both feeling great. As we walked we realized we really didn’t know the whole significance of this pilgrimage and maybe we should educate ourselves. As we walked along the path paralleling a highway I read about the history of Saint James. In short, he was one of Jesus’ first disciples, was beheaded by King Herod in Judah in 44AD and is the patron saint of pilgrimages and Spain. Because he came to the Iberian Peninsula and spread Christianity his body was carried back to Santiago and buried there. Early Christians were required to pilgrimage to the site of his body to earn admission to heaven. So this walk has been going on for much longer than 1000 years.

Although the early pilgrims had to walk the whole way, we have options. Today, we exercised one of those options. Rather than walk along a major highway  and then through suburbs and the busy city streets of Leon, we decided to bus from our destination city of the day, Mansilla de las Mulas into Leon and spend the night there. Since we usually finish walking before noon we reasoned that taking a bus after walking would give us the afternoon to explore the city and the legendary cathedral of Leon. Plus, we would catch up with all our friends. They said they were going to take an extra day in Leon to see it and rest, so we will be in step with them again.

About 11:00am we walked into Mansilla de las Mulas. Our bus did not leave until 1:49pm. With a couple hours, we headed to a restaurant for lunch, enjoying our typical 3 course meal (salad, chicken and flam) with wine for 11 euro. We sauntered back to the bus station about 1:00pm and researched the route ahead and made plans.

Right on time our bus arrived. For 3.60€ we rode 12 miles instead of walking and were soon at the bus station to the east of the historic downtown portion of Leòn. We walked the 1.0 miles across town to Plaza de Santa Maria where the albergue was, however we were planning to spend two nights in town and albergues only allow one night. We found the Hotel Pax next door and booked one of their pilgrim rooms for 60€ a night, a little more expensive than the 5€ albergue next door. But, private room with bed, sheets, blankets, shower and air conditioning suited us just fine for the zero day we plan to take tomorrow.

We had booked a room yesterday for 40€ a night, but as we rode into town on the bus we could see that it was nearly 2 miles from the center of old town and too far away from all the “action”. We cancelled it.

Once in our room we showered, then contacted Sandy and Regina to meet for dinner. They were agreeable, and we met in front of the Leon Cathedral. Before dinner we toured the cathedral, awestruck by the incredible stain glass windows, more that I have seen in any cathedral. The cathedral was built in 50 years by a town of only 5000 population. Where did they find the labor, money and time to create this marvel?

After our tour of the cathedral we picked an outdoor restaurant for dinner. It was Italian themed and the waitress soon arrived at our table (far removed from the restaurant) and apologized, saying she was the only waitress working. We said no problem, we were not in a hurry. She took our drink orders and was back quickly. I poured my Diet Coke into my glass, but it appeared to be flat. A few sips confirmed this. It took it back into the restaurant to get a new bottle. The waitress took it personally and came unglued on me. She tongue lashed me about it and finally stomped off, got a new bottle and showed me that this one fizzed. I thanked her and returned to the table.

When the waitress came to take our orders for food she laid a hand on my shoulder and apologized, saying she was under a lot of stress. We asked if we could help in any way. She said no and we continued with dinner. 

We had a great time catching up with Regina and Sandy. We sat for quite a few hours even though a fierce and chilly wind was blowing and I was in short sleeved shirt, shorts and sandals. When we finally departed, about 8:45, I was freezing. 

Leon is not a giant city, but it is a big one, population about 178,000. Yet, the old town core is fairly small. Regardless, we saw and got to talk with nearly everyone we have met on the trail. While at dinner we talked to Jim and Sara. As we walked back toward our room we saw Annamarie, and Andre, not to mention about 6-8 others. We had a great time. They are all leaving tomorrow morning and we are staying another day in town, so they will get a day ahead of us again. Or will they?  We plan to ride the bus out of town Saturday morning about 14 miles, then walk another 14 that day. This should put us in the middle of our “pack” again.

Once back in our room I took a hot shower in an attempt to get my body temperature back up. Once warm, I wrote a story for Robby and emailed it to Jeff, falling asleep a couple times in the process.  It finished, I fell asleep for good.

There are monuments and statues all along the path



Wide open prairies for 360°



Pop stop in Reliegos



Typical small Spanish town we walk through. Clean and beautiful. 









Sally crosses the river in León. 



On our way to our albergue we walk along the old city wall in León. 



León Cathedral stain glass. Spectacular and expansive. 


León Cathefral from the outside.