Day 19 - Boadilla del Camino to Carrion de los Condes (26km)

Tonight I am in a monastery. I understood that the Monastery of Santa Clara here in Carrion de Condes was a place run by nuns where you were obliged to go to a blessing for Pilgrims in the evening and to help in the cooking and cleaning, all for a 'donativo' or payment as you saw fit. I thought that would be an interesting experience. It is a lovely building but it seems to be just another albergue with bunk beds - although these have nice yellow over-sheets on them - set in relatively small rooms. Oh, it also has bars on the windows and there seem to be a lot of religious pictures and posters around for some reason...

Boadilla Church

We had a fairly long day getting here today. Firstly we had to make up for the shorter day yesterday (our lovely paradise was nearly four miles short of our planned stop). Secondly we took a detour to avoid an extended walk along a main road. The first of these resulted in a nice walk along an old canal in the cool of the morning ending in a very impressive, if clearly unused and smelly, lock. I later read that the canal was one of Spain’s finest engineering achievements, built to bring grain from the area to the small town of Fromista, which we passed through and which in the past had clearly benefited economically as a result. The second fact led to a pleasant walk along a narrow river where we could enjoy the birdsong and smell of flowers rather than traffic noise and petrol fumes.

 

 
Our river walk brought us to a church on the outskirts of the tiny village of Villalcazar de Sirga where the music, the people and the firecrackers made it clear that some form of celebration was going on. At first we thought it a funeral but as we rested a little further down the road a small procession of people - accompanied by a couple playing a small drum and some form of traditional reed instrument - stopped and explained it was in celebration of 'the Virgin'. It seemed we had happened upon some local festival, nothing like those you see in larger towns but small and intimate and made more personal by their engagement with us.

The day ended with a sole punishing walk along the road into Carrion de Condes but this was soon forgotten after showers and then beer and food in a small quiet restaurant near the monastery. Now it is time to retire to my bunk in readiness for tomorrow and the halfway point of the walk....

Santa Clara Monastery