The receptionist was charming and took my case to the outside shed for storage. She seemed thrilled to be welcoming everyone in every language and being Competant at all of them. Needless to say I am on the fourth floor gin but there is an ascenseur. Every time I hear that word I visualise my daughter repeating me on arrival for a short skiing break to Chamonix. I had asked the French lady,”Avez vous un ascenseur? Of course they didn’t. This was rural France, they didn’t have matching door knobs on the wardrobe. But I can hear Natalie repeating it behind me as we dragged everything up 4 flights of stairs. I still laugh about it now, but this is Puente La Reina in Northern Spain. Of course they have an ascenseur!!!
The funny thing about dinner was that it was a buffet, not like a car very but stations serving first,second third and fourth courses. Of course with this choice I wanted to try everything, a bottle of wine included….too good to be true. Don’t Europeans love their sausages…any way for 13 euros I was satiated.
Breakfast brought the usual routine, make sure the case is down, have the backpack with everything you need and make your lunch from everything on offer. Not much of a change really as it is always a ham and cheese baguette!
And then the marathon walk!!!….having said that, there is nothing that can distract from plodding into a hilltop medieval village where the only cafe has a tattooed and be-ringed Goth serve you happily. We finish the 15 mile walk only to find we have to walk another 45 minutes to some ‘hotel’ in the industrial area. It so far away from the Camino that we have to be bussed back the next morning at the earthly hour of 7am.!! I don’t complain but what struck me was a lovely Swiss guy and his wife who sat at dinner and said how the wine was awful….but he didn’t care? It was not what he expected or liked but it was fine? Was it? Why didn’t he change it? The over-worked waitress tells him that it has won awards but he is not convinced. He was such a happy sort but my head flipped back to tall American Dawn who is doing this trip with nor forward reservations at all, she takes pot luck with any hostel if there is room…she is doing it because she lost her 44 year old son in an automobile accident last year. She said she wanted to die but couldn’t because she had an older son…so she was walking for him and was going to meet the older son in Compostela. I meet her along the way several times and she is so full of smiles.
I get to Estella