It was an up and down stage today - literally. Altogether there were five significant climbs and descents. And by significant, I mean over 100 metres of altitude gain and loss. It’s not as much as some days in the foothills of the Pyrénées but more than enough to get the blood pumping and the lungs puffing.
The climbing started as I walked out the door of the albergue and that final climb of the day took me pretty much to the door of place I be am staying tonight, which is really between villages.
Towards the top of the first climb, the path led right through the gate of a huge Cistercian monastery.
The grounds and buildings were beautifully kept and it had a calm peaceful sense. I met a couple of pilgrims that stayed there and apparently they practice the seven hours of prayer. Like most of the monasteries in most countries in the world, the number of monks or nuns is shrinking and ageing. I wonder how much longer this place will look like this.
And then it was back into the forest, through groves of pine, oak, birch and chestnut, along with a fair share of blackberry and stinging nettle.
Someone had done a lot of work on the track in this section, there must have been two hundred and fifty steps made in treated pine.
Who knows about these things??!!
In the floor of each valley there were delightful stretches of track winding beside small streams. More of this, please?
After about twenty kilometres of walking the famous or infamous town Gernika came into view. On April 26, 1937, Gernika was bombed by Nazi Germany’s Cindor Legion and Fascist Italy’s Aviazone Legioaria. The attack inspired Pablo Picasso’s painting Gernika, depicting the carnage of the attack. I have seen the original in the Museo Reina Sophía (in Madrid) and it is chilling.
I had this in mind as I walking into the town so it was somewhat disorienting to come across a bright and really bustling city centre with umbrellas everywhere and hundreds of people sitting enjoying coffee, beer, wine and pintxos.
I spent some time sitting in the town and then walked on - up and up to the albergue where I a have paused for the night.
Here this evening we will share a meal - German, Italian, Irish, Hungarian, South African, Spanish (Basque and Catalan), Swedish, Dutch and Australian - pilgrims together.
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Tomorrow, I hope to walk into Bilbao, which marks the end of the first of five sections of the Camino del Norte.
The weather has been good for this first section and as I write, the sun is still shining, hopefully, at least partially drying my poorly hand washed gear.
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