I didn't have an internet connection last night, so I missed uploading this blog..... El Cid’s Burgos Our day in Burgos began with breakfast again, and once again it was the classic European fare full of meats, cheeses and fruits with a croissant thrown in. Scrambled eggs, of course. All of the hotels have a curious way of cooking our style of bacon. They don’t. It’s very limp, almost like it was boiled, not broiled. There haven’t been many takers. The European “bacon” is actually thinly sliced ham that has been salted for preservation. It’s more like prosciutto that is found [View Full Entry]

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On the Road to Burgos Early Sunday morning, after another European breakfast, we boarded our bus for the ride out of town out into the countryside and eventually Burgos in the north. We had three stops on our journey north. The rolling hills of Spain are quite beautiful. Bill Zaccone likens the area to eastern Oregon. The winds blow low over the hills, and we passed many groupings of windmills. They weren’t the type that Don Quixote tilted towards. Rather, they were the more modern version. Spain has developed extensive use of wind and nuclear power. Our first stop about 45 [View Full Entry]

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Today on our way to Lourdes we stopped at the French seaside town, Biarritz. Unfortunately the weather wasn´t great but mum and I still enjoyed ourselves. We went for a walk along the beach and seaside for a bit before heading back to the meeting point where we grabbed some lunch. We got to Burgos at about 5pm and were dropped off at the Plaza that housed a huge cathedral. Mum and I didnt go in. Again we just walked around for a bit, bought some stamps and grabbed a drink before we were picked up to go back to the [View Full Entry]

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Having delightfully avoided hearing or reading any news since we started we were not overly sure about the odds on Spain's fantastic footballing triumph last night. Our money was most definately on a German win but the Spanish nation seemed very confident and their footballers even more so. What was more surprising was the celebrations and post match feel good factor. Both were rather lacking. During the game we out paced the locals with the consumption of our three modest beers. The Spaniards who we watched the game with seemed to lose interest in any alcohol for the duration of the [View Full Entry]

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There is a rather significant football match for our Spanish hosts tomorrow evening. Currently a warm up game going on over our tent. Excitment is high and expectation even higher. We are staying put in the moderately sized town of Sahagun for the big game as it feels the best place to watch the Spanish emotions in full flow. During our year in the Spanish speaking world achieving decent fluency in their language is one of the primary objectives. Today showed signs of a solid start to this endeavour. Building on our smooth conversational exchange about the finer points of our [View Full Entry]

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Our host finally returning and revealing an additional room for our nights stay in Hornillos (last blog entry) seems now long in the past although only four days ago. Since our departure from Burgos Castile y Leon has opened up into a place of expansive gently rolling valleys covered with a gigantic patchwork of intensive crop farming. The mild undulation means that it frequently feels like we are walking to the edge of a huge plateau. Each time we seem to reach its end another new expanse opens up before us. Spain now looks a vaste land. Todays walk gave us [View Full Entry]

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Burgos was a shock to the system. We were caught off guard. Not off guard in the sense that we didn't know we were about to go through the biggest city of the Camino so far but off guard because we were so unprepared to enter back into the chaos of an urban jungle. Having walked from hamlets-to-villages and villages-to-small towns the past few weeks with the daily mission to arrive at our destination and then find food and a place to sleep life becomes simple, relaxing and rewarding. The momentum of a city in full flow did not fit with [View Full Entry]

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We have been somewhat surprised by our seemingly rapid progress. We have left Rioja behind us with it´s endless vines. Yesterday morning crossing into Castille y Leon province. We drank our way through several bottles of Rioja whilst in the region, of course only to heighten our cultural integration. By focussing our attention on an increasingly prudent application of the daily budget we were able to invest the evening´s remaining Euros in ever superior bottles of the region´s world famous export. Unfortunately, we didn´t quite hit the Gran Reservas. Although good wine provides more satisfaction than food you still need to [View Full Entry]

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17.Juni Tirsdag Først og fremst, så hadde verken Andrebo eller jeg sovet særlig mye før vi dro, Andrebo 1 time og jeg 3... så vi var ganske trøtte til og begynne med... Fløy til Nederland(sciphol) så til Madrid... turen gikk veldig bra.. når vi ikke sov så satt vi å hadde lattis... fikk tilogmed gratis drikke og mat på flyturen(KLM).. Landet i Madrid... bilen vi hadde bestil av Avis var av en eller anna mystisk grunn blitt avbestilt uten at vi hadde fått vite ne som helst.. så de kunne ikke hjelpe oss... men Andreas, som den initativrike personen han er, [View Full Entry]

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18.Juni Onsdag Vi kom oss ikke opp før litt utpå dagen, delvis fordi vi var så grise trøtte, men også fordi spanjolene har en fin oppfinnelse som heter persienner... og når jeg sier persienner så tenker sikkert dere "men det har jo vi også her i norge, jeg kjøpte det jo på ikea..." Feil! Persiennene her ser mere ut som gittere du ruller ned over kiosk vinduet om kvelden før man stenger... Det blir total mørkelagt invending.. og jeg mener totalt.. så vi trodde jo det var tidlig ennu, men ja... så når vi kom oss opp så var det [View Full Entry]

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