I realized last night that I had 18 miles, not 11 as I’d mistakenly thought. And it was supposed to rain the whole day. I was definitely feeling a bit dismayed, then ran into an English couple, Audrey and Peter, coming out of their room in the same hotel. They too were walking almost all the way to Akeretta. Ok, just knowing I had company whether we walked together or not was great.
I started early this morning. 7:40 is early here because sunrise is at 7:30 and it’s dark! It was raining, but right away I saw the St. James chapel was open and it was beautiful. Then started walking. I had a lot of quiet time, I was warm, comfortable and loved the walk. Again, so beautiful and the terrain kept changing, trail, forest, field, beautiful town, witch burning site, thin trail, wide trail. Never boring.
After a few hours, started listening to a book which took me another couple of hours, then connected up with the Irish couples I met yesterday. They are great and ended up walking into Zubiri with Fiona and Murph – ending the day again with them. Had lunch at a cafe, then they went to their hotel and I walked on for another 6m to Akeretta. As one of the guide books wrote, tiny town with giant houses. That’s true in this case. I walked up a beautiful path after having been alone since I left Zubiri. Then into this little town of maybe 4 houses. Dead quiet, no sign of life. Oh boy, now I am tired and it would be hard to find housing since most things have been sold out. Luckily, one of the giant houses was my hotel. I’m including a video that I recorded for the fam about walking into the town.
These houses are from 17th and 18th century, Basque. The first floor was animals, the middle was people, and the top was the hayloft and storage. And this hotel is a remodeled 1723 house. And gorgeous. It looked familiar – like it was from The Way when they had their Basque dinner. Turns it, it WAS the house where they filmed his Basque dinner and they argued about Roland. Population of Akeretta – 6.
Still bit cold so we ate inside, but we were talking across tables and it was fun, great food and, happily, a lot of it because I was starving. Another great day!
Reb's Walks! 