Putting on my Halo!

Rabanal del Camino to Molinaseca – day 25 – 24.62kms

Today I left at 6am…to get an early start on a very mountain day!!!

And was greeted with 1.5hours of this uphill…lucky I don’t read what’s ahead…I had had a coffee at the Albergue (decaffeinated) but hot…and off I went…as the sun was slowing rising!

More up…some parts not as bad as others…

Others kind of nasty…no looking up… just keeping an eye on the foot placement…Anyway…

The views were getting amazing … and I reached the first town, first coffee around 7.30am – Foncebadon! Got my coffee and basked in the sunshine… this is where my day changed!

The man at the next table was waiting for his friend…he had taken the road as he had a sore knee, his friend…ahead of me had taken the rocky path that I had and hadn’t turned up as planned for their first coffee…half an hour had gone by…he had a friend who just chose to walk on her way, and he had his friends phone on GPS and had him at a spot – about 2kms back down the track(that I had just climbed) and hadn’t moved for 30 minutes! He thought he better go look for him (these guys are 70!) I said I would come with him (who knows what we were going to find!) we left our packs at the cafe and headed back down the rocky path…on the way down (Bill) dropped his phone…so when he went to check the GPS again his phone was gone….so I climbed back up again another km and luckily found it so we could pinpoint his friends location ! We couldn’t find him or the phone anywhere…it was starting to get a bit scary!

So Bill and I climbed back up (2kms) to the cafe and thought he would use their WIfI to see if he could get a better location reading…just as he was about to do this, his friend sent him a picture of himself about 3kms up at the Cruz de Ferro!

Bill was furious with his mate who had turned his cell service off to save money !!! So the GPS was showing where he turned it off!!! And we both had wasted an hour an and a half of our walking day…and added another 6kms onto a long day!!! So Bill and I then headed up to the top of the mountain! At least Ron (the friend) was alive!!!

On a better track!!

Mountain vegetation…

And pine forests!

To the highest point – Cruz de Ferro…the famous cross where everyone brings something from home (a rock or memorable thing) and leaves here to unload their baggage! However I found out from the locals that its is cleared 2 times over summer and used as fill in potholes on the roads and cemented in! So I didn’t feel the need to unload my baggage here!! We then carried on to the next town of Manjarin…where there is a good truck and the last knights dwelling …which was a little creepy!

He had just cut his hand on a rusty old blade, but wouldn’t take a plaster…

He gave me a rose!! Oh dear! Anyway, Bill was meeting his friend here (she had knee issues) and taking a taxi to their next town!

As I had already done a few extra miles I decided to piggyback on their taxi and miss a few Kms over the top of the mountain, getting dropped off at the next town of El Acebo.. to walk the last 8km into my town!

Very cute little town, but I took a wrong turn on leaving the village and had to climb back up to get on track…I wasn’t making today easy for myself!

The views were amazing from this mountain village!

Church on the outskirts!

And this donkey ignoring me… Then it was down…. Like very down and very precipitous paths!

For three hours…took it real slow to look after my knees…met up with a chap from Toronto…who moaned all the way down! This was his 3rd rodeo so he should have known what to expect…

Again some great views our village in the distance!

Walking into Molinaseca…and diving for the first bar in sight for a cold beer after my traumatic day!

Only to get caught up in a parade of hundreds of kids and parents…chanting loudly! Apparently a kids soccer tournament had just finished today and a Portuguese team had won…so they were off up the main drag for the trophy presentations… caught up with my friend Jean, who is injured, and will meet her for dinner! I’m starving!!!