Rustic

Villar de Mazarife to Santibaniz (Thursday, June 17th)

We have been blessed with beautiful walking weather the last few days. Cool temperatures, beautiful sunny skies. The path has not been marked as well in the Province of Leon, and we even have to step back in to Tio Pepe's and ask Rosey how to get back onto the Camino from the alburgue! But then we are on our way. All three stork families are awake and busy on the church bell tower on the little plaza in front of the alburgue.

We have about 20 km ahead of us this day with no major cities to go through. One village is completely concreted between buildings except for this little triangular rose garden. There is also a very clever ad on the side of a building for an alburgue:
We see a lot of older women out working in their gardens - they are dressed up like this one. I don't know the Spanish word for 'babushka.'



When we stop for our usual mid-morning break, it is an omen of what our accommodations will be like that night, we just don´t realize it. Each town seems to have one bar that serves the pilgrims as they drift through each day. The plastic tables and chairs, and sometimes umbrellas indicate their liveliness amidst the shuttered windows in most of these sleepy burgs. The tables and chairs are usually emblazoned with "San Miguel" or "Amstel" or whatever the bar features on tap. The pilgrims stop mostly to use the aseos, the bathrooms. Rare is it to find a bathroom on the Camino that has all four of these: toilet paper, soap, hot water, paper towels-hand dryer. If you can find one of these, it´s an okay place; if you find two, you´re doing pretty good. Well, this particular bar didn´t have any of the above, nor did it even have a seat on the toilet! Or napkins on the bar to dry hands. And the men´s room was worse - or so says Paul from the Chicago group, who is there at the same time as we are. So the ´rustic´ part of the day began early.

One of the cities that we did go through however, was Hospital de Orbigo which was famous for it´s jousting tournament in 1434 (I think). A knight, Suero de Quinones, who was a little crazy, was scorned by his lover (you can't really blame her when you hear more about him!), and therefore had to defend his honor. Which meant taking on 300 knights from all across Europe who rose to the challenge, but he prevailed against them all. It took 30 days, but he defeated them and kept his honor! And during this 30 days, there was apparently quite a party in the town with feasting, music and dancing. To this day, in fact, shortly before we got to the town, the city holds an annual jousting festival.


The bridge across the river is one of the longest medieval bridges still extant. As we were crossing it, there were men working on it to rebuild part of it. It has been damaged many times in major floods over the centuries, but is still essentially intact in it's original form. We walk across it, admiring the stonework and contemporary craftsmanship.

We decide to stop and have lunch in Hosptial de Orbiga and go into a little alimentacion. I buy some fruit, a granola-like bar and one or two other little things for lunch. We go out into the square to eat. There are lots of pilgrims present in this pleasant little town. The Chicago group, Paul, Therese, Taryn and Dana is here, too and we will say goodbye to them here as they will high-tail it from here to meet a deadline to get to Santiago and then to Rome. We also run into Ale (Argentina), Charley (Scotland) and Kim (England) again! It feels like old home week!

Hospital de Orbiga was also a town with an outpost of the Knights Templar in the church of St. John the Baptist who had a mission to protect the pilgrims who came through there. After our lunch break, we poke our heads into the little church. Outside are some lilies (the symbol of Mary) and red roses.


We got to Santibanez by about 1:15. The only alburgue didn´t open for another 15 minutes. The guide book says, ¨The bleak facade belies the charm inside.¨ Well, the inside turned out to be pretty bleak, too, once we were in. Stella and I were in a room about 9' by 9' with 3 bunk beds (i.e. 6 people) in it. The bunk beds were so short that the bar for the top bed hit the back of my neck when I tried to sit on the edge of my bed! Some places put fitted sheets on the mattresses and pillowcases on the pillows. Sometimes we trust them and sometimes we don´t and immediately get out our sleeping bags. This was an immediate sleeping bag place. And lavendar soap, to try and scare away any bedbugs. Or anything else. The two showers and two toilets for everyone (supposedly they could take up to 60 people in this alburgue) were outdoors in the courtyard, and the sinks, for doing laundry as well as washing hands and brushing teeth, were open air. This is why I don´t like camping. And yes, this is better than most camping. By the end of the afternoon, all six bunks in our room were full. There was almost no room for moving around by the time that everyone had their backpacks in there and unpacked what we needed for overnight. And this couple that was put into our room later absolutely roared with their snoring!

This is the only place so far that we have been absolutely bored. We walked around town a couple of times, laid on park benches in this beautiful little pocket park, loving the breezes and the smell of the roses wafting over us. But there was absolutely nothing to do. The town had no stores. The only bar in town closed at 2 pm, shortly after we got there, there was no Internet, and the alburgue was too damp and chilly to sit in. So for once, we were at loose ends.



We took pictures of a new friend of Stella's ...


and interesting doors. Most of the residents of the town appeared to be older farmers and in the afternoon, they were bringing their large farm equipment back into town. They keep it on the first floor of their homes and live above. So in my two loops of walking through the town, I peered into the cavernous first floors that served as barns, curious to see how they worked and lived.

When the church finally opened up at 5, we went inside to look around and stayed awhile. Four members of the flower guild presumably, two older, two younger, came in to discuss at length, arrangements for every nook and cranny of the elaborate altarpiece. The church is a very recently constructed church. Spanish taste in church decorating is very 'over the top' by American standards, very Rococo or Baroque, with lots of levels, lots of frufru (a very technical decorating term), lots of gold, lots of figures or busts, and lots of flowers. And of course, even in newer churches, there are still side altars with special patron saints.

Finally, we went back to the alburgue and had a lovely dinner out under the cherry trees in that back yard. First course of a basic paella, just a flavored sticky rice really with a minimum of chorizo, but good. Second was a lettuce salad with beets (gladly missed those!), crusty bread, a potato and either lamb or pork stew/roast dish and potato tortilla, all with red wine and water. Then dessert was a creamy, liquid custard in a cup with a cookie. It was very eggy flavored with vanilla and cinnamon. I never did get the name of it. We thought perhaps it was flan that hadn´t set, but people said no. Gathered around the long table were people from USA, Canada, Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland, Spain and Sweden that I know of. It was a pleasant part of an otherwise ´rustic´ day.