Day 21 Castilblanco de los Arroyos - Almaden de la Plata

Don't you just love the names of these villages!  Last night we spent the night at a youth hostel and while Ana Maria slept soundly, I could not sleep a wink and felt very tired this morning.  We left at 0545 and reached our destination exactly eight hours later, which given the sort of terrain we covered is not bad going!


Today our trek was over 20 miles and not 25 as I mistakenly reported yesterday.  In any event, it felt more like 25!  The first 10 miles or so were on open road climbing steadily to 500 metres.

The other ten miles was through the most beautiful country park, "Parque Natural Sierra Norte".  The park has a couple of granite "Roman" Milestones which were erected over the Via de la Plata to mark the millenium in 2000.  Smaller markers have been placed more recently to mark the path.  This together with the yellow arrow markers make following the path simpler.  That said three other French walkers got lost up the mountain today and arrived at our "Albergue" tonight a couple of hours late!

A very good path which deteriorated rather badly towards the end of the trek led us first downhill for several miles and then sharply uphill again to 500 metres.  This last stretch to reach the Cerro del Calvario was the steepest gradient we have ever experienced.  This coupled with the bad state of the path made it very difficult and I had to stop every twenty steps to catch my breath!  Ana Maria, who of course is MUCH younger than me sailed through it without too much trouble!

Once over the brow of the hill, a short but very steep descent led us straight into the town.

Tomorrow is slightly easier with only about 12 miles to our next town "El Real de la Jara"


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