Fri, May 26 - to Burgos

Soaring Arches of
Sto. Domingo Cathedral

Live Cathedral Chickens in the Cage Above!

We're only an hour from Burgos, our next destination, so we took it easy this morning, just walking across the street from our Parador to the cathedral and walked around inside.  It is amazing that this small town (pop. 6520) has such an impressive church.  Great, soaring stone arches, golden altars, and in one corner a glass-fronted cage with a live, strutting white cock and hen!!  In the Middle Ages a family of pilgrims was walking to Santiago when their son was falsely accused of stealing and promptly hung!  His parents continued on to Santiago, and on returning, found their son alive but still strung up; his parents appealed to the judge who said he would cut the boy down when the chickens he was eating came alive...Santo Domingo returned them to life and the judge cut down the boy.  Since then, a pair of chickens have lived in the cathedral!

"Chicken" cakes in a Sto.. Domingo Bakery

We packed up, checked out, and drove out of town over the old medieval bridge and saw our first white stork nesting on top of a tall brick chimney - a sign of good luck!  We drove on a two-lane fast highway, N-120, watching a steady stream of pilgrims/hikers walking along the Camino.  If they are doing the full route it is officially 486 miles.  It became very popular in the late 20th century, but pilgrims have been walking to Compostela ever since the 9th when the bones of Santiago (St James) were discovered there.  If I had better knees, I would love to do it as one walks through lovely countryside from village to village eating tons of wonderful food that one burns off right away!

We entered Burgos, a city of 200,000, and, with luck, just avoided entering the old city with its warren of little streets , crossed the Arlanzon  River, and found our hotel and a parking spot right in front of restaurant Cobo Vintage where we have a reservation for tonight!

We have a lovely room in this NH hotel - a chain of small,  very nice European and Latin American  hotels.  This one is the old Palacio de La Merced, although the hotel part is very modern, you suddenly come upon old stone walls and arches.  We relaxed a bit and then walked across the river lined with leafy trees, through a huge stone arch into a splendid large plaza with shops,  apartments, and a very beautiful large cathedral!   We bought tickets, joined a crowd and went inside the cathedral where we  were each handed an audio tour device to listen to short essays on what we were seeing.  And, as there are many chapels each with its own architect, gold leafer, wood carver, stone mason, let alone who's buried there, there was a lot to see and hear about.

There was a collection of really fine paintings which must have been recently cleaned as the colors were magnificent. In the middle of the cathedral was a big slab under which the local hero "El Cid" is buried along with his wife.  He apparently fought for whichever side was paying more, but battled mostly against the Moors and so is a hero.

Choir Seats

El Cid's Casket

Around 4, we heard a clap of thunder and saw it was pouring outside; when it lightened, we thought we'd better head home, buying some gelato, on our way to keep us going until our dinner at 9 PM.

Glass-fronted Apartments in the Rain

Our Gelatoria

At nine we headed half a block to Cobo , a restaurant that has recently received a Michelin star.

We decided against the tasting menu as you get many tiny bites of exquisite food but it is difficult to remember what you have eaten.  Our Spanish usually holds us in good stead, but with exotic foods it is really impossible  to figure our the ingredients, so we got menus in English and Spanish.  They were very accommodating and gave us half portions of each other's dish so it was almost like a tasting menu.   We got three breads, and a tiny ceviche of fish in a spicy sauce.  I got white asparagus in a warm and cool sauces and Bob had beans and chorizo. 

Hake Fish with Seaweed

For our mains we got half orders of delicious hake fish with a light tempura and sauces and of Mallard duck with two preparations which, although excellent, served to remind us of our wedding night when my father gave us a cooler of frozen wild duck breast to cook for our first meal...I had no idea what to do with it and served it almost raw with a few buckshots left in for good measure!  Not my finest culinary hour!!    We had an almond cake and a chocolate dessert.   Wonderful service, but I'm getting tired of reading that, say, beets are one of the ingredients of a dish only to find maybe three tiny cubes will accompany the fish or whatever!