Day 3. March 12, 2017. Castilblanco de Los Arreyos to Altadena de la Plata. 29 kms.

The sage leaf rock rose

And the white asphodel

Stand before the stately oaks

In the sunny dell.

 

Sparrows chirping, doves cooing, I set out before dawn, the sky rosy in the east, and clear but for few smudgy grey clouds. The day would be divided into two parts: 16 kilometres along the highway, and then 15 kilometres through the Parque Natural Sierra Norte. It is described in one of the guides as a hell of a step, and it was.

Along the highway it was a very different terrain today, an olive landscape with large trees scattered in the fields with a few cows grazing beneath them. I was puzzled by the trees, which were oak-like in shape, but with smaller olive leaves. Werner informed me that they were oaks, used for making wine barrels among other things. In fact, they are called holly or holm oaks. And then, a little further on, a tree with a different bark which had been carefully stripped away in places. I felt it. This was a cork oak.

 

Now normally, when the bark is stripped from a tree, it dies, but not the cork oak. The bark regrows to be harvested seven or eight years later. Now did the Great Designer, knowing that his human creations would have an insatiable need for cork to stop their wine bottles, and wanting to save his trees from extinction, make an exception in this case?

Lots of yellow and white daisies, rosemary and wild thyme, and the familiar stands of asphodel. What seemed to be a flock of white birds hovering above a bush were the rock sage white roses swaying on their stalks in the brisk morning breeze.

And a welcome breeze it was, behind me at first, and then blowing into my face, perhaps heralding a change in the weather.

I noticed a fellow rummaging about by the side of the road and asked him what he was doing. His English was better than my Spanish. "I'm getting honey from my beans," he said.

A long, hard trudge for 16 kilometres along the side of the road, little traffic at first because we had left early, but then came the Sunday cyclists and the thundering bikers, so it was a relief to see the arrows directing us to the right and into the park.

And in the park, a pleasant gravel road wound its way through the valleys, oaks on either side, and then pines, planted on terraces to allow the water to soak down to the roots.

I made a detour to visit some ruins stretched out on a hill. Moorish defences, I wondered, or medieval castle? Nothing so interesting, only lonely, long-forgotten farm buildings.

 

Finally, the track arrived at the end of the park, and took a sudden, brutal climb. Only a few hundred feet, but after the gentle undulations, it was steep and nasty. Just when I was thinking I could go no further, I came to a memorial to a pilgrim who had gone no further, unless it was to his heavenly reward as the plaque proclaimed. It gave me pause, and I waited for my heart rate to slow down.

Another hundred feet, over the top, and then, to my great relief, there was the town below.

 

Down the hill and onto the terrace of a bar for a beer, and off in search of the albergue. Be warned! Just beside the church is an enterprising host, waiting with a hook to drag you into his albergue de peregrinos. But there was no toilet paper, no wifi, and only one shower, so we beat a hasty retreat and found the municipal albergue further up the street. Very comfortable!