Day 22 - Leon to Hospital de Orbigo

 

It's hard to find words to describe today. Long straight roads without corners. Withering heat with no breeze, giving way later in the day to hot winds. Kilometre after kilometre with brain in neutral.

My trusty watch, usually tells us how far we've gone and how fast we're going, then later downloads to create that pretty Relive video each day. After nine hours and two minutes and 34km, it ran out of battery. We walked for another hour, so four kilometres more for a total of 38km and 10 hours of walking, although we had several stops - the last one at about 32km lasted more than half an hour.

Those are the statistics. Needless to say, there was a fair amount of zombie-like walking, although we always keep up a steady speed. We feel good about ourselves, even though we're knackered. Cathie is asleep and it's only beer keeping me awake.

The distance between Leon and Astorga is about 50km. The first half along the main route is long and boring and follows a highway. An alternative route gets away from the highway, but adds extra kilometres. Because the hotels near the halfway point are crap, our itinerary for those two days provided for a first day estimated at about 32km and a second of just over 16km. In rural towns, hostels and bars have a habit of painting out the yellow arrows that mark the route and adding their own to take you past their door, so that added a little more.

We set our alarm for 5am and were on the road by 5.40am. As we left town, pharmacy clocks were showing about 20 degrees (although one had 25) - it didn't augur well. We made good time, clocking up 5km in an hour before we stopped for our first coffee on the outskirts of town. That was the way of the day, an hour or two of walking and then a break. A coffee here, a little picnic there.

At one stage we sat on a rock and knocked back a gazpacho. These little tetra packs have become a regular comfort food. To step back a bit, in Leon we had a fridge that didn't work, so we bought some ice to cool things down. I filled a ziplock bag with ice and put it in my pack along with bread, cheese, ham, chocolate, mustard, butter and tomatoes.

The road rolled on.

At another of our stops we made huge sandwiches. Sadly the ziplock bag had a small hole, so after that I had a regular flood of cold water dripping down the back of my legs and we had to abandon the bag, leaving a small bottle of ice, which later nearly came to the boil - it was nice while it lasted.

It took a long time to escape Leon. After about 7km we reached the point where the alternative route veered off to the left.

At first the land was scrubby, not much good for anything but rabbits.

It gave way to more cultivated areas with intensive grain farming.

It was a hazy day. Not quite sun, not quite cloud, with the sky in the distance looking as if it wanted to rain, or thunder, or do something. But it just sat there, looking sullen.

The surfaces were good - gravel surfaces giving way to paved country roads, so although we weren't walking beside busy highways, we were still walking on roads, in the construction of which they'd forgotten to add corners.

As the temperature rose above 30 degrees we plodded along shadeless roads for endless kilometres.

There's not much else to report. We couldn't believe how long the road was - and how straight.

Somewhere about 32km we stopped at a small town, completely crushed. We had a couple of beers which, believe it or not, is quite out of character before the day is done.

Look behind us - you'll see the many arches of the bridge.

Eventually, we staggered in to Puente de Orbigo, which is a very famous place. 

Although I'm dropping, I'll try to tell this tale quickly. The bridge dates from the 13th century and was built over an earlier Roman bridge. 

A noble knight from Leon, Don Suero de Quinones, scorned by a beautiful lady, threw down the gauntlet to any knight who dared to pass as he undertook to defend the bridge (and his honour) against all comers. Knights from all over Europe took up the challenge. Having knocked over 300 challenges, he took his mates to Santiago to give thanks for the freedom from his bonds of love and for his honour - now restored (poor benighted fool).

We're in our room, dazed and confused.

As a footnote, we've just seen a heat warning advising pilgrims in our area not to walk between 11am and 8pm because of extreme heat and dubious atmospheric conditions. We're up for breakfast at 6.30am and hope to cover tomorrow's 16km by 11am. Just had a great dinner - it's 8.30pm, and so to bed.

We both have something like 52,000 steps on our phones - a record for both of us.

Here's the Relive app - until the watch ran out of battery. Note the long straights in the second half: https://www.relive.cc/view/vZqNxwNLA3O

Here's today's photos: https://photos.app.goo.gl/cvXjMUpaqS75kFED8

As for music. Something that just goes on, and on, and on: https://youtu.be/ci3OyvBvWnQ