Frómista → Carrión de los Condes
Distance: 11.6 miles / 18.7km
Elevation: +345ft, -167ft
I woke up around 6am this morning without an alarm, and some people were already up and getting ready, so I figured I would just get up. I put away my charging cables, sleeping bag liner, towel, and blanket, and then woke Tovin up. He was sleeping on the bunk above me, and I wanted to let him sleep in a little. I went to the bathroom to get ready for the morning, and then when I got back, Tovin had finished packing all our stuff and was ready to go.
Our bunk beds last night (left) and the bakery this morning (right)
We left around 7:15am to go to the local bakery. I got a croissant sandwich with veggies & ham and Tovin got a tomato-sausage empanada, and we had breakfast. We also got a loaf of bread for lunch today. We walked for about 2 miles next to a road before coming to the next town, Población de Campos. We stopped and each got a cafe con leche, split an orange juice, and used the bathrooms. We ran into our friend Beatrice from Switzerland who sat with us for a while.
Before leaving town, we realized there is an alternate route for today that we decided to take. The main route is along a road the entire way, and the alternate route would go through some woods, a river, have some shade, and was overall a nicer path to walk. We walked along the alternate route for most of the day and took a few rests along benches and any place we could find to sit in the shade.
At around 11am, we found a group of trees with a grass clearing in the center that we decided to stop and have a picnic lunch at, since we brought bread and meat and cheese. We set down Tovin's sleeping bag and had some lunch. It was really yummy, and it was nice to just lay against the trees in the grass and enjoy the day together. After we were done with our rest and extra long lunch, we finally got back on the road.
We had about four miles left and it was around 12:30pm. It had gotten significantly hotter, the sun got a lot stronger, and it was a tough last push. We probably shouldn’t have taken so long of a break but it was worth it. The last four miles was along country paths next to a farm, and also along the main road. It was so flat, so hot, so boring, and there was a bit of a hill. It wasn’t very fun but being able to do it with Tovin made it a lot better. I’m very glad he’s here, and it makes me happy that we can do not very fun things together and make it enjoyable.
We took about an hour and a half to walk the last four miles, and when we made it to town, we wanted to go and buy a big bottle of Aquarius (a Spanish sports drink), but I forgot it was Sunday and basically everything in Spain shuts down on Sundays, because people here really value their rest. I am not sure if it is influenced by Catholicism or not.
We ended up just going to the hostel to check in. It didn’t have a receptionist but rather had a self check in kiosk in the vestibule, where you enter the booking number, scan your passport, enter your information, pay, and then it spits out your room number and key and you can get into the building. It was a really nice room with a nice shower, a big bed, and a pool! I think the real cherry on top is that the place has air conditioning.
We got settled into our room, turned on the air conditioning, and I got into the shower. It felt so nice to get clean and wash off the day, especially the last few miles. After I finished showering, Tovin showered and then also did all of our laundry in the shower with just the hostel soap and water. I am glad he is here for many reasons, but I will especially miss him doing my laundry for me. Tovin went outside to hang up our laundry up to dry, and then texted me to join him so I did.
We hung up our clothes on the drying rack, and then we found a shady corner with some nice seats to sit together for a few hours. I wrote a bit on my journal, got a foot massage from Tovin, and watched some TikToks. After a while, the clothes rack kept falling over, so Tovin ended up just bringing our clothes back to our room since it was pretty much dry anyway. He also went to the bar downstairs and got us some drinks and we sat together on the terrace for a while.
After we finished our drinks and snacks, we went back to the room and just took some time to rest our feet and recharge for the evening. We headed out around 8pm to go to a local restaurant, just a few houses down the street from our hostel. It had a short wait, but then we got seated and we decided to both get the daily menu (pilgrim's meal), which had a few different choices.
We both got bread and wine, and then Tovin got a tomato pasta, meatballs, a salad, fried thick potato chips, and an ice cream bar. I got a seafood-potato soup, pork chops, a salad, fried thick potato chips, and an ice cream bar for desert as well. It was a lot more food than we were expecting for just €31 total.
After eating, we walked back to the hostel and went up to the rooftop terrace where we dipped our feet in the now cold pool. It felt really good, and we also did some different foot stretches and rubs to try and make our feet feel better. After that, we went downstairs and filled up our waters, got some free hot tea, and then went back to the room and went to sleep.
