Puenta La Reina to Estella

First of all i like to appolgise for my bad spelling, my brain is walk only mode and spanish computers don´t spell check english. that´s my excuse and i´m sticking to it.
Any way The Albergue in Puenta la Reina was a joy . It was a hotel with an albergue in the basement for pilgrims ,it was the first one i came upon just on the edge of town. After freshning up i walked into town to find a farmacia to buy cream for my various bites.then returned for dinner which was a buffet with a bottle of wine per table.and guess what, I was on my own so a bottle of wine to oneself went down a treat. had a job finding my bunk though. I was texting home when I heard a familar voice, it was an irish pilgrim who was in a group of three very jovial and full of the blarney, I had seen them on the first day on the mountain pass to Spain and also bumped into them on Alto Perdon ( while on the Alto i also saw the Slovakian pilgrim i attended mass with in Pamplona). In the albergue i was also greated by two spainish pilgrims i joined for coffee in Pamplona near the cathedral, they shook my hand like an old lost friend and looking worried informed that rain was forcast for the next day which would make going hard. I also got talking to two young spaniards Pepe and Ramon both live in Crawley and are flight crew for monarch. I got up at about five o´clock this morning went to the bathroom to use some of the cream I bought the night before on my bites,which had now spread to my butt( how they got and why there i coudn´t tell you) any way all the lights weren´t working so i had to fumble about in the dark trying not to mix up the bite cream with my tooth paste( don´t get me wrong having a butt smelling of mint is not a bad thing but it would still itch). When me and my minty butt left the abergue it was about six thirty and still dark. I made my way across town to pick up the trail to the sound of cricketts and a distant dog barking, other than that the town was still asleep and quiet. When day light came i could see that the golden harvested wheat fields where now sharing the landscape with vinyards, which is good if i´m to continually consume wine in the quantities i did the night before. The winding trail led to some amazing little pueblo´s all with there own little church at the centre and situated above all the houses. The trail led me onto an old roman road just as it began to rain making the steep descents very slippery. I had walked ten kilometres befor stopping for some thing to eat, just two small wheat bars i bought in the second pueblo. I carried on to the next one and found a small cafe adjoined to an albergue and had a tortilla de patat and bread,with a coffee. Me, my little legs and minty butt made it into Estella at about 2pm but i carried on through the original town and onto Oyeiga which is about 2 kilometres further on. The heat got the better of me walking up a steep concrete path and i´ve now stopped for the day i´ve done my washing, and i´m listening to neil diomond played by Peter the german volunteer for this albergue. The albergue is a sports hall which still has all it´s original facilities including squash court, although i can´t see any pilgrim taken advantage of them.Any hoo i waffled on again so it´s time to go and the question is.... is life still good. well let me think I´ve found my lost socks i´ve completed my first 100 kilometres in Spain , i´m clean and don´t smell like a tramp and i´ve got a minty bottom. you bet it´s good Adios

Cizor minor to Puenta La Reina

As usual i woke in the middle of the night 3am, sat outside for a while in the rain then went back to bed . Got up at about 6.30am, and started the process of packing my rucksack with all my gear in the order i thought i may need them , i shared out the fruit i bought the night before ( while out buying the fruit i was overcome with a need to have an ice lolly but they only had ice creams other the huge ice on a stick clearly marketed for children as it had a big plastic stick to hold it with the cashier looked at me if had purchased something ilicit and put it the bag of fruit, on leaving i promptly retrieved it from the bag and started to lay into it, I got some strange looks from the local children as i walked back to the albergue. the stick turns out to be some kind of whistle . i've kept it as a momento).By the time we were all ready to go it was getting light and closer to eight o'clock than it was to seven. We filled up with water and made our way out of this pretty little town towards Alto Perdon. I stopped to see how Ray and Martha were doing behind me Ray called out and told me to carry on. I stopped part of the way up the alto and sat next to a memorial to a belgian pilgrim i had an orange and a pear for breakfast and watched the steady stream of pilgrims walk past, before leaving i placed a small stone on the heap of others left on the memorial by other pilgrims. On reaching the top I bought patato omelette roll and a coffee from a man in a van yes that's right, a man in van selling food on top of the Alto. I looked accross the plains that lay below, it was exposed and unshaded most of the way. By the time i reached the bottom to start my trek across the rolling plains i could feel the sweat from my head trying to find a way out from under my hat, my back was already wet from the ascent. I was nearing Puenta La reina when I saw the sign to the Eunate Church which was shown as being 2 km off the Camino. After walking through the small village and past corn fields i could just about see it in the distance. it worked out about 5km to get there and it was closed with the gates padlocked, to say i was unhappy would be an under statement, i heard some foot steps behind me and saw another pilgrim , Nils from germany was walking the Arragon Route and had also hoped to visit the church. I just said CERRADO (SHUT). It was a longer walk to get back on the camino and i´m now in an Albergue on the edge of Puenta La Reina, showered and wearing fresh clothes.
I checked my pack and found out I left a pair of walking socks back at Cizor Minor. All in All day of more downs than ups. Is Life Still Good?..........YES JUST

Huerte to Cizor Minor

We thought we were just outside Pamplona, every time we asked how far the standard answer would be 2.5 kilometres. we left the albergue at 8 and i got into the old city at about 11am had a coffee near the cathedral texted ray with my location and went to have a look at the cathedral, before i knew it i was attending a very moving mass alongside a pilgrim from Slovakia, which lasted almost 2 hours, the cathedral stamped my pilgrim passport I was now with Ray and Martha and yes we´re on the hunt for somewhere to eat, almost every place was shut but we found a small galician restuarant run by people from rays part of spain we polished off the the meal with coffee and Aguadiente de heirbas (fire water of herds) The walk across Pamplona city was long and hot 36 degrees with out any shade. from the old town it is about 8 k to the edge of Pamplona city and then onto cizor minor. On my arrival i was offered a foot massage and shown to my bed . i then sat under a fig tree drinking a cold fanta looking across at the enclosed gardens and nursing my itching little legs. LIFE IS GOOD
sorry i haven´t posted any photo´s yet between showering washing clothes finding somewhere to eat there´s not a lot of time left to do much more ADIOS

Zubiri to Huerte

Got off to a bad start woke up at about 3am iching my left leg is swollen from the amount of bites in the municipal albergue (only 6 euros for the night and another twenty for the medication for the cure of sleeping there)i´ve had plus some bruising from i don´t know were. I´ve been in touch with Ray and Martha who are in a private albergue just a few metres up the road from me. I got up at six and packed my rucksack went out into the gardens to collect my washing from the line , it was still wet so i packed the wet shirt and shorts into my rucksack and left three pairs of socks dangling on the outside to dry them off, as i set off i caught a glimpse of myself in a shop window, rolled up creased trousers ,creased shirt,dusty boots and socks hanging from my pack and i thought i cut quite a dashing figure. anyhoo i met Ray and Martha on the trail after waiting for an hour for them at thier albergue only to find they had left. we walked to larasoana together and went in searched of breakfast ,every where was shut but a man who owned the pension on the edge of the village saw us and opened up just for us, we had shandy ham and cheese sandwich and his wife gave us some plums from their garden. a special moment on the camino . Martha´s foot was playing up, the owner of the pension suggested we walk on the roadside instead of the trail as it was shorter and less demanding. We had walked for about 4 or 5k´s and Martha had had enough, i carried onto a small group of houses and spoke to a local who was trying to tell me that i wasn´t on the trail. i explained about Martha and he set off to get her and Ray, he then offered us a lift to Pamplona but we had already decided on Huerte which was a bit closer and had a shopping mall, Ray and Martha went with him and I opted to carry on walking. about a 1K on the road i found a track that led back onto the trail which was narrow with about an 80 foot drop on the right with the path crumbling at the edges and thorn bushes clinging to my pack and shirt. It reached a point were it crossed over the road i had been on and i then decided i was going to go back onto the road. I was now about 2k´s outside of Huerta and out of water and out of songs to keep me going when i looked up and saw a village on the opposite hillside called OLLOKKI and i burst into a verse in one of miss Minogue´s greatest " I should be OLLOKKI, LOKKI LOKKI LLOKKI". (don´t deny it you had ago at singing this to see if worked, didn´t you! ) anyway I got to the albergue which we had to ourselves after a shopping trip for creams and medication for various bites ( i seem to be top of the menu for all sorts of biting isects and the like , while walking i had a stinging pain on my left leg but ignored it only to find two small puncture wounds on my knee and a rash over most of my leg and a swollen foot) and some flip flops for Martha. We found a nice restuarant round the corner from the albergue but had to make it a quick meal to avoid being locked out. Ray and I went to the laundry room to wash some clothes and found that it had a balcony over looking the town square, so we moved two chairs out there a polished off a bottle of Tinto verrano between us while we wacthed the children playing with water bombs and chasing one another while their parents sat close by drinking we went to bed at midnight and they were still at it. an altogether enjoyable evening LIFE IS GOOD.

Roncevalles to Zubiri

 I woke up at about 4am but didn´t want to disburb the other seven people in the tiny portacabin we´re sharing. every body started to move at about 6am, Started off at 0730 making good time as it was flat and most of yesterdays pains were a memory, but not for long i thought the road to Zubiri was straight forward with a few gradients (wrong) the first 4 k was ok then after breakfast of coffee and lemon cake the track meandered across open fields and woodland. i stopped for lunch in a little village and spoke to a couple I had been seeing every now and then along the way,and after consulting the maps i was informed that the last 4k was straight down to Zubiri, they forget to point out the long steady climb before hand . A lot of the track was unshaded and uneven with rocks and scree threatning to end the whole trip in a blink of an eye. passed a sign stating Zubiri was only 6 kilometers away but we still continued to climb for another 2 hours. Then we started the long decent, not in distance but in time, i change from boots to sandles as they were starting to hurt again, I finally crossed the bridge into Zubiri at 5.20Pm after stopping for a quick drink in the firs bar i went to the nearest albergue which was full i found the municipal albergue about 100 metres further up the road. Sharing a room with the same English couple I saw earlier , a Spainish guy from the Rioja region (soon to be my new best friend)and a Japanese girl I found wondering through town in search of an Albergue i´m going find somewhere to eat then another early start I hope to make Pamplona. Adios

St Jean Pied de Port To Roncevalles

Well i´ve made to Roncevalles in Spain a long walk 27 K but more like 37 with the gradient upto an altitude of 1458 metres. fatanstic views and eagles soaring no more than twenty feet above our heads .  It´s been a long exhausting day, i  left St jean pied de port at about 8 am after checking that my friend Ray and his wife Martha were ok, unfortunately she injured herself last night and at the moment can´t continue. So i´m on my own. The walk through the Ibeneta Pass was spectacular looking down on clouds and dense woodland. I reached Roncesvalles at about 1850 hours booked a table at the restuarant for a pilgrims meal if you don´t book you don´t eat. Went for a quick shower ,I´ve been put on the camp site as the main accomodation is full, missed my booked dinner but i may try and get in after mass.the last 4 k was very painful as it was down hill, after spending the whole day of walking up hill my little legs protested that they were now required to do the opposite and i had to strap my knee to try and ease the pain. Sorry it´s only a short post with a day missing (gatwick to St jean pied de port) When i´m more relaxed and at a PC i understand i will try give a more in depth account with some pictures if i can. I´m off now to phone home and then it´s off to mass and dinner if i´m lucky.