Day 10 - Azofra to Santo Domingo de Calzada - 16km

It was spotting with rain in the morning when I left after a final goodbye to Mick, Yvonne and Robin. I didn´t leave until about 8 as I was hoping the rain would stop and also had planned only a shortish day. The track was nice and wide, but rather hilly, and passed through vineyards and farmland most of the way. Unfortunately the rain became heavier and I had to stop and put on my poncho.

I paused for a break and a snack after a long long climb up to the only village on the whole way, then set off again grateful it had stopped raining. As I left Cirueña I could hear hymn singing, and thought it was coming from one of the houses there, but then realised there was quite a large procession ahead of me going along the Camino to Santo Domingo. I virtually followed them the 5km into town although I never managed to catch them up. The farmers had switched sprinklers on amongst the vines, despite the earlier rain, and in some places the shields on the sprinklers which were supposed to protect passersby were ineffective. This meant that you had to pause, study the track ahead and try and time your dash through the moving showers in order not to get soaked. Not easy to dash with a rucksack on your back! I don´t know how the procession managed in their best clothes...

I felt tired by the time I arrived and my back was troubling me as usual. I booked in (bottom bunk again, lucky me), dumped my stuff then went to visit the cathedral. This is the cathedral famous for having a live hen and a cock in a cage inside to celebrate an old legend. The story goes that a young German pilgrim travelling to Santiago with his parents, spurned the attentions of the innkeeper´s daughter. She repaid him by hiding a valuable item in his luggage then accusing him of theft. He was caught, condemned and strung up on the gallows. His parents continued their pilgrimage unaware of what had happened to their son, thinking he had changed his mind about going with them. On their return many weeks later they were horrified to find their son hanging on the gallows, still apparently alive. They rushed to the priest and begged him to save their son. The priest was just sitting down to dinner with a roasted cock and hen on the platter before him. He insisted their son was no more alive than the fowl he was about to eat, at which point the birds came to life before his eyes. So the son was saved, proved innocent and it all ended happily. I can vouch that the cock is real as it crowed several times while I was in the cathedral.

After lunch I decided to have a snooze but was constantly disturbed by cocks crowing in the albergue garden. They keep spare birds for the cathedral there in a large hen house. I went into the garden to see them and bumped into the chap who´d been at dinner with us the previous night. After a brief chat I went out for a wander round then into a café for a drink. He was in there and insisted on buying my drink. I then went shopping and back to the albergue to make something to eat, where he turned up in the kitchen too. After eating I escaped into the garden but was joined there as well. At that point I decided I felt like a really early night and went off to bed. The poor bloke was probably just lonely but I was beginning to feel haunted by then.