El Camino de Santiago or St. Jame's way, as it is known in English, is a pilgrimage path to Santiago in Spain. The crypt of Apostle St.James lies in the cathedral in Santiago. Much has been written about it, both in books and on the web. One of the books we enjoyed reading and used as a reference is 'Walking the Camino de Santiago' by Bethan Davies and Ben Cole.

Having heard about the Camino over the years, we decided on touring this famous route by bicycles. The route is rich with eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth century churches and monuments. The cathedrals in Burgos, León and Santiago are simply stunning. We were quite surprised at how popular the Camino was. Most of the pilgrims were on foot. As their path paralleled or criss-crossed our bike route, we had daily opportunities to chat with them and exchange stories. They came from all walks of life, of all ages, shapes and sizes.

The route is very well signposted, you can see from examples here. There are also water taps at frequent intervals.

The climb to the Ibañeta pass was quite good and not too steep. The top half was in slight drizzle and we reached Roncesvalles in a cloud. We were glad to have seen it the day before under bright, sunny skies. We got our sellos in the monastery and bought our first camino souveneirs, camino log pins which adorned our bike bags. After a hot soup in the restaurant, we bundled up and headed down. The pretty little town of Burguette was beckoning and we decided to stop there. Hotel Loizu was quite nice with a garage for our bicycles a couple of doors down. It was only 2pm! We showered, got some coffee in the bar and sat in the beautiful lounge on the first floor. In the evening, we walked around the village and found a supermarket and bought some green figs for next day's ride. They were so delicious, they did not make it to the next day.

Setting off in St. Jean Pied de Port

Dinner was sumptous and of course the wine flowed freely. For dessert, we had 'tarta de Santiago', a cake made of mostly ground almonds, butter and eggs. This dessert is offered with many 3-course meals on the camino, we would be enjoying the tarta many more times.

It was a nice day of riding on a hilly terrain. In Zubiri, we chatted with three Italian women cyclists. They were very friendly and we would run into them many times on the camino. Sadly, our conversations tended to be brief due to lack of a common language. Whenever we saw them, we would greet each other like the best of friends but could not get past '¿Como estás?' and 'Where are you headed today?'

Pamplona is a nice city. We spent about two hours, taking in the sights and getting our stamps. There were many monuments of the Encierro, the Running of the Bulls.

We made a slight detour from the main bike route to visit the church of Santa Maria of Eunate which supposedly has links to the Knights Templar. It is lovely and is set in calm surroundings. When we arrived there, a wedding was about to begin. The guests were all waiting for the wedding party. The women were dressed simply divinely, everyone from grandma to little girls.

Another nice town was Puente La Reina, which came into prominence primarily because it was a town on the camino. Pilgrims had been crossing the river Río Arga by ferry. Circa 11th century, a queen of Navarra, upset with ferrymen taking advantage of pilgrims, had the bridge built. Hence the name, Puente la Reina i.e., the queen's bridge. We had thought this would be a good stopping point but the hotels were full. We decided to go on to Estella, another 25km from Puente. I called a hostal there and reserved a room.

In Puente La Reina, we ran into the Experience Plus group which had stayed in our hotel in Burguete. We would see them again and again and even as we finished in Santiago.

The hostal was in a rather commercial part of Estella, about 10minutes by foot from the centre of town. We parked our bicycles in the ground floor storage. Besides a few pieces of furniture, our bicycles were the only other things in this huge room. The bubbly landlady stamped our credencials and gave us some tips on where to go for dinner. There would be no breakfast because the next day was Sunday and the family would not be available. We were to leave the room and the garage keys at the front desk on departure.

Dinner was paellas at the Plaza Mayor. It was a bustling place, parents eating and drinking in the cafés while their kids played on the plaza. It was a relaxing wrap up to a long day.

Breakfast in the morning was at a bakery across the street from the hostal. We were hungry and polished off couple of pastries. The coffee tasted really good.

Los Arcos is a pretty little town and has a beautiful church with a huge organ. Here we chatted with a foursome of German and Austrian cyclists. During lunch in town, I met a German man who was walking the Camino for the sixth time. This time it was a honeymoon, he had met his Brasilian wife on the Camino three years before.

Viana is another pretty town, tucked away behind high walls. There was a fiesta going on and a band playing in the center of town. We got our stamps, refilled our bottles and were on our way again.

Logroño was an upcoming milestone. Somehow we were unimpressed with the town and decided lunch could wait. We followed the arrows to the albergue to get our stamps. There was a large group of hikers in the yard, waiting for accomodation. It was only noon! It seems the albergues fill quickly and overflow hikers must keep walking or find other accomodation. We stopped at a park on the way out of town and ate our yogurts. We had to ignore a local man's well intended directions. He was indeed guiding us to the Camino, but to the walking path, not the road.

We rode on remote roads to Navarrete. It was very rural and quiet till we landed on a neighbourhood picnic just outside Fuenmayor. What a fiesta! If it were earlier in the day, we might have stopped in.

Overnight was in Navarrete, in a classy hotel just outside of town. When we asked the hotel receptionist for dinner recommendations, she sounded worried about the meagre options on a Sunday. Bar Deportivo might offer some choices, she said. We were prepared for cold sandwiches but as it turned out, it was a most sumptuous dinner on the lively terrace of Bar Deportivo. And the wine, well, need I say anything?

It was a short day today. We wanted to overnight in Santo Domingo as it offered monuments we wanted to visit. The ride was pleasan with a little rain along the way for about a half hour. Heavy as the gortex parkas are to carry in the luggage, they work when you need them to.

Azofra was a little town with a small plaza which was full of pilgrims. We took that as an invitation and stopped for our mid-morning snacks. As we left, I chatted with a young Canadian woman who was walking the Camino with a prosthetic leg. Inspiring!

Nájera was another cute town. We spent some time looking for the monastery 'built into the cliffs'. We found it but it was not quite how Jerry had pictured it from a poster he had thought he had seen. Nonetheless, it was an attractive building but was unfortunately closed.

We rolled into Santo Domingo a little after noon. We splurged and went for the parador on the central plaza of Santo Domingo. Paradors are government run hotels, converted from historical buildings. This one was a 12th century hospital. It was luxurious!

Checking in at the same time as I, was a French man living in London. He had walked part of the camino in the spring and had stayed in albergues. Having experienced the stress of finding a bed in the alburgues then, he was staying in hotels this time around.

The Santo Domingo cathedral houses a live rooster and a hen which have an amusing, anecdotal background - Santo Domingo de la Calzada, where the chicken crowed after being roasted. We were eager to visit the cathedral but had to be patient, it would be open only at 4:30pm.

After visiting the cathedral and walking around town, we settled at a taverna for drinks and to catch up on our journals. Some hikers we had seen earlier stopped by and we all enjoyed cervezas together. Dinner was paellas, at another bar two doors down.

The fiesta at Plaza de España was hard to miss, we followed the crowds and enjoyed the festivities for a short time. The following morning was La fiesta de patatas, or the potato festival. Maybe, they were just warming up on this night.

What an awesome day of cycling! It started out with slight drizzle which tapered off quickly. The roads went through varied scenery, up and down hills and had nearly no traffic. We chatted with the German-Austrian foursome and the Ex+ group along the way.

Burgos is quite grand, with the cathedral dominating the main square. This city, as most other cities, was squeaky clean. We rode into town and got a room at the first hotel we saw. It was nice and was within a few minutes' walk from the center.

As a variation, dinner was going to be tapas. The place where we ended up, Casa Pancho, was apparently written up in guide books. It was probably one of the best meals on the camino. As we were wrapping up dinner, the Ex+ group showed up. We stayed on had a very enjoyable evening together. We asked the waiter for a digestive recommendation and the bar treated the entire group to a complimentary local liquor, Tizona Verde.

It was a nice, long ride of mostly flat countryside. This was the meseta, or the plains of Castilla. The road paralleled the camino much of the way and allowed us an opportunity to talk to the walkers. The Buen caminos were getting very frequent. Many of the pilgrims said it rather mechanically. It must have been the heat or the monotony of the seemingly endless flat path. Cycling on this terrain was quite a lot of fun and we made tracks.

As we were assessing the day and how much further we wanted to go, some in the Ex+ group suggested we stay at the same hotel as they, in Carrión de las Condes. Their hotel was a converted monastery and sounded appealing. An hour or so later, we were checking in at Hotel Real Monasterio San Zoilo.

The hotel was really rustic, wooden beams lined the ceiling in the room. The elegant hallway had a lot of dark wood and windows with coloured panes in a radiating pattern.

We walked into town for dinner and ate on the balcony of a bar. It was a slight mis-adventure, trying new tapas, but we survived. This town marked the halfway point on the Camino, or so the bar placemats claimed.

Today's ride was again mostly flat. We got our stamps in Sahagún and stopped for coffee. We ran into the cycling group and the Italian chicas at the same bar. Here, I got a 'must do' tip from a Spanish gentleman, tapas in the Barrio Humedo part of León. Here we also saw pilgrims on horseback.

The last 15km coming into León was on a busy stretch. The parador in town came highly recommended by our Spanish friend Gabriel and I had made a reservation earlier in the day. When we arrived there, I could not believe that was the place we would be staying in. It was simply grand.

The hotel had a guarded parking lot. Still, we thought it would be better to have the bicycles somewhere indoors. After much persuasion(in Spanish), I convinced the concierge to let us park our bicycles under the stairwell inside the building. It was understandable that they did not want bicycles ruining the opulent interior of the hotel.

Parador San Marcos at Night

The León cathedral was bigger and grander than any I had seen. We wondered why it was not as well known as some its more famous counterparts in Europe. The word 'grand' seems to repeat itself in this narrative, I cannot think of a better word to describe these Spanish monuments.

After an hour of sightseeing, we looked up the Ex+ cycling group and later met up with them for dinner. In the last two-three days of cycling, we had enjoyed the helpful and amusing chalk markings on the road by their guide and thanked him by inviting him to a drink. This evening, we also met Maria and Peter, an Austrian couple who live near our old stomping grounds in Germany. We promised to keep in touch.

Breakfast at the parador was the largest spread I had ever seen. Hot foods, cold foods, exotic fruit, cakes and even champagne!

Another easy cycling day. The town of Hospital de Órbigo was very pretty and we stopped for lunch. We met another Austrian, Gotthard. He had cycled all the way from his home in Austria. We would ride with him the rest of the afternoon and next morning. We had decided on Astorga as the next stop. Upon Gotthard's request, I made a hotel reservation for us and him at hotel Gaudi.

Just outside of Astorga, a young woman was examining the damage to her front tire. We stopped to help. She was Maya from Norway and was figuring out how to fix the flat. This was her first time and she quickly learnt how to do it. After repairing two spots, the tire still seemed flat. The Esterbauer book showed a bicycle shop in town, some local boys confirmed it with directions. Jerry walked with Maya to the shop while Gotthard and I checked in at the hotel. As it turned out, the repairs were fine but her pump was busted. We saw Maya again during the next few days, both she and her tire were holding out well.

Hotel Gaudi was right at one of the two plazas in town. Astorga is known for chocolate and of course we bought and tried some. All I can say is, it's not Ritter Sport or anything close.

Gotthard, Jerry and I walked down to Plaza Mayor for dinner. Gotthard treated us to a bottle of wine as a thank you for my having made his hotel reservation.

It was a beautiful, gradual climb to the pass, only the last part got a bit steep. El Acebo is a lovely mountain town and we were ready for lunch. Over some hearty soup, we decided to stay in Ponferrada. We passed another pretty town Molinaseca and were in Ponferrada shortly thereafter. The hotels here were completely booked. We later learned that the curators and organizers of Yo Camino exhibition had taken up most of the hotel beds. We stayed in a hostal 3km further along on the camino.

We took a bus into town for sightseeing, Castillo de Templarios and the churches. The exhibition Yo Camino housed a collection of statues, murals and paintings from various monuments along the camino. It was a real treat, as if specially arranged for us.

As we sat in the plaza enjoying the cerveza and vino tinto, who should walk by but the Italian women. We exchanged greetings, that would be the last time we would see them. They were pushing on much futher the next day than we were. We still had spare days and decided to travel just 40km before the next mountain pass.

Dinner was the standard(but excellent) 3-course menu with wine. It was very generous, we were so full by the time we were done with the first two courses that we had to turn down dessert!

It was an easy ride to Villafranca del Bierzo, a pretty little town. We rode another 20km to Vega de Valcarce and checked into Pension Fernandez. We selected a two bedroom apartment. Luckily the second bedroom was not let and we had the apartment all to ourselves. It was the coziest of accomodations.

Some time later, we locked ourselves out and discovered the landlady did not have any other keys. She called a friend of hers who tried to break into the room. As Jerry was contemplating a climb to the first floor window, the lady dug out a pile of keys from her dresser drawer. After trying a few, we were able to open the door. What a relief. Through all of this, the owner had been smiling and patient. As a thank you, we bought her a bottle of Cordo Negro, was she ever surprised!

The pension had a big yard and a clothesline. We talked to a Canadian woman putting her clothes on the line. She was nice and I was on the verge of asking her to have coffee with us when we learned that her daughter had come down with a case of the mumps. They had moved from the alburgue to a double room in the pension because it was quieter and more comfortable. They had now been in the village for five days with no relief in sight. Needless to say we made a hasty retreat. The lady understood, mumps is very contagious.

We bought some cereal, coffee and milk for the next morning. Early evening was spent reading in the tiny living room. We sat down at a local bar which offered a nice dinner selection. By the time we sat down and ordered, the choice meals were gone. We had pork which was not really prepared to our taste. But hey, we weren't exactly going hungry.

Jerry fixed us a nice breakfast from the groceries bought the evening before. We left at 8:15, it was the earliest we had been able to depart on this trip. It was a comfortable, steady ride to the top and a long downhill. We ran into the Ex+ group near Samos. Sárria seemed like a good place to stop. The town was unimpressive but somehow we landed in a nice nook. When we stopped to look around, we were staring at a hotel.

We wanted to see the sights while there was still daylight. We postponed showering and got a map at the front desk. The receptionist marked a walking route which would take us by all the monuments. On the way back to the hotel, Jerry had a CD made at a photo shop.

The hotel was lovely, just a small problem with the hot water. The manager had called maintainance but we could not wait any longer. After a tepid shower, I craweld into bed to get warm. While waiting for the hotel restaurant to open, we watched 'Smallville' in Spanish.

As we made our way back from dinner, the manager excitedly told me the hot water problem was fixed. The super hot shower before going to bed was very relaxing.

The hills had become smaller, the cycling was over steady ups and downs. We had actually wanted to go till Melida which meant we could be in Santiago the next day. We called the hotels in Melida but they were full. As a result, we stopped 20km short, in Palais de Rey. We still had days to spare so it did not matter much. The hostal was on the side of a hill and our bedroom had a great view. The young man at the hotel/bar wanted to practise his English and we chatted, he spoke English and I, Spanish. When Jerry saw the man's motorcycle in the garage, it sparked off a conversation between the two of them. There are no language barriers when it comes to motorcycle fans.

We had a lunch of salads, they were fresh and good on the Camino. They typically came with tuna fish. Jerry ordered his without tuna, I guess he was getting a little tired of tuna.

As we were now close to Santiago, we thought it was time to make hotel reservations there. We also booked a room in Arzúa, our stop for the next night.

I went down to the hotel restaurant and reserved the best table for us. The exceptional 3-course meal cost an unbelievable €8/pp, including wine and bottled water. At the next table sat Jim, the American from Seattle whom I had seen while we both checked in. He had cycled the camino years ago and was now doing it on foot for the seventh time. Each year, he was introducing the camino to different people, this time it was his friend Micheal.

We set off by about 9am. It was a very cool morning. The cycling was mostly on country roads, up and down seemingly endless hills. I had a large piece tortilla de patata in Melida, a regular mid-morning snack. On these recent cool days we enjoyed Cola Cau, the Spanish brand of hot chocolate.

We arrived in Arzúa at 1pm, a very short day, as was the previous day. I was surprised at my own melancholy feeling, the camino was almost over.

We checked out the sights and ate Paellas Verduras in a bar across the street from the hotel. The restaurant in the hotel seemed to be the nicest dinner option. I reserved a table, the last available one. As our orders were being taken, Jim and Michael from the previous evening walked in. They were told the restaurant was completo, or full. So, we called them over to our table, dinner with them was very enjoyable. We learnt a bit about their backgrounds. Jim worked at a youth correctional facility. Micheal was born in Germany, grew up in Romania and had now made a life in Seattle.

It was cold this morning, about 12ºC. The road was up and down all the way to Santiago. The finale was quite exciting, arriving at the Plaza de Obradoiro with the imposing cathedral. It was the perfect place to finish the tour.

Santiago de Compostela

While shooting photos, the cycling group showed up. After all around congradulations, we bid the group Hasta luego and proceeded to the Oficina del Peregrino for our Compostelas.

The compostela certifies the pilgrimage based on the stamps collected in the credencial. In the form I filled out, I had to declare if I did the tour for religious or spiritual reasons. The lady looking over my form looked disappointed to see I had checked 'neither'. I explained to her that it was a vacation, in addition, I liked cycling.

We both got our compostelas and headed to the hotel to check in and get cleaned up. We now had task of finding our way back to Pamplona and our car. The staff at the tourist information was quite helpful but did not have enough information. At the back of the tourist office was a car rental agency. After investigating and weighing our options, we decided on the overnight bus to Vitoria, very near Pamplona.

At the Santiago bus station, we reserved an overnight ride, for the next night to Vitoria. The bus company ALSA was very prefessional. The man assured us there were hourly buses from Vitoria to Pamplona and that journey would take an hour.

Now it was time to send postcards and get a few souveneirs. Back at the plaza, we ran into the Swedish couple Lotta and Björn. Earlier in the day, we had cycled into the centre of Santiago, more or less together. We spent a very enjoyable hour having drinks with them.

The restaurant menus were full of fish and seafood but we both ended up having chicken. And of course, tarta de Santiago.

The next day, we checked out of the hotel but left our bags and bicycles in their store room. We attended mass in the Cathedral. The star attraction, the swinging incense burner, was not to be. Still it was fun attending mass which honored the pilgrims.

We saw many familiar pilgrims and had lunch with Linda and Chas, part of the Ex+ group. Dinner was with them again and Susan.