Grado to Salas

We had the Pilgrim menu last night (soup, fish, pud and a carafe of wine – each) which was excellent and preceded by a few celebratory beers and concluded with a complimentary apple aperitif. Excellent evening. It rained most of the night …….

Woke this morning to clear blue skies.

Shortly after leaving the road leading out of Grado we followed a mountain path climbing for 4 kms. The descent was steep and tricky. This was the pattern for the day – up and down. The scenery was often breathtakingly beautiful and the paths through woodlands were invigorating. There was a particularly unpleasant stretch through thick, deep mud along a river bank; any mis-step and the mud galoomphed (devoured) one’s boots. Another decline was over smooth rocks – tricky.

We stopped for lunch and a rest in a small town called Cornellana (the filling in the ‘sandwich ‘ was tough and the roll was well past it’s  reasonable life expectancy). The next stretch was a steep climb for 2 kms through the mountain forest followed by a 1 km decline through awful mud which necessitated careful steering and nimble footwork- a real challenge for weary legs.

At about 2 o’clock with the arrival of dripples of rain we stopped in a shelter featuring a machine dispensing cool drinks and a visitors book ( in which we wrote), ate an apple and went through the palaver of donning rain gear …….. and the rain stopped.

We walked for an hour in our rain tops before stripping down to our base layer (vest). We rest of the walk was a gentle climb and we arrived in Salas after four sometime…… and the rain resumed. The hotel is very old, basic but comfortable. The church bell visible from my window proclaims the hour and dongs on the half and will undoubtedly keep me informed on the quality of my night’s sleep.

Tomorrow’s route starts with a very long steep climb but eases off after that.

Yesterday we saw 2 pilgrims on the road ( one we saw twice; he galloped past us the first time – perhaps I suggested to an amorous encounter- and was much slower the second – perhaps post amour :-). We saw no pilgrims today.

God bless.