Walking the Camino to Santiago de Compostela: Day 14

Day 14 - Monday, 5th May, 2014 - 19.5 km

[Local shop warnings about coming in with bare feet!]

[Grazing sheep - Atapuerca]

[Park by river on way to Burgos]

We set off in very good time because we knew that there would be a good number of fellow Caminoers heading for Burgos. The day's journey, which was just under 20 km, was spent by me last year 90% on roads and passing through urban areas, ending with a 10 km hike along straight dual carriageway straight into the old part of the City of Burgos. This year we planned it differently following our noses over the hills, sometimes off the prescribed route, until we dropped down to a motorway bridge just before Burgos Airport. Burgos Airport is one of the many Spanish white elephant airports which is rarely used. We headed round to the South side of the airport rather than the North way, which I had done last year and we eventually connected to a river and walked beside it the whole way through parkland ending just before one of the old gates by the Cathedral, our destination.

The Municipal Alburgue there is very modern and comfortable and we queued up with others as it had just opened for business, keen to get one of the 160 beds available. So we secured a very comfortable nights sleep for 5 Euros and met up with many familiar faces doing the same.

This ends the largest third part of the journey to Santiago and starts the hot flat plain land called the Meseta, which we will start tomorrow. Hopefully the crowd bottleneck will be over because many people stay for a couple of nights here to rest and recover and sightsee. It is also the end of the Spanish 4 day holiday. My ribs are still very sore from my fall last week and I hope I haven't cracked a rib. Getting on and off top bunks is still a bit painful!

We fed ourselves up and tried the local delicacy - Morcilla, a slightly upmarket black pudding. While drinking before our evening meal we got into conversation with a couple, Julie and Keith, who were also a Brother and Sister in law team walking the whole Camino. Other people had told us about them, so we were amused to finally meet.

Buen Camino.