So today began icy cold. I woke up around 6am and met Courtney downstairs who is always the first one up and out. Before she left this morning I made a point to ask the hospitalero if they had a lost property box. Yesterday Court was saying she really wanted some walking poles and I thought maybe someone had left theirs behind. Of course yes this was the case and the camino provides once again! while I was waiting for @chazzie-leigh to get ready I went for a walk to take photos of the church. When I came back she was in a funny mood. Last night she missed out on yoga because she wanted to find food and then this morning she couldn't find her shoes. We left with Emily into the dark and extremely cold morning.

I was soon separated from the girls because I could not resist the temptation to capture the sunrise and all of the amazing colours it was casting across the vast sky.

Once again, the planes in the sky took centre stage as the sun highlighted their paths and before engulfing the landscape in its bright orange glow.

I had a phone call from Char and she was asking where I was. Still in a funny mood it sounded though she was a bit distressed so I hurried along to find her. This made me a little frustrated and I think because of that I restarted yesterday's injury. Not an ideal way to start the day. When I finally caught up to Char we had a chat and worked out our differences. We settled each others silly presumptions about each other and made up. I am sure that this camino has helped us to become more understanding of each other's needs and more importantly more considerate of each other. We can still have disagreements from time to time but these are swiftly followed by an exchange, a discussion and a resolution. I am very thankful for this as our arguments could sometimes go from hours to days long!

We climbed a small mountain where we could see our destination from, Burgos. Atop the hill was a large labrynth which I walked to the middle of but did not follow as it would have added on an extra half an hour of walking to an already sizeable day.

Down the other side we went until I had to take a small break to rest my injured foot and take off my jumper as the sun rose higher in the sky. Little did I know there was a small town just around the bend and we stopped for a coffee, smoothie and snacks as well. We reunited with a few pilgrims we had met since the beginning. We basked in the sun over espressos before taking to the path again.

Marie the American girl noticed I was limping and suggested that I use some sort of compression on the shin to support the muscles and ligaments. This was the best advice I could have been given. Initially the tight bandage hurt the swollen muscle but eventually this became manageable and I found myself walking nearly normally again. We passed through the small village and towards the large city of Burgos.

Eventually we came to an airport which we had to circumnavigate and after that we were in the industrial zone of Burgos. We had heard of an alternative route to get into the city but as we seemed to have gone past it already we carried on.

This part was pretty gross. We were walking along the six lane arterial road and I felt as though I was smoking a cigarette the entire way. On top of that, the concrete pavement we were pounding with our feet was particularly unforgiving. I began to limp again which was obviously uncomfortable. We passed a sign that said 10km to Burgos.

We were not impressed but we had to carry on. By this point we were getting quite agitated with hunger and exhaustion but we were determined to get to our destination. Earlier that day Emiel had told us that he had organised an Airbnb for us and we were not obliged to come but we were welcome.

Obviously that was not a question and we were heading straight there for a private bed and bathroom and relaxation beyond anything we would have seen on this camino yet! With about an hour to go I could not handle the concrete jungle anymore so we diverged onto the riverside.

Finally we reached the street where we were to sleep and though we could not check in yet we relaxed at a bar on the corner with a couple of good sized portions of patatas bravas.

While waiting for our friends to arrive we were approached by a man asking if we were waiting for an Airbnb.

We were suspicious until he said Emiel's name then we followed him up the street to the apartment which was only two doors up. He showed us in and we were so hyped, it was huge! 5 bedrooms, 9 beds and room for 13 people.

We were first in so we judged the rooms quickly and took the second nicest, leaving the best for Emiel.

Soon the others arrived and I let them in using a similar style of cinematography as the MTV show Cribs. We were all hyped now.

After settling in, the next task was food and drink. We selected a restaurant down the road and had a very mature dinner with our pilgrim friends. It was really nice to be waited on.

There ended up being 8 of us in the house that night through various means. The camino crossed my path with Maggie the American at the tourist office. She had just arrived in town and was looking for the albergue and I was on a mission for some beersies. Without heesitating I asked if she wanted to come and stay with us and she was happy she did!

Goodnight Burgos

PEACE

@stickycj