Burgos to Castrojeriz (40km)

This journal will now be in the voice of Chris, because he took over writing because Rachel is a slacker.

Sleeping was great since we only had maybe 4 hours of sleep in the last 30 hours. The only problem was all of the people partying until 5am and me wanting to go join them. That and the 3 guys that kept snoring and waking us up constantly. Ended up getting up around 6:30 because of the many inconsiderately loud peregrinos (pilgrims). There were also loudspeaker announcements wishing us good morning and giving us a countdown to 8am when we had to be gone from the alburgue. We are finally on the trail after days of travel to get here. Rachel has us down for hiking 36 kilometers today to Convento de San Anton, but wants to try to go another 4 km to Castrojerez so that the next day will be shorter (43.3 km). The countryside is very pleasant. Beautiful in its own way. It isn't wilderness hiking, but it is certainly enjoyable. We figured out that we can hike about 5km/hour. This is what we estimated at home, AWESOME!

We bust through 20km before we stop for lunch at Hornillos de Camino. We had to wait 30 minutes before we could get the "menu del dia". Rachel said that she thinks you might get more wine with this one than we got the night before with the menu de peregrino. We did get a whole bottle of wine and a 3 course meal for 19 Euros total. Fantastic! We also have an excellent conversation with an Italian guy that is around our age and an older guy from Holland. The guy from Holland says that he started from his front door and has been walking ever since. Crazy. I wis that I was him. He also said that he hasn't worked in 30 years. I really wish I was him. The Italian guy has hiked the Camino, or parts of it, the last 3 years. He had on a shirt with the Camino symbol on it and a tatoo with the symbol on his leg. He was a fast hiker as he passed us later on that day. He actually spent 3 months living in Roswell, GA in 2008. Small world. This was our first conversation with fellow Peregrinos in English. Also at lunch we met our first American. He was from Phoenix. He questioned us on why were were doing this. We told him because we wanted to see Spain and hike. Then he asked us again why and we told him because we wanted to. He then asked us again and Rachel had to spell it out that we were not religious pilgrims paying a penance or looking for an indulgence, but that we were merely secular pilgrims looking for a hiking trip to experience some culture.

We hike 10 more km and take a break at a bar in Hontanas.  Rachel got a coke.  While she was in the restroom I ordered a small beer and got charged 4.60 Euros!  Pretty sure that I got screwed (Rachel: yes, yes you did).  At least I got a stamp.  Better yet, I ordered on my own.  First time yet.  We probably should have stopped here but we pushed on.  We got to Convento de San Anton.  The guide book listed it as being partially outdoors.  That mean basically it is like an Appalachian Trail shelter.  There are cubbies of rooms in the ruins.  We would have frozen here if we stayed.  The bags we brought can't handle the 40 F nights.  We pushed on to Castrojeriz.  Rachel was hating the last 4km, but we made it at 7pm.  The first two places to stay that we tried were "completo".  Rachel nearly had a meltdown, but we backtracked about 1km to an alburgue at a campground.  It is a big metal barn with bunks.  Nice, good showers and bathrooms.

We try to find the supermercado and finally do at 7:59.  They close at 8.  We grabbed some bannas and donuts for breakfast and a bottle of vino tinto to cap off the evening.  Total cost was 3.04 Euros.  The wine was only 0.87 Euros.  And it was good too.  We watched a little soccer in the bar at the campground.  Barcelona won.  We split a chorizo bocadillo.  Not too bad.  We hand washed some laundry in the laundry sinks and hung it out to dry.  It probably won't.  We showered and then went to bed for our next day which is supposed to be 44.3 km.

Rachel:  Chris says he doesn't remember this, but in the middle of the night a woman came over and woke him up because he was snoring.  She woke me up too because she was shaking the bunkbed that we were sleeping in.  She told him that he was keeping everyone up.  I was too groggy to react, but it was pretty funny in hindsight.