Well, this is weird. My first day off in all my six caminos. Reasons are many and varied.

Whilst we were eating last evening we were visited by Antonio, a volunteer with the Asociación de Amigos del Camino de Santiago de Córdoba. He has come for the opening of Michel’s exhibition and was somehow alerted to the difficulties we were experiencing with accommodation over the next stages. He tried valiantly to organise something for us, pulling all the strings he knew and making countless phone calls, but all to no avail.

Antonio trying to help with accommodation and below, relaxing at the Hospederia

I want to highly recommend the bar/restaurant on the main road through town ‘Gran Peña del Cordoba’ even though the TV is likely to be showing football. The owner is the most charming and caring man and the food is good and reasonably priced.

The rest of my group are staying at the beautiful Hospederia del Carmen, a converted convent with cloistered courtyard and long wide corridors with comfy chairs and good wifi, while I slept at the not so beautiful albergue. I popped back to the exhibition with Clare and a few others before heading off to sleep. Then this morning I brought my stuff to the convent and met the others for breakfast.

Today will see a parting of the ways. Gwen and Lori are bussing into Córdoba and will walk on from there. The rest of us are staying in Castro del Rio for another night and will bus to Córdoba tomorrow and walk on on Monday morning. I am fairly relaxed about this as I have already walked the two stages we will be skipping so I will not be missing anything I haven’t already experienced. And hopefully we may break out of our growing pilgrim bubble.  But I am particularly sad to lose the company of Gwen who is the life and soul of the party. Maybe our paths will cross along the way

So I have been sitting in the beautiful environment of the Hospederia del Carmen, They have put an extra bed in the room so three of us are sharing for a cost of 70 euros and the remaining member of our group has accommodation elsewhere. Although last night’s albergue was a very far cry from the relative luxury of my current surroundings, I did actually have the best night’s sleep of this camino, not a peep from my room mates and no ridiculously early risers.

What I’m not liking is the cost of this camino compared to others. Tomorrow we stay in a hostel in Córdoba which is 25 euros and the following night, in Cerro Muriano, there is no longer an albergue and we have to pay 27:50 euros. Ouch!

I’ve spent a couple of hours this morning catching up on the last two episodes of ‘Homeland’ and I’m beginning to feel a bit twitchy – perhaps I should have walked today and bussed back here. I’m now thinking I will catch the bus to Córdoba in the morning and jump off at Santa Cruz and walk the 25-ish km into the city. When I last walked this stage there had been a terrific rain storm during the night and we were advised not to take the camino path as it would be extremely muddy, so we walked all the way on a major road. Not great fun. So at least I will be walking a different route this time. If there is an early bus I will do this.

Some of the many charms of this pretty town

I haven’t enjoyed my first ever non-walking day on the camino, and am anxious to get going again tomorrow.