Got up at 8am this morning. Experienced a slight heartburn in the night, must be the heavy food and the strong wine. Lucky that I brought Zantac with me so the heartburn did go away leaving me to sleep well the rest of the night.

We are still doing the backpack taxi as I am still hurting though not as much as yesterday. We decided to get a small shoulder bag to carry some lunch and water. We bought a small shoulder backpack at a sports store a few kms prior to leaving Estela. It fit our needs well. Got some fruit, bread and yogurt. After a few much needed stretches, we continued on the path of the camino. As the camino dictates, you do not know where you are going but you look for the signs on the way. The signs are the Camino Shell and the yellow arrows. They are well marked and visible for now. I have not heard of anyone getting lost just yet but I am sure there must be plenty of stories on that item.

Just before leaving Estela completely, we came upon the famous Wine Fountain, Fuente de Vino. You can drink at the wine fountain for free. The fountain has two taps, one for wine and the other for water. The custom is to take the wine in your scallop shell and sip from it. There is a camera on the fountain to prohibit people from abusing this priviledge. When we got to the fountain, a local walking his dog put his face beneath the wine tap and opened the tap and let the wine flow into his mouth. He must be doing this often as he seemed quite the expert at this without touching his lips to the tap. I have not bought my scallop shell for my bag yet. So I did the following instead. Marybel had finished her yogurt so we washed out her yogurt cup with water and then filled it with wine. Both of us drank for this cup instead of the customary shell. Once again, a most delicious wine. I am getting to be quite the wine drinker. When we drank this wine, it is in the morning….wine for right after breakfast…lol. I took a picture of this and will see if I have the opportunity to upload this later.

We continued on our journey…as usual…Marybel walks ahead of me. I did not tell Marybel this but Craig from Scotland said yesterday without Marybel around as I told him that I might be slowing Marybel down with my snail pace. He said that perhaps I did not need to speed up but Marybel may need to slow down instead. After all, a lot of people do the Camino for self reflection and slowing down benefits this inner quest of the Camino. I also believe that each person do their own camino in their own pace. I have mine and Marybel has hers.

We reached the town of Villamajor de Monjardin. I arrived at 2.30pm and Marybel arrived only 40 mins earlier. The Albergue of choice here is the Villamayor de Monjardin Albergue. It is very new, having only opened for 3 weeks. What a wonderful albergue!

We were starving and had only some bread and pate to eat. The caretaker of the albergue provided more bread and some salami to make up the rest of our meal for free. The albergue has kitchen facilities so that you can cook if you wanted to. The town´s mercado is not open. Marybel wanted to buy some eggs for breakfast tommorrow and this objective cannot be accomplished without a grocery store nearby. This is what the owner of the albergue did. He got 6 fresh eggs from home and gave them to us, once again for free. Even though breakfast is provided, it is pastries and coffee. We now have something extra that others will not have, fried eggs for breakfast for tommorrow due the generosity of the owner of the albergue, Javier. I cannot say enough how this albergue is the best that I have stayed in, even if it has only been 4 days on the Camino. Great service and offerings for only $15 per person.

The pilgrims for this night is a retired man from Britain, Colleen from San Francisco and an Irish couple, I did not get their names. We did not have an opportunity to find out more about them as we got busy getting laundry done. Dinner was passable in a nearby bar for $10 euros, pasta, turkey and fries and oranges for dessert. Having kitchen facilities is not good when there is not grocery store nearby to get supplies for a decent meal so the pilgrim´s menu is prime for moments like this.

The view from our room is fantastic overlooking the Spanish farms and vineyards. Did I mention? What an amazing albergue!!!

Internet is free here so I am able to provide an update of four days on the camino. I do not know what is available over the next few days. I promise that I will try to do as much as possible when I have access.

I have to wake up early tommorrow morning to cook us eggs. Tommorrow, we go to Torres Del Rio. This trek will be 19.9 kms. I am taking a challenge of a longer trek as the trek appears to be easy with no ascends and descends, just straight walking on level country roads. Let´s see what happens. I will keep a log and advise you guys later.

Hasta Luego!!