Day 21 (6/1) Molinaseca to Herrerias

As much as I want to make this a quality post, it's after 11PM and we had a long 13-miler on concrete and limited shade, so first draft will be brief and then I'll gussy it up once I can ask Jeff/Cory/students to add more details. <goes to sleep>

<revisited on 6/4>

Okay, let's try this again from the top. From Molinaseca, we met the students at their albergue and boarded a bus to Ponferrada, where we walked around the Castillo de los Templarios. 

From CaminoWays.Com

The Castillo de los Templarios (Castle of the Knights Templar) in Ponferrada, Spain, is one of the largest and most complex medieval fortresses in northwestern Spain. Originally built over a Celtic hill-fort and a Roman citadel, the fortification was gifted to the Knights Templar in 1178 by King Ferdinand II of León. Its primary military objective was to protect pilgrims walking the Camino de Santiago.

Also from the internet:

The Spanish Templar Knights were an elite order of warrior-monks who played a pivotal role in the Reconquista (the Christian reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula) and protected Christian pilgrims traveling the Camino de Santiago. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

The Spanish Templars were not a separate, independent organization but rather the Iberian branch of the global Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon. They were deeply integrated into Spanish medieval society: [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

We were only in Ponferrada for about 40 minutes before we re-boarded the bus and shuttled to Villafranca del Bierzo, where we started our walk to Herrerias. We had a nice trail stop (and I finally picked up some pocket Tabasco for underseasoned (it happens) tortilla emergencies).

This is the section of the trip where "creepy babies of the Camino" also become more prevalent. 

I walked with Cory, Jeff, and Aaron--we've started calling Jeff and Aaron the Giraffe Brothers because they are quite tall, take long strides, and come in handy when one wants to eat local cherries that are high in the trees.

We had one major devastation on the walk. Despite a positive experience at Rock and Roll Pizza in 2024 (Berkeley will remember this site vividly based on the clipping), we rolled in 10 minutes after they closed (2:10), so we weren't able to order food, but still ordered drinks (Aquarius--duh). Since they were closed AND we ordered drinks, we thought it would be okay if we used their picnic tables to drink our drinks--bought from their establishment--and a few trail snacks. It was not.

We made a charcuterie board out of leftover nuts, muffins, anchovies, and granola bars (we were pretty low on snacks, so had to get creative), and the cafe attendant came out and said, "This is a little much. So-and-so can use our tables because he bought food from us." LADY, WE TRIED. AND WE BOUGHT DRINKS FROM YOU. 

We ended up across the street, sitting next to the dumpster, on palettes, trying to manage our charcuterie board and replaying the interaction over and over again to figure out where we went wrong.

Store stop karma does exist, though. Not too long after the R&R Pizza disaster, we found a unique little cafe/albergue called "Casa Cantadora: The House of The Elven King's Heart. House of the Sun, the Light." It's absolutely as new age as it sounds. Our aura got fluffed big time. But that wasn't even the most aura-fluffing cafe stop we've had on the trip--more on that in a future post.

The best part about this stop was that it had river access, so we were able to soak our feet in the water for a few minutes before proceeding onto Herrerias. I remembered Herrerias from 2024, although we actually stayed in Ruitelan. Herrerarias--specifically, the Paraiso hotel--is nestled above a sheep field and is a perfect place to enjoy a nice dinner and a game of bocce ball--both of which we did.

Due to space limitations, Cory and I and a few students were lodged in another albergue about 10 minutes up the road (Casa do Ferreiro), which was also very nice and quaint.