Banos de Montemayor

I left Hotel Sinagoga at 9.30 am and walked about 2 kms down the road to get back on the Via de la Plata. It was another perfect sunny day, but according to the forecast it may be the last one for a while.

After another 5 kms (of road walking as no proper Camino track here), I reached Banos de Montemayor and soon found my hotel Los Postigos. This is a historic building which has had a nice conversion and a friendly proprietor.

I was looking for somewhere to have lunch. There are public thermal baths in the town centre with a huge hotel attached. I checked out the dining room, but it was absolutely packed with oldies, so I quickly left (knowing it would take ages to get served) and took myself to Bar Carlos near my hotel and ordered a chicken and bacon brochette w patatas fritas and a white wine. This wine was particularly good and put me in the mood for a siesta!

View on the road

Approaching Banos

Entrance to my hotel

View from my window 

Later, I went to check out the thermal baths. All the special treatments and massages designed for ageing limbs were booked out by groups of oldies from the big hotel, who got called in groups of 6 from the reception area. I just settled for a swim and relax in the heated pool. I also took a few photos of the parts dating from Roman times, which have been preserved as a mini museum.

Preparing for a plunge 

Oldies having their treatments 

Museum

Hervas

Today was warm and sunny. Coats, gloves, beanie all redundant! I can't believe I'm writing this! After half an hour's bus ride from Plasencia, I found myself in the mountains. The snow on the tops seems very close.

Hervas is a lovely spot, just off the Camino but well worth a visit. It has the best preserved medieval Jewish Quarter in Spain. I had lunch before exploring: an enormous helping of lamb chops. (I had been watching Rick Stein in the Albanian mountains on TV last night, enjoying a whole roast lamb with shepherds, that I had to eat some myself!)

Jewish families settled in Hervas in the 14th century and worked as weavers, cobblers, money lenders and tax collectors. When Ferdinand and Isabella ordered the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492, some 25 families were led out of town by way of the medieval bridge to Badajoz and the Portuguese border. Two years later a few returned and converted to Christianity, adopting Spanish names.

Their typical houses were of 3 stories, combining wood frames and adobe. The ground floor would contain a wine cellar and a stable, the first and second floors would have the kitchen and weaving loom, bedrooms and store rooms. Tiny narrow alleyways were built between houses to channel off rainwater. One of these is said to be the narrowest street in Spain.

Room with a view : a mountain view, with snow on top 

Start of a walk through the Jewish Quarter

Medieval bridge 

View of the town from a lookout

Typical houses: some have vertical tiles on the walls as protection against rain

The houses are famous for their displays of pot plants

Caparra

http://www.turismoextremadura.com/viajar/turismo/en/explora/Ciudad-romana-de-Caparra/

More info at this website!

There had been heavy rain overnight, so I knew it would not be a good day for walking. The stream crossings would be nasty, and I've become a fine weather walker!

There was a taxi service that would take people to Caparra on the Camino: €27 one way (at which point you could continue walking on) or €40 there and back, with the taxi waiting for an hour - time to visit the ruins and the interpretive centre. No prizes for guessing which option I took!

The Caparra Arch is significant for pilgrims, as it appears on the logo and the official way markers for the Via de la Plata. It is a compulsory photo opportunity, but today was a poor day for it. The Arch is actually 4 arches joined together, pointing in 4 directions and originally marked the dead centre of the Roman town.

Excavation of the SE gate

Excavation of a Roman house

The house in relation to the Arch

Thermal bath area 

Excavations still in progress and covered in protective glass

Back at the Parador

Galisteo to Plasencia

17 kms by taxi (€20)

Today I decided to take a rest from walking as rain showers were forecast. There is also a problem with accommodation up ahead on the Camino. I could see a freeway in the distance from my window, so I knew it would be a fairly quick shuttle into Plasencia, the nearest city to the East. The small towns I've walked through so far on the Via de la Plata have very little of interest. The tourist infrastructure is not well developed as there are not enough pilgrims to make it worthwhile. Plasencia on the other hand, though off the Camino, is full of interesting things to see.

I checked in early at the Parador, a historic building in its own right. Then I made my way along Calle de Zapateria to the Plaza Mayor, where it was Market Day. Lots of interesting cheeses to try, beautiful fruit and veg stalls as well as a few handicrafts. It had certainly attracted the crowds and was a bonus for me.

The Cathedral ("old and new" conjoined) was next on the to-do list, but tourists were excluded till Mass finished at 11.00 am. The old part is Romanesque and has a nice cloister and square chapter house. The new part (c1500 onwards) allows no photos. For me, the most attractive were the carved wooden choir stalls, with all kinds of scenes, biblical and secular, carved on the seat backs.

After that I did a quick walk on part of the defensive walls, in much better condition than Galisteo but just as high. It was a bit blustery on top and the threatened bad weather was approaching. There was a medieval interpretive centre in one of the watch towers, Torre Lucia.

I was eating a cheese sandwich back in the Plaza Mayor in a sheltered terrace reminiscent of those in Brussels, when I noticed umbrellas going by and the stall holders rushing to cover up their produce. Time to get out of the rain to my nice warm room at the Parador!

Market

Cow bells for sale

Houses in Plaza Mayor

Door of Old Cathedral

New Cathedral (Wikipedia photo)

Cloister 

Detail of columns in cloister

Chapter House

City Wall, with several watch towers

Map in the Interpretive Centre, showing extent of Moslem Conquest at various dates.

Later:

I noticed a guided tour of the Parador building was in progress at 4.00 pm, so I tagged along - it was in Spanish, but I managed to get a written guide in English afterwards. It went upstairs to some private salons and a library, and down to the depths where there was a wine cellar and storage for grain in the old days. It was originally a Dominican Monastery dating to 1477, after Saint Vincent resuscitated the sole male child of the Duke and Duchess of Arevalo. The Parador chain took it over in 2000.

Wine cellar and grain storage below

Dining room, with decorative wall tiles from Talavera

Tapestry in dining room; treading grapes on the left

View from the bar of the famous "staircase of the air", which dates from 1577 and rises in a faultless study of thrust.

Riolobos to Galisteo

Riolobos to Galisteo 10 or 11 kms on winding country lanes, up and down all the way.

Dep R 8.35 am Arr G 12.00 pm.

First I had to walk about 2 kms from the Camping Site along the road to get back on the Via de la Plata. It was a nice morning again for walking, mild and sunny with a few clouds about; the usual farms with cows or sheep. The walled town of Galisteo, which dates back to the Moslem occupation, could be seen a long way up ahead, but kept disappearing behind a hill and never seemed to get any closer.

I finally arrived, drank a beer at the first bar I came to, then had to walk a further kilometre out of town to locate my hotel, the Medina Ghaliayah. After a lovely soak in a hot bath, it was time for lunch and a siesta.

At about 5.30 pm I set off to explore, but there wasn't a lot to see apart from the defensive walls which were quite high and spectacular with 360 degree views over the surrounding countryside. There were steps to go up, but they were steep and crumbling and I am not a risk taker!

Galisteo in the distance

This calf was licking its mother's neck

Getting closer!

Pretty impressive walls!

Canaveral to Riolobos

Canaveral to Riolobos

Fitbit says 20,000 steps.

Three German women, staying at the Albergue in Canaveral were planning to take taxi to Grimaldo, so I asked if I could join them. It proved a good move as it saved a long uphill stretch. After that, I said goodbye to them as I knew they were fast walkers and I wouldn't be able to keep up with their pace.

It was a pleasant day weatherwise, sunny with just a bit of cloud cover and warmer than of late (17 degrees now at 9.00 pm). The route was through country lanes and tracks through fields, some a bit waterlogged. Two Spanish pilgrims passed me, loaded up with camping gear and accompanied by a brown poodle called Turk.

At the turnoff for Riolobos, I was sitting having a snack when a Maltese cyclist arrived, very fed up. He had taken a wrong turn and added many needless kilometres to his trip. Then I nearly forgot my stick till another cyclist rushed after me with it in her hand.

This was horse country, many in the fields and one brought out in a horse box for a ride in the countryside. I was pretty tired when I arrived at Riolobos as the stony track was up and down all the way. No wonder the cyclist was annoyed with himself. I had booked a "bungalow" in a camping site, but it turned out to be a tiny studio apartment on the first floor around a courtyard.