Day 7: Los Arcos to Loraña 27 km.

The penultimate day of the hot weather today. We calculate around 6 hours of walking, plus breaks, so 7 in total. 6 am wake up is planned. I’m covered in sweat sleeping all night without a breeze, so I’m awake by the time the first alarm goes off at 450am, and getting ready shortly afterwards, despite the general agreement for six.

We turn our torches off and walk for several hours by the light pollution almost dark, on an easy path we don’t need illumination for. It’s quite magical, we have the moon and a distant L-shaped church tower for company as the hypnotic beat of the path drums our skulls as we slowly wake up. We see a black speck in front of us, it might be a fellow traveller, my sight is playing tricks on me. After a few minutes we pass a pilgrim, wishing her good morning, and of course, buen camino.

The light slowly enters the world, filling the details into the world. It’s quite magical, I love this waking of the world, when you’ve been up for an hour or two. We stop for coffee in a village, then a few hours later bump into my Mexican companion. It’s 10am, and we have a coffee and walk together, it’s great to catch up and see what he has been doing for the last few days. He knows my french companion as well, they catch up too.

Finally, we trickle separately into Logroño, and fine a cosy albergue for four of us. It’s lunchtime and we’re in pincho and wine country. We’re round the corner from some great nourishment and merriment. Five rounds later and I’m happy, full, slightly tipsy and back at the hotel for an hour or two of downtime. I’ll head out later for a couple more pinchos once I’ve recharged a bit. Another great day, the Camino really does keep giving.

Sun and a long 29 km walk tomorrow, the last really big one before I head to Bilbao. I’ll be rising early again. It’s been great.