16.2 miles
Lovely sunny day. No rain in forecast for several days.
Stephen made us breakfast and then made sandwiches for lunch while I cleaned and tidied up.
I am really working on the IT band stretches. I wish i had a foam roller!
This is a pretty flat stage!
We walked out of town on an unpaved road. We initially encountered a few locals jogging or walking but we were soon quite alone. The dehesas have given way to olive groves and vineyards.
We also saw fields of grain, fig trees, almond and peach(?) trees, and at the sides of the road—anise, giant fennel, mustard, vetch, Spanish lavender, thistles, Patterson’s Curse, corn camomile, wild daisies and wild orchids. We passed several pig farming operations, and grazing horses and sheep.
We made a little detour to the church in Calzadilla de los Barros to try to see its famous retablo. However, like many churches in little villages in Spain, it was shut tight!
Our challenge for the day was avoiding muddy puddles, some of them quite deep! At one stage, we had to cross a stream. It was fairly deep and very muddy and there weren’t quite enough stones to get across without getting our boots very wet. However, Stephen who went first, very adeptly used one of his poles to move one stone onto another one, which gave us just that extra needed step!!
We eventually encountered some other hikers—a German couple — who were making very slow progress. The wife seemed to be limping but they spoke to us cheerily enough. Since we could do nothing for them, we didn’t ask any questions, which i later regretted.
We did have some road walking on entering Zafra, mostly on a little used road. Stephen’s feet were hurting by this time and he was ready to get to our lodging for the night.
Zafra (population of about 16,500) has a lively old town of cobbled streets. It is a very pleasant place to spend some time.
The outdoor cafes around the Plaza Grande and the streets of the old town were all full of people
