Day 6 - Puente La Reina - Estella - 7 September, 2014

Time Departed: 8.00am
Time Arrived: 2.00pm
Distance: 22kms
Cumulative Distance: 115kms
Percentage Completed: 14.3%
Weather: Hazy, Sunny and Hot.
Accommodation: Hotel Tximista
Feelings: Henk - Shattered, Neil - Apprehensive, Di - Let's do it!

Henk woke up shattered after little sleep. Our hotel butted walls against the wonderful St James' Church, which tolled its bell on the hour throughout the night. Then there was a dog barking, a storm in the distance (no rain for us!) and the room was very hot. I slept through all of this. Neil was apprehensive because of the heat.

We worked out a different approach today. They are only minor but we think it made a difference. Try and leave earlier (hard if breakfasts are later), skip morning tea break and have less time on lunch. This was to try and reduce our time walking in the afternoon and reduce the heat stress. I also chose to walk slower after lunch and take bigger paces. It seemed to work because we felt better when we arrived at the hotel. It was still very hot.

We walked through the cobbled street of Puente La Reina (Queen's Bridge) and crossed the bridge out of town. The lovely bridge was built in medieval times to aid the pilgrims crossing the Arga River.

The walk wasn't difficult today as we continued alongside ploughed, undulating farmland. There were many grapevines ready for picking and we had snacks of blackberries which lined the paths. 

There were quite a few minor climbs to the hilltop villages we passed through. It seems that the Spanish don't get out of bed until 10.00am on a Sunday. We met up with the same people from yesterday so we are in synch with a new crowd.

We enjoyed walking through the large, medieval town of Cirauqui with its narrow winding streets and old houses with large crests over their doorways.

The morning cloud and haze kept us cool until 10.30am and then the sun hit us. Once again there were few trees and little shelter. We had early lunch at 11.10am at a small village, Lorca and left again at 11.30am. We sat in a children's park in the shade and it was a welcome respite. When we left we only had 8kms to go and were pleased with progress.

Once again the sun sapped us of energy. Our hotel was changed and we had to walk over an extra kilometre up many steep stairs to the other side of Estella. It was a good thing Henk had his GPS but I did ask a few locals whether we were going the right way. It's a great hotel on the edge of town but we should have got a taxi to avoid the distance and the heat. It's quite a way off the Camino so we will get a taxi tomorrow morning to get us back on the path again.

We met at six for a drink on the hotel deck. The hotel doesn't do meals on a Sunday evening but they recommended places close by. On discovering that they only start serving at nine and we had lunch at 11.30am we decided to go into the town centre. via taxi. It turned into quite an adventure. We firstly found that very few places serve meals on a Sunday evening and secondly we found that getting a taxi at nine on a Sunday evening is like finding a needle in a haystack. The taxi phone was out of order. After having engaged quite a number of people in the discussion over a number of city blocks one group finally worked out what to do. We got the impression that not too many people from Estella use taxis but they were all very friendly. My limited Spanish came in handy.

Whilst all this was happening a storm went close by and the temperature which was 30 degrees in the plaza at seven o'clock dropped to 23 degrees at 8.30pm. It was so lovely and cool.

Overall, it was a better day. No leg pains. We drank plenty of water and ate regularly. The BBC Weather has more rain clouds over our way. We can only hope!