If Garry and I witnessed a sporting religious event the previous night, now it was Yoni’s turn to turn to religion. We have been friends 45 years, but there is still the Great Divide. Garry and I support St.Kilda and Yoni, Carlton, and never the twain shall meet. Carlton were playing an even bigger enemy than The Saints. The Collingwood Magpies. (Our dislike for the mongrel mob is our only commonality when it comes to AFL footy). So Yoni magnanimously gave us till 10.00 off, so he could watch the game. We are, after all, on holiday, so a 10 o’clock start on one day was welcomed by us lemmings.
When we eventually made it to the car, we were off to Ezcarray and a walk down the Ria Oja. For the first twenty minutes we walked by the pretty river, and then the path veered upwards and into forest. I can think of no better way of spending a Sunday morning than a) Carlton losing and b) walking peacefully by a river and through a shaded forest. And during our walk I had an epiphany. In these new age days of peace, love and brown rice, many of us, friends, partners, acquaintances, meditate to help navigate the traumas of our difficult daily lives. I am not one of these. I have never felt the need nor inclination to sit and open my chakras. But whilst we were walking through the forest, I dropped back 30 metres from my friends, blocked out whatever conversation they were having, and just smelled the forest and listened to the birds sing. Cowbells rung, the river babbled beneath us. I have never meditated, but if this is the peace of mind that meditation helps you achieve, then maybe I should reconsider. Or maybe I shouldn’t, but instead, head out into the forest more often. Cynicism aside for 30 seconds, it was wonderful. I’m getting soft in my old age. Whatever, my friends now call me the Gamai Lama.
Yesterday we had our picnic on the grass under a tree in an urban park. Today, we enjoyed the remnants of yesterday’s picnic on a conveniently placed picnic table overlooking the river. Tough. Real tough. And I haven’t even started with Ezcarray. It must be affected by the meditative qualities of the Ria Oja, upon which it sits. The time was well after 12.00 and we hadn’t had our first drink for the day. We happily righted this misdeed in the beautiful central square of this peaceful village, together with families of locals, enjoying Sunday in the way they know best. Strolling, drinking and eating tapas. We may have finished our picnic remnants only half an hour earlier, but there are strict regulations in this area about drinking. It is compulsory to have tapas with your drink. And who are we to break the law?
We needed to be back to the parador by 2 o’clock so Yoni could have another board meeting. All four of us have responsibilities in the real world and we each found ways to deal with these responsibilities in our own time and manner. Garry and I weren’t the least bit upset. Being in Rioja and not spending a leisurely afternoon at a winery is sacrilegious, punishable by expulsion. So while Yoni made critical decisions regarding New Mexican seaweed, Mark completed a weekly article that he writes, Garry and I found a very nice winery, Campo Viejo, outside of Nogrono, where we sat on the veranda overlooking the vineyards and learnt the differences between Crianza, Reserve and Grand Reserve in D.O.C wines. It just gets harder and harder.
We actually needed to keep Mark away from the locals, lest he seriously insult them. For someone who has made his living from linguistic pirouettes and verbal skills (quite well, I might add), he just couldn’t get his brain/tongue around Spanish place names. Rioja was butchered by him, coming out as rokka, rochia, whatever. Anything but the correct name and pronunciation. Other places also had their names twisted to the point of unrecognizable. This is rather surprising from someone so eloquent. It must be a sign of his relaxed holiday mode affecting his verbal abilities. Or his disrespect for good wine.
By 4.30 we were ready to explore yet another quaint Spanish town. They’re all quaint in there own way, a bit different from each other, yet preserving a common Don Quixote type look. On most days of the week in Spain, 4.30 p.m. isn’t exactly rush hour. Lunch is not long finished and dinner a long way off. Sundays seem even more sedate. The new part of town on this Sunday was not really super impressive, but I did manage to get some good pintxos is, especially an interesting serving of battered and deep fried pig’s ears. I can’t say that it rates with the best portions I’d eaten so far this trip, but I guess it’s something I have to try once. And it will probably stay as a one-off thing.
The narrow laned old town was not much busier, but it was slightly more interesting (read “quaint”). On Mark’s insistence, and Garry’s active support, we looked for what Mark described as a worker’s restaurant, as a juxtaposition to last’s night’s fancy restaurant. Given it was a Sunday night, no worker’s restaurants were open. So we found a restaurant with the plainest, dumbed-down menu we could find. Whilst we stood outside the restaurant, reading the menu, a rather disheveled Dutch woman came up to us and asked if she could join us for dinner. Sha had started the Camino today and when she had arrived to the town where she wanted to sleep, her booking wasn’t in the system. She couldn’t find anywhere else to sleep so was forced to continue on to Santo Domingo de la Calzada, 36 km from her starting point. And she looked just like someone who had walked a hard 36 km on her first day out. Garry and I wee happy to help out this refugee-on-the-Camino, but we also new that there were other (a deliberate syntax error) amongst us who may be less inclined to dine with unexpected company. We dodged and said it was fine but we couldn’t promise when we would be coming for dinner, which was an elegant, and actually truthful way of declining.
When we did arrive to the restaurant for dinner, our Dutch almost companion had found another group to have dinner with, leaving everyone involved happy. This Dutch woman may have had blistered, bandaged toes and a stooped limp, but we noticed that all the other people sitting at this cheap restaurant were all wearing sandals after a hard day’s slog and all had toes heavily bandaged and walked with varying degrees of difficulty. Most were Northern European. It must be a “thing”. Getting to middle age, staying in spartan lodgings, eating at uninspiring restaurants. Penance for past sins, perhaps? We also noticed staying at our very nice parador small groups of young, toned, sporty Spaniards, also carrying big backpacks. They seem to be doing the Camino with a different purpose and mindset. I know which one I would be preferring.
The down market restaurant was manned (personned, in new age speak?) by a rather surly waitress who it appeared would have preferred to have been elsewhere. Her name was Sara and I think she shared certain personality traits with a more famous Sara here in Israel. In any case, at 9.30 p.m. Sara clocked off, without us actually having received the entirety of the set menu or informing us that she was off to an all night bacchanal. The owner somewhat unwillingly completed the bargain. If travelling is about enjoying a range of experiences, we very much succeeded if we compare tonight’s and yesterday’s restaurants.
In any case, we had a post dinner night cap and off to bed
