When I was a child we had a black Labrador, creatively named ‘Beauty’ by my parents, although in later life she grew huge and hardly fitted the title anymore (as it happens, every one of my parents’ dogs grew huge in later years, with the exception of the afghan hound that they inherited from me and he was a bundle of nervous energy and refused to be over-fed). Anyway, when Beauty was a pup and taken out for a walk she would suddenly decide she had done enough exercise and just sit down and refuse to move further. We referred to this behaviour as going on ‘sit-down-strike’.

Ella put me in mind of Beauty today. After an hour or so of walking in the heavy rain she suddenly stopped and said “I can’t do this any more!”. Not that she had much choice. There was nowhere to stop unless she wanted to go on ‘sit-down-strike’ on the side of the road, just as Beauty would have done.

So we strode on after a short break for breakfast until we had covered 20 km and she could finally get her way.  We are staying in a new-ish albergue with probably 12 beds and a very uninspiring menu. But it is clean and that is the most important attribute of communal accommodation.

All joking aside though, Ella does have a valid point. She hates walking in the rain and she doesn’t want her memory of our great adventure to be clouded by a miserable last few days. And the forecast for the next few days is not good. We might get a glimpse of sunshine this evening and then tomorrow promises to be a mirror image of today (more sit-down-strikes on the way!), and then it might improve a bit.

I am employing the ‘head in the sand’ stance and assuming that the forecast will be wrong and we will reach the coast to a greeting of glorious sunshine to reward us for our efforts. As the little French gits sang to us in the communal kitchen so many days ago (I did include this anecdote in my blog of the day, but thought better and deleted it before posting) “always look on the bright side of life”. I much prefer to take the positive view of this funny little ditty than whatever insult these young twerps intended, and I have often sung it to myself along the way. If anyone knows why it should be an insult, please don’t share it with me – I like the positive view!

So, not many photos today, although I did risk my precious toy for a few ‘hórreos’. These structures fascinate me. I would love to do a research project on them. I suspect they have a lot more relevance than just a storage facility for maize. Most of them have religious icons on the roof apex, some are ancient and some brand new, they are made out of a variety of materials and are quite beautiful – even the basic ones constructed with bricks have a certain aesthetic quality.  This is the wikipedia definition………… an hórreo is a typical granary from the northwest of the Iberian Peninsular, built in wood or stone, raised from the ground by pillars ending in flat straddle stones to avoid the access of rodents. Ventilation is allowed by the slits in its walls……… and here is a selection that I have taken over the last week or so.