Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz is a very small town with 3 pensiones and a very small shop with few choices. So, rice puddings for dinner. (I’d experienced lunch in the cafe. 😁).
It was very hot last night. Benedo was positively melting when he came back from having a few beers. Hard to explain but we were in a room at one end of a passage. A double bed in the room beside us and a kitchen in another plus, our bathroom in another. Just outside our door was an air conditioner.
The other end of the passage had a locked door. If there’s a fire, know I tried to escape but that door, and the bars on the window, saved my estate from paying for a cremation. 😏 So, we left the bedroom door open and ran the cooling system for most of the night..
We planned on leaving by 06:30 as we expected it to be a long walk in the heat, a couple more than yesterday, Tuesday (about 23km).
At the other end of this last stage to Córdoba is, for me, a nice hotel room, alone, and with a balcony and a kettle. I offered to share with B but a double bed was the only option. And I’m not going there even if it was a big double. Might be easier to nudge him as he snores but……
And did he snore last night! He said he has sleep apnea and is supposed to lose weight. Now, if beer had negative calories he’d be very successful.
Last day to Córdoba
Estimates of the distance range from the 26km down to about 22 or 23. The disparity made no sense until we were nearly in Córdoba and we realised: the low numbers only count the distance to the outside of the town.
The reality: there are a couple more km to the centre after that! About 3!
We did well today, about 5 hours of up and down many small hills in the dusty tracks.
And no, we didn’t leave at 06:30. Guess who is a gossip and who last night left his hat in a bar that wasn’t open at 06:00 as the guy’d said it would be. Lent him my buff to cover his receding hair bits. Then realised my solar powered hat was deep in my pack. Recovered it and, by then, the other bar’d opened up and he and his hat were happily reunited and it was after 06:45!
The farms changed over the course of today’s walk. Olive groves grew increasingly less frequent
until we were in grains of some type and sunflowers. Both had been harvested already. Then we came to hectares of what looked like a fruit tree but, had no drip irrigation so it seemed unlikely. Sure enough, they were almond trees.
Finally, Córdoba.
B is staying in an albergue somewhere, Manolo arrives late tomorrow and he is looking forward to that. They are leaving Friday, as am I.
The next stage to Merida has 3 days I have no intention of trying to walk. Nearly 40km in this heat doesn’t seem like fun. I can’t imagine B will do them easily, especially with some being consecutive days. I know his knees are grotty, often cause him pain but, he is a bloke and wouldn’t want to fail Manolo. However, B is 11 years younger than me and M another 8-10 than him. I am aware of some of my limits!
Love the requirement that dogs in Córdoba pee into particular drains. 😂😂😂
Lunch in Córdoba
Yup. Eggplant fried with honey (molasses) drizzled over it; grilled asparagus and shrimp, fried. Very fatty meal. Very tired.
Very nice to lie down.
Wandering the world 