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| The church in Tabara |
We have now left the Via de la Plata for
the Camino Sanabrés. The alternative is to continue north to Astorga and join
the Camino Frances. All the guidebooks advise following the yellow arrow left
for Ourense when leaving Granja, except for the UK guide. Author Alison Raju
claims that the short cut to Puente Quintos up the hill to the right is
way-marked all the way. I wandered up her route yesterday afternoon and the only waymarks are for
Astorga. Nevertheless I liked the idea of a shortcut and checked it out on
Google Maps. Sure enough, up and over the hill was the way to go but we had to
ignore the arrow pointing right and turn left. It was then almost a straight
run through to the bridge.
Taking that route gave us a head start on
the others in the albergue. After
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| The bridge over the Rio Esla, the main tributary of the Duero |
crossing the bridge we could remain on the road
or follow all the advice and walk south for a kilometre alongside the river and
then climb a hill for the most fantastic views of the reservoir. We had read
notices urging us to ignore claims that this route was dangerous. We started
along a narrow rocky path and Pauline found the going difficult. I decided to
take the lead and find the easiest route but had no sooner done so when I lost
my balance and landed on my behind. Had I fallen sideways I am not sure where I
would have ended up. There was no harm done but I had a look further on to see
if the path improved - it didn't and so we headed back for the road.
After
about 5km we picked up the Camino again and headed on to Faromontanos de Tábara
for lunch. Unusually we were first to arrive, having gained more time by not
taking the scenic route. Originally this was as far as we planned to go today
but it was just noon and another six or seven kilometres would take us to
Tábara. That, in fact, turned out to be more than 8km due, I believe, to
detours caused by the construction of the AVE rail track.
The albergue in Tábara is a kilometre from
the Plaza Mayor and not actually on the Camino but we decided to use it rather
than the hotel in the town centre. It was a good decision. Hospitalero José was
at the door to greet us and explain how he tries to maintain the spirit of
Camino in the albergue. Tourism, he believes, had taken over in many places.
José had no English but our friend Manuel from the US was on hand to translate.
Jose also explained that he would be cooking a communal meal at 8:00pm and
would take care of our day's washing in the washing machine.
After showering we headed into town to find
a bar with WiFi. It was there we learned the sad news that our friend and
neighbour John Wade had died. Our thoughts and prayers are with Mary and their
family.
On returning to the albergue we found our
clothes on the washing line. Other peregrinos had also arrived. For dinner
there were Manuel, Andrea, Ton (for Antonia) and Martin from Holland, a young
Italian man, an older Spanish man, a late arriving young Spanish cyclist,
ourselves and Jose. He had cooked us Arroz Zamorana, a very tasty local rice
dish. It was agreed at the very enjoyable dinner that communal breakfast would
be at 7:30am.
601km
completed according to Google's "My Tracks", 345km to go (as per the
Confraternity of St James (UK) guide.
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| Looking down the Rio Esla before crossing the bridge |
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| The Church at Faromontanos de Tábara |
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| This herd of goats was just crossing the road to go into the field as we arrived |
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| It's a long road that has no turning |
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| FinallyTabara |
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