El Camino de Santiago - 2017

Day 3: Cirueña to Grañon

3rd morning picture just west of Cirueña
Location in Google Maps

Michelle wrote:
09 Sept. Saturday
We had a breakfast of toast and Cola Cao (served by the hostess) and got on the road at 8:00 am. It was overcast with some light rain, but nice and cool. 









The walk was an easy 5.8 km into Santo Domingo de Calzada with fields all around.  We think they might be potato fields because we passed a potato packing plant on our way into town.  

Breakfast in Sto. Domingo.
Fresh squeezed orange juice and
Finally: REAL CHOCOLATE

We stopped for a snack and had our first real chocolate on the Camino this year.  Then we had to stop in a shop for pilgrims (Planeta Agua) and Curtis finally bought some flip flops!  It is very helpful to be able to get your feet out of boots or shoes and into sandals or flip flops at the end of a day of walking.  They can air out and spread out and relax.  

It was a nice walk 6 or 7 km walk between fields to Grañon.  The light rain was on and off and so were our ponchos.  

The San Juan Bautista albergue is very unique.  It is attached (literally) to the church and is a minimalist experience.  It is all stone and wood and very cool.  

We are sleeping in a loft on a 2½” pad on the floor with 10 other people.  



There were other rooms downstairs that had the sleeping pads.  A total of 48 people spent the night there.  There was one shower & toilet for the women and one shower & toilet for the men, plus one more toilet for all of us.  It was interesting.

Laundry room

There was a large room with tables to sit at and write, read or visit.  While I was writing in my journal, a young man was playing a guitar and it made it peaceful and relaxing while so many people were around.  The laundry room was at the top of the church!  There was a door in the loft that opened up into a room with a stone/concrete floor that must have been above part of the chapel.  There was a sink for hand washing and lines strung up for drying the clothes.  If it was a sunny day, there was a clothesline in an empty lot about a block away that pilgrims could use to dry their clothes.  Definitely one of the coolest laundry rooms I’ve ever seen.

Curtis was able to make himself valuable as a translator for the albergue volunteer that didn’t speak English.  The other volunteers were out and she was trying to help everyone check in and get settled. He even helped check people in when they arrived.  I hardly saw him all afternoon and early evening.  

At 6:00 pm, those who wanted to were able to help prepare the communal meal.  Mass was at 7:00 pm and dinner at 8:00 pm.   We attended the mass so we could enjoy the whole pilgrim experience and out of respect for our hosts.  At the end of the mass the priest had all of the pilgrims come in front of the altar and he gave us a special pilgrim blessing.  

Dinner was very crowded with all 48 of us.  It was fun to see everyone talking and laughing.  Most of the pilgrims were Italians, but we some Swedes and Hungarians, too.  There were only 3 or 4 Americans.

Choir loft where we listened to some
beautiful guitar music and shared our
thoughts after dinner.

After dinner they took the pilgrims to the choir loft of the church.  One of the volunteers played the guitar and they had a single candle lit.  Everyone sat in the choir chairs or on the floor.  The host spoke in Spanish, Curtis translated what he said into English, and another pilgrim translated what Curtis said into Italian.  It was quite a process, but almost everyone should have been able to understand one of them!  They passed the candle around to everyone in the room and asked them to tell why they chose to come on the Camino, or share some kind of uplifting thought in words or music.  It was really very moving and reminded me a lot of the campfire testimony meetings at girl’s camp.  It created a loving atmosphere for those who attended.  Most of the albergues that we have stayed in do not go to that much effort to create a special bonding experience for the pilgrims. The volunteers feel a great love for the service they are giving and the pilgrims feel it! How they do it day after day, 7 days a week, I do not know, but they do!

Michelle waves from the dinig room / lounge of the alberque San Juan Bautista, in Grañon

Curtis writes:
The day started out rainy. But the dry land surely needs it. It's still beautiful.
Like the day before, we spent the night in a small town and walked through the bigger towns without seeing much of the sites in that town. This is the bridge on the way out of Santo Domingo de la Calzada. I don't think this bridge is ancient, but it's certainly designed for a wetter era.

Bridge over the Rio Oja that flows down from Sierra de la Demanda and gives the region its name: Rioja

We spent the night in an albergue that is part of the cathedral in Grañon: Albergue San Juan Bautista.
It is a "donations only" place. Everybody pays what they can. There are no beds, only mats on the floor. But it is a very popular spot. There were more than 45 guests there that night. At 7:00pm all were invited to attend mass, and then at 8:00pm we had a communal dinner. By ‘communal’ it’s understood that everyone shares.  Only one big salad is made, one big pot of soup, etc. After that, there is singing and then lights out at 10:30pm.  When we got here, relatively early in the day, there were already 4 guests before us.  About the time we arrived, three of the four people in charge went shopping for the evening meal.  The remaining volunteer did not speak very much english, so she relied heavily on me to translate.

The instructions for the arriving guests were simple:

1. Leave your boots at the window as you come up the stairs, and your poles too.
2. Sign in with first name, last name, nationality, where you started the Camino and where you started this morning.
3. This is a donations only albergue; the collection box is there.
4. There are 2 and a half baths.  Women’s bath on the left, men’s on the right and the half bath is off the stairs one floor down.
5. The kitchen is not communal - only the hospitaleros will be working in there.
6. The laundry is upstairs in the attic over the church.  If the clothesline in the attic is full, we have access to a clothesline in a lot across the square and around the corner.
7. The password for wi-fi is shown there.

The picture above was taken early in the evening, showing the loft where we slept (in the far back corner), the kitchen and showers are below the loft, on the left of this picture and the reception is on the right. The view from the loft is shown below.

View of the lounge area from the loft where we slept

Same view, but prepared for dinner

The view from our corner of the loft.

• 22 of the guests were from Italy
• 4 from USA
• 3 from France
• 3 from Sweden
• 2 from Hungary (Alex and Erik, twins on bikes who had covered ground that day that took us 4 days)

And 1 from each of the following:

• Mexico
• Germany
• Bulgaria
• Brazil
• Holland
• Portugal
• Denmark
• Spain
• Estonia
• Latvia
• New Zealand

Michelle signing the register at
Albergue San Juan Bautista in Grañon

The approach to Grañon.  The trees at the end of the road in this image
shelter the water fountain in the image below.

Looking back at the road from Santo Domingo.
The grass, the bench, the water, the shade: great spot for a pilgrim on a hot day.

The walk from Santo Domingo to Grañon was unique in that we happened to be walking with a large group of kids walking with a few adults.  I assumed it was a school group, but Michelle pointed out that it was Saturday.  One of the adults towards the front of the group was telling some of the boys walking near him about legends in history.  I wanted to keep pace with them and listen too.  They were talking about Marathon when I first heard him.  But I also needed to keep pace with Michelle.  That girl sets a pace and just goes.  It's hard for her to stop and start.  So I had to leave the history lesson behind for awhile.  Eventually they caught up with us again and the professor was several centuries further along and still facinating to listen to.  I just realize that the effort to translate what he was saying made it difficult for Michelle, hence she walked on.

View of the Camind de Santiago as it leaves Grañon

Every evening on the Camino needs to include the activities necessary to be prepared for the next day.  In Ventosa, we learned to scout out the path leaving town while there's still light.

And on this particular day we had to make sure we knew where to catch the bus the next morning (Sunday) to get back to Logroño for Church.  We asked at the first bar, but the owners were new to the town and they did not have an answer.  Later, as we were walking from the park, we came across a lady watching people pass by from her upstairs window.  We asked her and got the answer we needed.  The bus does not go through the town.  There's a shelter just off the freeway where the bus will stop.

If you need a bus in the area of Logroño (between Burgo and Zaragoza), I recommend Autobuses Jimenez

We bought tickets online each time we rode the bus.  It turns out that is rare.  Most people pay the fare when they board.