Walking Day 9 Laredo to Guemes
28.5 km. 7 hrs. 314 elevation gained.
Hotel el Cortijo on the sand bar peninsula was a perfect location to start today's walk. Coffee and toast at 7:00 and just before we left it started pouring so we had a dry place to put on all are rain gear and head to the end of the peninsula , about 5k to catch the 9:00 Santona ferry. It just pulls up on the steep beach and drops a ramp down.
From Santona we opted to go around one mountain and take a shorter flatter alternate route as Al has been having to deal with a progressively painful shin splint. It reminds him of his younger running days.
So today the rain was on and off till about noon. Love my gaiters that kept all the water out of my boots.
The route was mostly country roads over rolling farm land. Lots of Holstein cows and big work horses. A young man was moving a couple horses from a field with a harness on one of them but let the other one run free into town on the street. One happy horse. Little lands being harassed by a cat. Running up one road.
Albergue de Peregrinos, Guemes is amazing, noted to be the best one on the way. When we arrived around 3:30 we were greeted outside with a cool glass of water and a basket of cookies. It has 60 spaces and we counted over 40 pilgrims from all different countries. England, Holland, France, South Africa, Chek, Germany and Spain to name a few. A 78 year old Priest Ernesto Bustio is quite the character. He was born in the main house and his grand parents raised 15 children here. We had a great group meeting and group dinner of truly delicious bean soup, potato chorizo stew, bread and wine plus fruit for desert. Our room is like a little cabin with 4 bunks and our own shower and toilet.
The lesson tonight included his philosophy of the camino, personal responsibility for ourselves, ecology and others, freeing ourselves to learn from life's universities. "Or something like that". He had taken a 27 month sabbatical 36 years ago and traveled the world in a Land Rover camper and started this Alberque about 19 years ago and it is now a collective.
No comments:
Post a Comment