2015-10-06: Caminando Salamanca – Cubo de la Tierra del Vino (37/37 km)

In spite of syncing my GPS the night before it refused to find the proper satellites among the city blocks in the morning. So I had to walk a bit using the guidebook through the streets of Salamanca. Eventually the GPS synced and I had navigated correctly.

Out through a number of suburban villages. In between you really realized that you were on the meseta plains. A slowly undulating landscape in autumn brown beige. A little rain and a fantastic rainbow. Hardly any forests and very few trees. At the end of the morning the GPS tracks and Guidebooks were too old and for a while I was almost lost. But I found the new camino track that was badly marked but you could guess the idea of a field way close to the motorway. Lunch at a bar in “Calzada de Valdunciel”. I had a number of work mails to reply. I left the village around twelve. On my way out I met a guy from Bilbao.
The next 16 km also followed mostly field ways close to the motor way. The meseta continued but here with a little more trees or almost forest. The only thing to see was the big prison (Cárcel de Topas). I had very little water left and no place to refill. A very "dry" part of the Vía de la Plata.

Eventually I reached the village “Cubo de la Tierra del Vino” after some 39 km (remember I was lost for a while). I found I private albergue almost directly. Some pilgrims. Most Spanish but a couple of German young ladies one of which seemed to have a connection to one young man from Spain. You never know what happens on the Camino. But the other pilgrims are males and some of them my age or not too far from.

And there I am now, waiting for the dinner at 8. I have been out at the village and bought a few things in the one-and-only small shop. Found a SMS from my daughter Anna. She was at Corse. Quite a surprise.

Spent the night with two Basque gentlemen having a good dinner at the albergue. Talking Spanish all the night. Slept well.