My Camino de Santiago (Cannibals and Pinchos)

A few of my fellow Peregrinos woke up with hangovers as a result of last nights partying, I however somehow managed to avoid one. In fact I was feeling really bright and breezy, my stomach was completely back to normal (that cheap Rioja wine will cure anything), I even managed to eat a typical Spanish breakfast of sweet cakes, croissant and cafe con leche.

We were heading for Burgos, the first sizable city since Pamplona where I intended to take my first rest day and do a little sight seeing. Today the weather had warmed up a little as I set off in company with Pablo and Lucy (still protecting their identities). We kind of dawdled as Pablo's leg was playing up again as a result of an earlier muscle strain.

After a few kilometres we passed through the small Pueblo of Atapuerca with it's archaeological park which was designated a Unesco World Heritage site in the year 2000. The remains of the earliest human being ever discovered in europe were found in a cave here while they were digging a rail line to a nearby mine. They are believed to be 900,000 years old and the ongoing dig has revealed that people were living here up to 1,000,000 year ago. The site has also revealed that our earliest ancestors were cannibals, even today there are very few vegetarians in Spain (no connection, I'm sure). Unfortunately we were unable to visit the site or museum as they were both closed at this time in the morning.

Once through Atapuerca the path led us up hill past a military training area to a small flat plain on which we came across a large wooden cross and the love circles, another one of the unofficial icons of the Camino Frances. A few years ago some unknown person started making a concentric circle out of the stones which litter this hill side. Over the years passing pilgrims have added to it, so that now it is quite large. Somebody has also created a love heart out of the stones as well. Just over the crest of the hill we got our first view of Burgos a few kilometres away in the distance.

The route into Burgos led us through some sleepy villages. We had to vacate one of them in a bit of hurry after Pablo pulled on a rope running up the outside of the small chapel. The rope was connected to the bell which started to ring exceedingly loudly, bringing locals out of their houses to see what was happening. We were laughing like a bunch of naughty school children as we ran away, luckily no harm was done.

 Some time later we came to the perimeter fence of the airport. We followed this fence along a muddy track into an industrial zone on the outskirts of the city until we came to the suburbs. The quickest way into the city was by following a busy main road choked with heavy traffic. As we didn't fancy breathing in all the exhaust fumes we crossed the road and walked through a small housing estate where we discovered a path that followed the river into the city centre.

Pablo spotted a sign for 'MacDonalds' as we entered the old city so left us and went in search of a Big Mac meal. Lucy and I carried on and booked into the municipal albergue which was located very close to the Cathedral. We met up with some of our friends who invited us to a pilgrims mass at the Cathedral later in the evening. First however we went in search of some local food and were lucky enough to find a small bar selling excellent pinchos (not tapas) and decent wine at a reasonable price, this is much better than a Maccy D's meal.