My mom grew up in Portales, a town in southeastern New Mexico. My dad grew up in Dora which is very near Portales. My Aunt Theressa still lives in Portales.
I knew that Portales was the Spanish word for porches, or portals. When we were in Logroño in 2013, we stayed in Hotel Portales. Yesterday we were walking through Logroño on the street that runs beside the cathedral and I noticed several business with Portales in their name. I thought, “what is it about the word portales that makes it such a big deal around here? Maybe I’ll ask in the hotel.”
Then, I realized that the street we were walking down was named Portales Street! Oh, that explains why so many businesses are named Portales. And then, duh, I realized we’d been walking under a huge porch/portal that went on for several blocks. We were quite enjoying the coolness it provided. So, I suppose the street was named for the porch!!
Cafe PortalesPortales Doner KebabView of the porchesAnother view of the porches
Flights of stairs climbed: 2. That might be actual stairs. Logroño is pretty flat.
We had a low key day. Went to the post office which is always fun. The post offices here are great. They are clearly there to help! We needed to mail a package to Burgos. Plus we had received a notice that the suitcase we mailed from Pamplona to Sahagún would be returned to sender if it wasn’t picked up by April 30. Well, we won’t get to Sahagún till May 6. We had told them May 6 (twice) when we mailed the suitcase in Pamplona but I guess that didn’t get communicated. So, we asked at the PO here what to do about this dilemma. It turned out that the Pamplona PO put down the Sahagún PO as our return address. So, I guess the Sahagún PO will send it to the Sahagún PO. The woman in the Logroño PO this morning told me “tranquila”, not to worry. But it still makes me nervous; we will try to contact the Sahagún PO directly.
Then we walked about a mile to the main train station to get a Tarjeta Dorado (Gold Card) which is a year pass for old people to get a big discount on train tickets. But, unfortunately, for some reason, the entire main ticket and information office in the train station was closed this morning, and only this morning. So … No Tarjeta Dorado (yet) for us. (We were too lazy to walk back there this afternoon.)
Then we walked to the cathedral. There is a Michaelangelo (attributed at least) behind the alter and I wanted to see that. But … The cathedral was closed.
We walked down Laurel Street, famous for its tapas. Seemed much more upscale than it was when we were here 13 years ago. We ended up coming home and making good sandwiches in our apartment.
We did go out again and got to go into the cathedral this time. BUT, the light wasn’t working to show the Michaelangelo painting. It was enclosed in glass and there was so much glare you couldn’t see it without the inside light working.
So … It was a bit of an off-kilter day. Charlie and I are eager to get back on the trail tomorrow.
Correos: the post office. They are very modern and efficient and the employees work hard.Calle Laurel, tapas streetThe cathedral from the side. If you squint you might be able to find the stork’s nest. First one we’ve seen.The Michaelangelo painting. What you see in the middle is just a reflection on the glass of what was on the opposite wall.The light “no funciona”Charlie managed to get a view of it through his camera from the side. I never was able to see it.
They have a lot of books at the post office, mostly children’s books. More books and boxes. We bought a box to ship some things to Burgos. You can even get Camino merch, and socks, and neck warmers.
Pretty run-of-the-mill electric candles. But then I moved down and saw the next one. For a few seconds these looked like real candles. They flicker. Very nice work, quite realistic. We “lit” one, 0.20€. When you put in the 20 cent coin the next one in line lights up.This is one of the spires of the cathedral. It rained a bit as we walked to the church.
It must be asparagus season. This little market had four kinds and one was green asparagus. They had three grades of white asparagus. The most expensive ones were the largest which goes against my intuition. This is a small Dia market near our apartment. It has four shelves of different kinds of canned asparagus.
This was the first Camino over-the-highway bridge so far. There is a much larger and well known one just before Astorga. I saw the sign, interpreted it as “walk your bike”, and thought what else would you do?When I got closer and saw the ramp I realized it was to help you do that. Wynette doesn’t like stairs and used the ramp. It was a little steep but she said it stretched her muscles and it felt good. Wynette on the bridge with mountains in the distance. The sign on the other side has been defaced.
Miles walked: 10.4. Six of those were on the path and 4.4 of those were around Logroño.
Elevation gained in flights of stairs equivalence: 14. Not a lot of up and down.
Today we walked the short six mile distance between Viana and Logroño. We were out of the hotel in Viana by about 7:20 and in Logroño by 10:30. We are staying here in the big city for two days.
We crossed into La Rioja today. Logroño, population 200,000, is the capital of La Rioja. So, we have left Basque country.
We have an apartment with a kitchen. I was going to say “little apartment” but it’s actually quite roomy.
We enjoyed going to the nearby grocery store and buying good bread and cheese and tomatoes and a salad kit and made lunch “at home”. We also got food for breakfast in the morning. Logroño is famous for its tapas, but I have a feeling we are going to eat most of our meals in the apartment. We have such fun going to the grocery store and finding great things to bring home.
We did errandy things today like a post office pickup, grocery shopping, laundry. We are glad to have another day to spend in Logroño. Tomorrow we can tell you more about the city itself.
The walk was nicer than I expected since I knew we would be walking on the outskirts of Logroño. We went through some industrial stuff but not a lot. We went through a few tunnels to go under highways. I enjoy seeing the picture that gets framed at the end of a tunnel. The above is looking back.And this is looking forward. There is always graffiti in the tunnels.We passed this monument.It says “In this place were assassinated on September 3, 1936, 25 residents of the Riojan towns of Ábalos and San Vicente de la Sonsierra, victims of the Franco repression. The people who forget their history are condemned to repeat it.”This man was busy tending his window plants. He had grape vines growing all over the front of his house. We are in wine country!We crossed the Rio Ebro just before entering Logroño. The Ebro is the longest river entirely in Spain.Our home for two days.
