Day 22 – Heading South

We both slept well in our private rooms. I was nervous about Viki barring entry to her room at 6:50am, but fortunately she let me in. We had muesli for breakfast, then set off by sunrise to a beautiful nearly full moon over the cathedral in the distance.

It was tricky finding the route out of town, but eventually, after some hills and some no-cycling highway sections, we were on our way. We passed loads of pilgrims walking towards Santiago de Compostella- it was quite cool to see them all and for everyone to wish each other “buen camino!”. While we started high, in the sun, we soon descended into the morning fog of lower elevations, got chilled, and put on our jackets.

The ride today went very well. So well, in fact, that Viki remarked, “this is glorious”, during the last 10km. We were both just excited for our fancy hotel night, courtesy of Lesley (thank you!). We chatted up the check-in staff and amazingly got upgraded from the cheapest room (garden-view) two levels to sea-view with a huge terrace. We had our sandwiches on the terrace (it was only 2pm – somehow the notion of a nice hotel made us extra speedy today), had a nap, and then went for our 5pm spa appointment.

The spa was wonderful. There was only one other couple who had booked for the same time slot. We had an entire pool, jacuzzi, steam room, sauna, warm beds, fancy showers , ice bath, and a beautiful view over the ocean to ourselves. It was then back to the room, bolognese rice for dinner, and excitement for breakfast buffet tomorrow.