Castro-Urdialis to Islaris, Sunday, April 22

Post by Wynette: We walked 7 miles today. (Plus about a half mile to beach, photo above, near where we are staying tonight.) We wanted to go a bit further but there didn’t seem to be any place to spend the night without having to walk about 8 miles further, 15 in all, much further than we wanted to go. There was one albergue two or three miles up the Way but apparently it is the albergue from hell, complete with bedbugs. (Thank goodness even albergues get reviews these days.)

So we are in a nice, but inexpensive, business hotel (with lousy wifi) on a highway. They have a popular bar and a huge restaurant and we ate a good lunch here. There must have been 100 other people eating along with us. We’ve noticed that good places to eat here are mobbed by Spanish families eating out on Sundays and when we arrive we are told they are “completo”. This time he said we could come back in an hour. We planned to eat at 1:30 and had to wait till 2:30. So we were plenty hungry when we were served our first course dishes of white bean stew and cooked vegetables with ham and then second course dishes of grilled bass and pork ribs (so tender) and dessert (layered cakes). We usually get the menu del día (around 15 euros) and there is so much food. We probably should start sharing one.

Pobeña to Castro-Urdiales, Saturday, April 21

Post by Wynette: We walked 7.8 miles yesterday. We left early and started the day walking up the stairs shown above. (Only about a third of the steps are visible here.) Then we walked along this path:

Then we climbed down to see the top of an old castle.

Then we walked along the ocean path some more and then along a quiet highway:

And then along a green headland:

Then along the beach to our hotel in the old town in Castro Urdiales.

Equestrian center

We walked by this today. A class was in session. And here is the view back on it from the terrace of the bar we stopped at soon after.

The bar had great coffee. I had two.