We woke up today in the Austrian albergue.

I had a lovely uninterrupted sleep and felt fresh in the morning. I find that my body is in the rhythm more. I don't use an alarm clock and I'm up before 7 every day (today was 6 am). I wish you could wake up naturally in normal life. I really don't like having an alarm clock wake me up, but when you have a job to get to you kind of have to have it!

We began our walk as normal after some muesli for breakfast. It was a very pleasant morning. Having cloud cover overnight certainly moderates the temperature for us. We met a very friendly pussy cat on the trail. He came out of nowhere meowing his little lungs out. So we sat next to the path and played with him for a while. Best start to the day!

After that we stopped in at the next cafe, our friend Brad the Canadian was there having a cuppa so we joined him and I had an espresso. €1.10. How can I say no?! I ended up walking with Brad for a while and enjoyed his stories from his life. He's had a pretty wild time, lost in love, sailed the Pacific Ocean with a man who wanted to kill him and become both a yoga teacher and high school teacher somehow in between! I was very entertained, plus he's a real stand up guy so it's nice just to hang out with him for a while.

We continued on the path and it was a very moderate path. Nothing too strenuous at all and with overcast skies above the temperature was just right!

We did stop though, as @chazzie-leigh was feeling a bit odd. We found her at the top of a hill and her shoulders had begun to get numb and she thought she was having a stroke. My God she's such a hypochondriac! After a bit of fruit and a few loving words we carried on steadily.

The sun did come out eventually. And when it did there was no holding back! The cloud seem to dissipate in a matter of minutes and we were instantly in a thick dessert heat walking through vineyards.

This made the last stretch of the walk quite tough. So tough in fact that when we pulled into the next town we decided to find a place to stay and call it a day.

We found out about Chars ailment and it's not uncommon among pilgrims. We think it's because her bag is a bit too heavy... So tomorrow we are going to try post off a few things in Logroño. That's her extra hiking pack, and maybe a few other little bits inside.

This afternoon we have just been cruising until the supermarkets open at half 5. These Spanish siestas are sooo long. I don't know how anything gets done here! We found a little restaurant and shared a plate of patatas bravas. That's just fried potatoes covered in spicy tomato sauce and usually mayonnaise but to make it vegan I gotta take the mayo off. That was muy bien!

Not sure where we are headed tomorrow. All I can say is we are heading west my wayward son! That's kinda the beauty of this thing. You can do as much or as little research as you want, either way you're going to have an experience. And a memorable one at that!

PEACE

@stickycj