Place

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I did begin this series of blogs by saying that I wouldn´t be talking at length about where I was and how it was great, gnah gnah gnah, but if you believed that for a minute, I´ve got a bridge I´d like to sell you...

Yesterday I arrived in Burgos. I´d walked 35 Kms for the past two days to get here and had been told that all I needed to do was get to the tourist office and they could arrange a hotel room for me. It was a warm day and I was tired and it was 3.00 in the arvo. I´d been walking since about 6.00 am. I was done. The first tourist office was closed and looked as though it was kinda for the region around Burgos, not the city itself. That´s OK, I thought, the other one is marked on the map and there´s a sign over there (imagine me pointing at the sign over there) and it will probably not be closed. Well I ended up having to go into the cathedral sales office and asking where the tourist office was - anyone who´s ever travelled with me know how much I love asking for directions. The lady behind the counter was very helpful in pointing me to the hole, at the end of which in a darkened section, there was a small sign indicating the tourist office. But it was closed until four thirty, she regretfully informed me. So I sat and waited, debating whether I should just go and try my luck at one of the nearby hotels and see how it went. No, it´s fiesta and I don´t know what I´m doing, I´ll leave it to the experts at 4.30, which eventually rolled around (at 4.30)

The very helpful lady at the tourist office gave me a map and some names of hotels. I went straight to the hotel I´d been eyeing off and booked in at a rate I was OK with and went to bed - trying hard not to think of the hour and a half I´d wasted...

To say at this point that I had a negative view of Burgos would be an understatement to rival... bugger I can´t be bothered with a metapor so insert your own and understand that I was not happy. But 10 hours of sleep and a shower that may have been the second greatest experience of my life (so many nozzles!!!!), induced me to give Burgos another chance. It feels very different to Pamplona, a bit more restrained but the cathedral was amazing. Big, ornate and gothic but also spare - it´s a very interesting contrast to the rest of the city but it also fits right in.

And so here´s the thing - part of the city being able to resurrect itself after a hot day in the sun and the world´s worst tourist office, was the aesthetic pleasure to be gained from the place. The location WAS the message to bastardise Marshall McLuan in a way I´m sure he would not approve of.

Oh, I think I might absorb a few cliches tonight and go to the bullfight too...

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