My Camino Route in 2023

My Camino Route in 2023
This year (2023), I will be walking my tenth Camino in thirteen years. This time I plan to walk the Camino Sanabres from Zamora to Lalin, the the Camino Invierno from Ponferrada to Santiago. The route is shown with the red line on the map.

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Lezama    August 30



14 miles today that was mostly on wooded trails and farm lanes, except for the last 2 miles of highway walking. I swear that this camino is 49% uphill, 49% downhill, and 2% level. It is very much harder than the Camino Frances or Portugues. Still, I think Greg and I are doing quite well. We plan to walk only 7 miles tomorrow to Bilbao. We want to have enough time at the Frank Gehry designed Guggenheim Museum where the building itself is as much a work of art as the art displayed there.

We had an interesting experience the other day in Deba. While waiting for the albergue to open, the two British brothers asked a policeman some questions in Spanish. After a perfunctory reply and their response of "Muchas gracias", he proceed to let them know that we were not in Spain, but in Basque country and taught them how to say thank you in Euskadi, the Basque language. Greg and I happenned to see him again 45 minutes later and wanted to ask him when the tourist office opened. I told Greg that he should try English, that at worst he would not understand. Greg did so and his reply was in perfect English and very courteously delivered. So one must be careful in this region. There is still much resentment against the Franco regime and even with the present government. All signs are in Euskadi, only sometimes are there dual signs with Spanish.

3 comments:

  1. Hi, Bridget from UK here. April 2010 my husband and I walked from Gernika to San Vicente on the camino del Norte, so I shall be following your blog with interest. The stage to Lezama was our firts day, and we tried to follow a route in a german guide which used less paved road. Due to our poor german, we mistook 'there is a road on the right, take the next one' for take the road on the right' and walked an extra 3 or 4 miles! Just as well the next day into Bilbao was short, although a steep climb I recall.
    Enjoy the Guggenheim, although I prefered the actual pictures in the Museo del Bella Artes.
    From soon after Portogulete (spelling?) you will have lovely coastal walking. The Spring wild flowers were amazing - please let us know what they are like in the Autumn. I am trying to persuade my husband to agree to us walking or cycling a further stage in October, but maybe there is to much else going on for us!

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  2. Looking forward to hearing what you think of the museum. In last year's art class we studied some Gehry's architecture and Heather I visited the Gehry - Disney building in Anaheim. The online photos look fantastic.

    The encounter with the Basque policeman sounds very illustrative of the ethnic struggles that never end throughout the world. People have long memories.

    What did you have for dinner?

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  3. Our hospitaleras took us as a group to a restaurant a short walk away. I had a good ensalada mixta, then white fish with fried egg, patatas, and grilled peppers along with the never ending fresh bread and wine. Homemade flan caramel for dessert. This morning we stopped at the panaderia for toast and cafe con leche. Will post later on the Guggenheim.

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