Day 6 part 2

Today was a gentle slow walk, a day of bridges and portals, a late start from the chic alburge in puente la Reina, after the usual cafe con leche and a fesh squeezed orange juice. Light rain to begin, heeding margerita's advise from the night before, we decide to walk along the road for the beginng stretch to avoid the clay like mud and steep climbs on the camino footpath. Leaving the town one walks over the stone 12th century pilgrimage bridge, so rich in history and beautiful. Determined to take the short cut, "vinykitska stratka" (sp) as we say in Czech, we set of in search for n111 to the next town, pilgrims wave to let us know that we are on the wrong path, and even kelly, now without bike ( left at the german alburge in Pamplona) walking with eniss, yells come on down, but I'm dermined and reply, "i'll see you later when you are muddy". We come to a roundabout , no signs for n111 or for any towns en route! Hmmm options are motorway or retracing back to na1110, to cut a long story short, the map in my updated guide was completly wrong , since the old road no longer existed and the motorway was in the wrong place, but we found a road going in the right direction, a long slow climb of about 3 k. And we join the path just as Kelly and eniss come around the corner, and they are not covered in mud ( much to my demise) and accuse us of taking a taxi, it turns out that the mud has been resurfaced with stone and is good for walking, but Kelly the self prophesed atheist (after reading Hawkins) pescitarian teetolar citizen of the world is in a lot of pain from blisters developed yesterday over stony terrian and eniss (one of the originals from day 1) has been keeping him company, she too is a vegetarian and I discover a confectioner baking cakes all over the world. We walk gently together, coming to the medieval village of cirauqui, visible on the horizon for a while, the sun has come out, the drizzle continues and we are rewarded with a rainbow. Then it is cloudy for the remainder of the walk. This is my favourite village so far, narrow narrow streets , plants everywhere and very well kept as have been all the towns and villages in the navarra region we have been walking through these past few days. I go to a little supermarcado to buy bread, bocarones and juice, the proprietor shows the usual mix of initial unfriendliness and suspicion but soon warms up. A roman road leads us downhill from this village to the ruins of a roman bridge, a perfect place for a picnic, the bocarones are in oil and herbs and better than the ones in vinegar. The walk goes on and later I realize that the empty bocarones container is not sealed shut and the plastic bag is not intact and fishy olive oil had been dripping down my trousers for the last few k, hmm laundry soon. we have to say goodbye to Kelly in lorca he can't walk anymore, I will miss his English/new Zealand humor calling me darling, but he is retired and has time. The remainder of the walk was slow, one alfa spotted, bridges and portals and mimosas. Everyday is rich on the camino. The English couple have made it and together with eniss we are staying at the same place tonight. One of the Koreans has also made it and I heard that the band of israelis caught a train from Pamplona to sarria yesterday so that they can walk the final 100k.

Enjoying vino tinto and Jamineiberrico in a bar full of locals and no pilgrim in sight (yay) in the old town square.