El Camino de Santiago - 2017

Day 5: Viloria de Rioja to Villafranca Montes de Oca

Michelle wrote:
11 Sept.   Monday

Leaving Acacio and Orietta's place

We left Viloria de Rioja around 8:00 am and walked almost 20 km through gently rolling hills with big fields separated by trees or bushes.  It was overcast and cool, but we were walking into the wind, which was tiring.  
 We saw 2 deer or antelope gracefully leaping through a field, the first wild animals we have seen on the camino this year.  

The villages we walked through were not very memorable, sadly.  But the vistas made up for that.  There are more forest covered hills in this area than we’ve seen since leaving the Pyrenees.  We passed some interesting looking caves up on the rocky hillsides.  Curtis made up a story that sounded very much like a Louis L’Amour book.  It was a fun way to pass the time.  

Wide open fields as we leave Viloria de Rioja

Arriving at San Anton Abad albergue/hotel at 1:58pm.

We made it to the pretty little town of Villafranca Montes de Oca and stayed in a nice albergue that is part of a very nice hotel, San Anton Abad, set up on the side of a hill.  The church is across the road.  The streets are narrow in this town and the semi trucks come whizzing by without slowing down.  There is no sidewalk either.  It makes for an exciting walk around town!  

We ate a nice dinner at the restaurant in the hotel.  I think I make a better flan, but their rice pudding (arroz con leche) beats mine by a long shot! We got a private double room with a private bathroom.  It was great to have some privacy – but it comes at a higher price!  We slept well in our private room and didn’t even hear the church bell ring every ½ hour!
We heard about Hurricane Irma heading towards Atlanta but were not too worried about the affect it would have on Atlanta.  Having access to news via the internet helped a lot with the worrying and being able to contact Matt and Clarissa.  

At one time, all these hills were forested.  I was glad to be able to get a picture of one of the last trees.

Our destination, Villafranca Montes de Oca is on the left in this picture.
Link to this spot in Google Maps

Curtis writes:
The cloud cover on this day was much appreciated.  The Camino is well maintained in this section, meaning the gravel road is better to walk on than the trails where the soil has eroded away leaving only rounded stones that give tender feet much grief.

Michelle was not much impressed with the towns and villages we passed through this day, but you must forgive her for writing her journal when she was tired.  True: the parts of town that we walked through may not have been the most interesting.  But I've gone back to Belorado where we stopped had ate a small snack at Bar Eterno, using Google, and I noticed that Google Maps has much better memories than I do.  I particularly like the town square in Belorado, which, sadly we did not walk through.  Check out the street view at this point.  Belorado Town Square

I think next time we go through this part, maybe I'll stay in Belorado.

Leaving town we were passed by a three-some from Japan.  I don't remember coming across anyone else from Japan.  Thinking about where people come from to walk the Camino, we met people from  Europe and North & South America, from the Pacific rim countries of S. Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, but nobody from India, China, Mongolia, Russia, the Middle East (including Israel), or Africa.  It would really be surprising to see a Moslem on this trail because the history of the trail is heavily entertwined with the removal of the Moors from Spain.  Acacio, our host the night before, was looking forward to the day when Moslems would enjoy hiking the trail too, but his perspective was that the trail existed long before Christianity reached Spain.

The highway, N-120 goes right through Villafranca Montes de Oca without a single stop light.  The only thing that slows the trucks down as they zip through town, is a sharp corner at the entrance.  My pictures did not do it justice, so I give credit to Google Maps for these:

Entrance to Villafranca Montes de Oca

The narrow space between the buildings is shared by N-120 and the
Camino de Santiago as evidenced by the blue sign with the yellow arrow and shell icon.

Once you get away from the highway, the town is relatively nice.  I like how people find way to add color and life to the stone walls and cobbled streets.

Having a private bathroom with 2 sinks, we decided to wash our clothes without using a machine.  The clothes line at this albergue was substantial - but not enough.  There were a lot of rooms with a lot of bunks.  This is the first occasion I was glad we brought a short section of line to hang our clothes on.  We also brought our own clips.  I picked up some compact clips at Hobby Lobby the day before we left Atlanta.  We used those every night.

After doing the laundry, we went searching for a store where we could buy snack to hold is over until dinner and also snacks for the trail the next day.  Our search was in vain because everything is closed from 2:00 to 5:00.  So at 5:00 the store that was 5 steps from N-120 opened and we joined a plethora of pilgrims looking for food.  At 7:00 (not a minute before) the Hotel Restaurant opened.  We enjoyed a nice meal there with a fine dessert (not yogurt).  After dinner, we gathered our clothes off the line, and collected our section of line and clips.  Then it was time to write in Facebook, in Whatsup and send an email to my mother and youngest brother.  And just like tonight, I end up writing slower (or longer) than I should and I get a short night or late start tomorrow. 

View from our window looking northeast

View from our window looking West
Yes, the bell was used regularly