Day 8, September 1: Ventosa to Santo Domingo de la Calzada (32 km; 7:10)

In the morning as we were leaving at 6:40, the Dutch hospitalera chided us for leaving so early in the dark. “This is pigeon hunting season and the Spaniards shoot anything that moves”, she said. “Hopefully peregrinos aren’t on the menu,” I replied, and off we went. Shotgun blasts could be heard frequently over the next couple of weeks.

The cool and partly overcast sky made it another great day for walking. Since we always walk toward the west, we had a great view of our shadows stretching across the ground as the sun rose behind us.

329. Our slender silhouettes preceeding us on the approachto Najera.
It’s about ten kilometres to Najera. The walk through the semi-industrial approaches is boring, but the old part of the town is much more attractive as it is squashed between the Rio Najerilla and the reddish-pink cliffs that rise up behind it.
331. Najera
We found a restaurant where we had cafe con leche (coffee with milk) and a bocadillo (essentially a subway sandwich) stuffed with ham, cheese and peppers.

Every town and village in this part of Spain has a “fuente” (fountain). We always made sure that there was a sign indicating that the water was potable before we would drink or fill up our water bottles. The fuente in Azofra was typical.
337. Fountain at Azofra. Alas, this one only dispensed water, no wine.
Santo Domingo de la Calzada is named for a poor shepherd who helped pilgrims by building bridges and making other improvements to the Camino. The city is dominated by the cathedral in which his tomb is located, which is both a working church and a museum.
354. Cathedral at Santo Somingo de la Calzada
The city was quite lively since it was both a Saturday and a concert featuring a cultural exchange group from Argentina was scheduled to start in the main square at 10:00 pm. Since the albergue closes the doors at that time we unfortunately missed the entertainment, although we had own symphony of snorers to make up for it.