Total distance: 99.7 km. Total climb: 500 m.

Cultural highlight: Frómista

Our breakfast in Burgos at the Hotel del Cid, in addition to the usual variety of cold cuts, cheese, bread, jam, fruit and yogurt, includes a bottle of sparkling wine in a silver ice bucket. Not even Dean is willing to give it a try, so, yielding to social pressure, I pass up the opportunity to mix a morning mimosa.  Also for the first time there are two kinds of cereal. Both are cocoa coated– one apparently puffed rice and the other puffed corn – and I give the latter a try. Once in the bowl it looks a bit like dog chow, and it does have a satisfying crunch.

We exit the historic town center on a different route from the one by which we entered, passing through the historic Arco de Santa Maria. The area is busy with tour buses and tourists as I take a last look at the towers of the cathedral. I am already 15 – 20 minutes behind the rest of the group.

The sky is clear, but the temperature pleasantly cool as I pedal westward out of town on a designated bike path. When the bike path runs out our route follows the Santiago Highway, N120; fortunately, the shoulder is wide and traffic is not heavy. A light headwind is already blowing. After 25 km the chalk arrows direct me to take a hard left onto a deserted two-lane road between fields of wheat, pasture and wildflowers. We are entering the Meseta Alta, northern Spain’s high plain: fertile, sunny, and flat. The authors of two personal accounts I read by modern day pilgrims who walked the camino both illustrate with personal experience that intense rain does indeed fall on the plain in this part of Spain. Fortunately, the lack of any serious incline enables us cyclists to travel over 100 km a day, never straying from the narrow elevation band of 800 to 1,000 meters. We would cross from Burgos to León in two days instead of the 10 days it would take the typical pilgrim on foot.

I slow my pace when I catch up with “Pancho and Julia,” the Santa Fe judge  and the psychotherapist. Soon Loreto, riding as sweep today, comes up from behind. The total absence of vehicle traffic and the lack of a center stripe makes us comfortable taking possession of the road and riding two abreast. Alas, this lulls us into overlooking the threat we pose to each other. As we pass through a field of red poppies I stop and dismount to evaluate the landscape for photographic potential. Judge Pancho is riding at a leisurely pace 15 or 20 seconds behind me – not exactly hot on my tail and not on a collision course with me. But he is deep in conversation, telling some tale to Loreto. My unexpected presence at the side of the road spooks him. He veers into Loreto, loses his balance and falls in the road; Loreto is knocked off balance and her bike careens into a ditch on the left side of the road, pitching her onto the opposite bank. Pancho gets up displaying a bloody knee and knuckle. Loreto rises wearing some weeds but seems unharmed. Fortunately, there is no ill will; each of us apologizes to the others for our role in the collision. Wiping the blood from his knee, Pancho says to me, “You’ll hear from my lawyer.” That would be he himself, I realize, and he’s saying it with a wry grin. We happen to be right beside a battered sign that reads Camino de Santiago, and clearly this is a good photo spot. I ask the others to pose for a photo and they oblige. Then we resume the ride. From that point on I will make sure that I am alone or completely off the road when I stop to take a photo.

In addition to the abundant wheat fields of the meseta, sheep seem to be a theme of the day. The barking of a dog far out in a field draws my attention to a shepherd and his flock. Later, Loreto and I have to pause briefly as a flock is crossing the road.

The now familiar headwind grows stronger, but Loreto informs us that we are lucky because it is only a fraction of the strength that it could be. Another element of luck, she informs us: the red poppies only bloom for a few weeks, so it is pure chance that we see them in such profusion.

On an unexpected downgrade I sprint ahead of the group; then I fall behind again when I am the only one to take a half-kilometer detour to see the church and albergue at Hontanas. And I am the only one to get this stamp in my passport. Returning to the road I notice a large number of pilgrims on the footpath far out in a field.

There are no opportunities for a morning snack. But the town of Castrojeriz, where a pre-Roman (Visigoth) castle sits atop a hill, provides an opportunity for lunch. Loreto claims that the bar owner, Toño, makes the best tortilla along the route, so I ask him for one, along with a bottle of San Miguel. Totally unlike its Mexican namesake, a Spanish tortilla is an omelette, always containing potatoes. The one that Toño brings me also has roasted red peppers and is served with bread and olive oil. Much more satisfying than the all too familiar bocadillo. The food and ambience are so satisfying that my mood is only slightly disrupted by the music playing gently in the background. I mostly ignore an instrumental arrangement of “My Way,” then yield to the pleasant nostalgia of a Beatles trilogy spotlighting three different voices: “Across the Universe,” “The Long and Winding Road,” and “Octopus’s Garden.”

The next 26 km of quiet, uneventful riding has me looking for dovecotes. The CCH informs me that the fields here around Boadilla del Camino are filled with these palomares, which have three practical purposes: “doves eat insects that eat crops; dove droppings fertilize the soil; and doves are good to eat.” I see nothing that suggests a dovecote, though. Nor any doves, for that matter, fulfilling any of their purposes.

The architectural highlight of the day is a church at Frómista. When I arrive there late in the afternoon, however, my first thought is refreshment. There is a bar, but even more convenient, Maria Elena is there with the van and a special treat to share with Julia, Loreto and me. (Pancho, still charged with his Power Bar, has ridden on.) Maria Elena pulls a snack basket from the van, and in it, among other things, are some Petit Ecolier cookies. Even though these are the milk chocolate variety, rather than dark chocolate, I voice my enthusiasm: “Little Schoolboys!” Maria Elena says I make this sound like some sort of perversion – but isn’t that innuendo exactly what gives these wafers a double attraction? These happen to be single servings, individual cookies wrapped in foil. Unfortunately, in the heat of the van the chocolate coating has fused with the wrapper; the wafer I pull out is bare. The chocolate has to be extracted independently, either with finger or tongue. A messy task. Since it does not mix well with chocolate, I forego my afternoon beer today and quench my thirst with a carbonated fruit beverage.

Next to us on the patio at the bar, however, three jolly German-speaking cyclists are refreshing themselves with beer. In rather limited English (which is still much better than my nonexistent German) they tell us they are from Bavaria and (like the Dutch man we met in Santo Domingo) have pedaled, with full loads, all the way on the walking trail. No highways and no hotels for these. Nonetheless, they treat us as fellow pilgrims. “Lance Armstrong!” one of them addresses me, and he offers me a sip of his beer.

The snack break was well timed. I feel better, and the church – the Romanesque Iglesia de San Martín (1066), to be precise –  is reopening at 4:30 after siesta time. Julia, Loreto and I join Maria Elena for a visit. Although of modest size, this church, heavily restored in recent decades, is a fine specimen. The capitals on the columns inside depict many legendary scenes involving people and animals. We locate the tale of the fox and the crow. On the exterior, the corbels supporting the varied roofline are an amazing mix of strange bovine, simian and possibly reptilian creatures. In the opinion of the CCH this church is “the purest extant example of the 3-nave, rounded apse Jaca style of Romanesque.” I just think these critters are cool.

Another hour of patient pedaling into the headwind brings me to the Monasterio de San Zoilo, our lodging for the night. Although the dark wood paneled hallways clearly identify this as a converted monastery, my room is far more spacious and luxurious than a monk’s cell. I have a couple hours to relax before we ride off in the van together for dinner a couple kilometers away. Dinner is at some medieval looking banquet hall where our party of eleven comprises the smallest group. On a separate level a few feet above us there are five tables seating a party of at least 60 people who are making an unbelievable din. There are smokers at every table except ours. The meal consists of some of the usual cold cut appetizers (lomo and chorizo, in this case), a platter of green salad with cheese, tomatoes and eggs, and large cuts of lamb. The wine is a red Ribera del Duero, from the province of Castilla y León, where we are now. It is labeled crianza, indicating medium aging: at least six months on oak and two years total. No comparison to the fine reservas of La Rioja, but drinkable.