Tues, May 23 - Driving to Santo Domingo de la Calzada

We  both got good night's sleep by drinking a whole bottle of wine and turning off the lights at midnight!  We slept in until 7 and went down to the buffet which was excellent with the usual bottomless glasses of fresh OJ, sweet croissants, cheeses and prosciutto.  We should have stayed here two nights as it is such a delightful hotel and would be great for recovering from jet lag, but RR had a full day's activities planned so off we went.  Also, we should have purchased a talking GPS for the car by now, but RR thinks the least I can do is map read for him.  When Hilary's along, they switch off on the driving and map-reading duties. but when it's Bob and me I get the map, and then I start to day dream, and  a critical junction comes along and....

Palacio Urgoiti

Anyway as our hotel was just north of Bilbao, we retraced our route, heading south under a clearing marine layer,  passing the airport and heading into a mass of spaghetti.  The roads and highways are in very good shape and well-marked for the most part, but as everyone drives so fast and as the place names are a combination of Spanish and Basque, it can get confusing!  We managed to get on a low-traffic road zig-zagging over a mountain pass and stopped by a small nature preserve to check out the abundant wildflowers on display.  We turned onto a still smaller side road through tiny villages until it ended in the tidy village of Lalastra in the Valderejo Parque Natural, which preserves a lovely chunk of land between two mountain ridges.  It even has a visitors center with maps of all the trails.  We took off on one, past a herd of cows all of whom had cowbells on clanging wildly - a wonderful noise!   We walked through a lush green valley to the ruins of a tiny town and hermitage, spotting some birds among which was a Cirl Bunting, a new life bird!

F

Dedicated to MB!

We split a coke in Lalastra on returning to the car and continued south.  The soil became rocky as we entered La Rioja, the famous wine area, and we were surrounded by numerous vineyards.  I was carefully looking for the LR111 exit to Santo Domingo de la Calzada from the N232 when I realized that it did not exist!  And we were quite a ways past where it was supposed to be!!  We turned south on a tiny road which finally met up with a larger road (not on the map) paralleling the A-12 freeway which took us into town!  We found ourselves coming into an old part of town when the road was suddenly blocked, barricaded by metal pylons.  Bob remembered reading that one has to drive up to

the pylons and they will lower themselves into the street - which is what they did!   We entered a narrow stone street, lined with high stone walls and drove slowly until we arrived at a small plaza, and there we were right in front of the Parador de Santo Domingo and next to the cathedral!  (The Paradores are a hotel chain run by the government since the 1920s and they have managed to preserve many old monasteries, government buildings, etc by turning them into hotels, and by building new hotels in underdeveloped areas.  This Parador used to be a hospital to care for pilgrims on their way to Compostela).

There were no cars around but we parked and were given 20 minutes to unload our luggage and move the car to a parking lot down the street. We found our spacious room with a canopied bed and a view of the cathedral tower.  We were given a metal washer which we inserted into a slot by the car park and the gate mysteriously opened and we left the car.   It was six by then so  we settled into chairs on the plaza and got our welcome glasses of wine and nuts..our first nourishment since breakfast.

At 8 we walked across the plaza and found Los Caballeros, a Michelin (but un-starred) restaurant just opening and went in.  Across the way was a large scallop shell on a sign post,designating that we are on the Camino de Santiago which goes all the way to Santiago de Compostela.  The road will be filled when the pilgrim and tourist season starts soon.

Our dinner started with a glass of hot pea puree, followed by Riojan soup of veggies, bread and a bit of smokey sausage.   Then we both had cod, the local specialty,. Mine was cooked perfectly in a pool of pureed leeks with very crunchy almonds and deep-fried spinach leaves.  Bob's as in a red pepper/tomato puree - both delicious!  That plus a $14 bottle of good Rioja white wine was a perfect meal.  We left at 10, still light as Spain is on double daylight savings, and fell into bed.