Camino Pilgrim

I guess it was either anxiety or excitement, but at 4am I was completely awake, checked the route elevations and stop options and decided to go hike extra early today. Super thankful for reflective trail signs locals have started to use at certain points of the route.

With just my phone flashlight and GPS app, I climbed over a hilltop rise and started descending towards Burgos. Several small villages were on the way. I was even able to find breakfast slightly after 6am on a Sunday.

The approach to Burgos was again for me by the airport, but this time I wanted to go through Vilafria. Definitely a better route option than going the long way around the airport into an industrial zone like I did last time.

The walk into Burgos was long and hard because of the surface always being concrete tiles. Feet really start to hurt fast on those. I think around 20km today was done just to get through Burgos itself. My feet are completely devastated. Would have loved to do a 25km day, but there was no such option.

Ended up the day in the first village after Burgos. Still a 10km walk from the city center, out of which 8km was in open sun and focused on doing highway crossings or going under them.

I definitely need to make a few smaller days now. The hardest part of Camino is roughly 72km away. I will want to stay the night just before entering hell in this heat. Instead of killing my feet and pushing that distance in 2 days, I would do it in 3 days and use the shorter walks to recover my feet.

All the days here are way too hot for me still. Physically, I do not get drained of water anymore, but my feet overheat quite fast, forcing me to make extra stops.

The difference between walking 30 or 25 kilometers in a day is almost 2 hours, because I would need to spend roughly 45min to cool down my feet before walking just 5km in the midday heat. In the mornings, you will get it done at twice as much with half as little break time.