Started off the day, waking up and realizing I’d slept! Wow! What a great start to the day. Then when the taxi driver came, I asked him to please slow down just a bit. And he did. He was fun to chat with as much as I could. Mostly he talked about how tired he was, that he’d started the day at 6 am and would keep going. He doesn’t take a day off from March to October, because after that, there’s no business and things are really expensive here – actually he talked about groceries and necessaries. I’m not surprised because it’s so remote. He said that crazy road he was driving is closed off and on during all of winter because the snow gets too high. Then he asked if I would mind if he smoked. I said yes, because it hurts my head. He said you never smoked? I said nope, one puff made my head explode (word for explosion is the same in both languages). He then said, everyone dies, what does it matter? Why worry? I said I wasn’t worried about dying, I just didn’t want my head to explode!
Then I started my hike. Only 12 miles and it took me over 6 hours! Long up and really long down, but oh so beautiful. The mist down below was just amazing and I stayed above it the whole time until it was gone and then I was coming down.
First little town, just tractor, cat, tiny church. Says it all.
Coming into La Mesa, these windmills are on many of the hills and they get a lot of their electricity from them. Good thing because the hydro plant was definitely dead. Getting to it later. There was an albergue that had a cafe and Wise Pilgrim said there’s nothing else pretty much until you get to Grandas de Salime, so glad I stopped.
The little crocus like flowers to the right are the most intriguing flowers for me. First, because it seems like they’d be spring flowers and second because they are in a bunch here, but usually, they’re singular and just seem to randomly pop up in the most barren areas. Really cheerful little bursts of color.
I couldn’t take enough pictures of how beautiful it was.
I saw a woman doing a selfie with a tripod and everything, examining the photos, but she stayed put so I asked her to get a photo. Isn’t it amazing behind me?
And now going down. For hours, but the paths were never as rough as they were yesterday.
Here’s the dammed reservoir, but it looked like a long river.
Ok, I was tired at this point and totally missed getting photos of the defunct ghost town of the hydro plant. I’d come over the ridge at the right, down to the river to cross on the damn and was now going back up the other side. The last photo was across the way. I was trying to get a photo here to show how incredibly high this road was, with seemingly a straight cliff all the way down. Needless to say, I couldn’t get close enough for an accurate picture, but it was really really high.
I had to stop by the side of the road to have a snack, I was listening to “House by the Cerulean Sea” a fantasy book recommended by Kaziah and Eli C and suddenly I was off the road that I’d been following into the sky, onto this beautiful path, that just got prettier and prettier. I was definitely in an altered state and when I saw this pretty little town emerging after a long time on the trail, I wasn’t sure how much was book related. I turned off the book.
Really cool church, giant, actually, at the center of this wonderful little town. Iglesia de San Salvador de Grandas, directly related to the Primitivo Santiago Way. A temple is mentioned in 1186, then it was completely remodeled and extended during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. However, the front door, gargoyles and the font are from the original building.
Town building, the bell rings the hour and the church’s bells seem to chime in for longer ringing. Love hearing the bells.
There is an ethnographic museum here, showing the cultural anthropology history of the Asturian area. It was a really impressive museum. I had to take a picture of the schoolroom, of course, and then appreciated how they wrote about it in the guide: This area, however, is more than the sum of the objects it contains; it is the place where a universe of knowledge and learning enabled children to open their minds to goals and horizons which were formerly only open to a few, to the wealthy.”
“General dissemination of rural schools arrived with the 2nd Spanish Republic, and although General Franco used them as indoctrination centers for his regime, education was able to prise the door open and help to bring freedom to the people.”
Isn’t that great?
And here are those shoes. They were clogs worn to manage the wet and mud that was (and still can be) ever present. They made my shoes look SO comfortable.
Ach.
From my hotel room!
Reb's Walks! 