Day 4 (Camino II): Roncesvalles to Akerreta

Last night the internet connection was painfully slow for uploading pictures to my blog. Perhaps that was my penance for the excesses on this trip so far. Fortunately the walls of the hotel were so solid I did get a good night's sleep. In fact, we spent a little time looking around and admiring this hotel before setting out.

Hotel Roncesvalles: combining old and new - solid monastery walls with modern design/amenities

Hotel Roncesvalles: Lobby

We are about the last to leave Roncesvalles. We are usually some of the slowest on the trails. Today we are walking longer than most people - 28 km. Plus we tend to stop at every bar and restaurant on the way. Do you see a trend? All these mean that there are very few pilgrims following us most of the time. An exception is an elderly lady from Amherst, Mass, who walks extremely slow because she has a sizeable bunion which looks a bit inflamed. She got into Roncesvalles at 10pm last night after taking 14 hours on Route de Napoleon. It sounded just plain dangerous as she risked being stranded in the mountains.

Thank God it's in km and we are only doing 500 of these.

Good to start out in a nice trail next to the road. A medieval cross in view on left.

Perfect weather - zero clouds in the sky

We hit small attractive towns regularly in the early part of this stage, a typical situation we experienced last year. At Burguete, we enter a hotel to check out the piano that supposedly has Hemingway's signature, only to receive a cold reception from the staff. The few pilgrims who were behind us followed like lemmings. Why wouldn't the management take advantage of the association of their hotel with Hemingway and make it a must stop? At Espinal, we break for leche caliente with our Valcarlos comrades and listen to their Irish tales. At Viscarret, we run into a worried and hungry group of middle school students from Korea, and we feed them lunch. They got separated from some of their members - it's a long story. It started with their teacher retracing his steps to retrieve their lost Camino credentialing papers. We tell them they can always get the credentials easily at the next town, but they seem obsessed over their "passports" with stamps from their first stop, St Jean Pied de Port.

Hemingway used to come to this hotel in Burguete while he was discovering the magic (and madness) of the Navarre region. 

Espinal: we stop for drinks with our newly found Irish friends.

Another forest of pine and beech trees between towns

Helping students from Korea in Viscarret

The latter part of this stage calls for lots of ups and downs. We take a girl in the Korean group to her albergue in Zubiri. It's again a long story but we probably wasted a good two hours helping these Korean students. They are all united so it is a happy ending. It is getting late and we probably should have stayed in Zubiri ourselves, but we push on to Aketerra 6 km further away, where we have a hotel reservation. We arrive past 8pm and the hotel receptionist tells us he was worried. Even Girard, a pilgrim from Nevers, France, who I had recommended this hotel to, was waiting for us since 5pm!

 

Leaving Viscarret: A long climb toward Alto de Erro

Alto de Erro: A memorial to a Japanese pilgrim who perished on this spot in 2002. It does not seem treacherous, so maybe he had a heart attack?

Puente de la Rabia: leading to Zubiri, which we entered only to drop off a Korean student at her albergue. This is a medieval bridge with the legend of healing animals stricken with rabies.

Illaritz: even as our steps get heavier and heavier, we have time to stop and admire solid construction of these Navarra houses.

Larrasoana: supposedly an attractive town, but we don't cross this medieval bridge and instead push on to the hilltop town of Akerreta.

Finally arriving in Akerreta and heading straight to the restaurant. Mixed salad never tasted so good.