Castile and Leon

Today I am in León, the capital of the region of Castile and León through which I have been walking over the last few days.  It is the largest autonomous region in Spain and known as ‘The Land of the Castles’.  There are more than 300 medieval castles throughout the region, more than any other region in Europe, and I have seen the ruins of a few although of course the Camino passes through only a small part of this large area. Many were built as a defence against the Moorish invaders and are still well preserved. 

There are more UNESCO world heritage sites here than anywhere else in the world and during my walk I have enjoyed two of them: the Way of St James and Burgos. I have also seen field after field of crops in fields with extensive irrigation systems; agriculture is the most important sector of the economy around here and the canal I walked along to Fromista, built in the late 18th century to transport grain, suggests it has been this way for a while.