Belorado to San Juan de Ortego and Beyond: Grey Skies and Cool Breezes

July 1st.  The temperature has dropped and it is now almost cold.  Today, Canada Day, we walked from Villafranca Montes de Oca through San Juan de Ortega and on to Atapuerta - a distance of 22kms.  This walk was a great improvement on some of our previous walks - not only because of the weather but also because of the scenery.  We crossed three small mountain peaks, walking first through a magnificent conifer forest and then a lovely oak forest.  Part of this walk was rather spooky - a large man in a Range Rover came up behind us and looked us over.  He did not stop, though, so I said thank heavens for wrinkles and frizzy hair!

Atapuerta is a very interesting place because the oldest human remains in Europe were found here (Homo-Antecessor, 900,000 years old).  The dig is still going on in the prehistoric caves that dot this area.  Because of this it is a UNESCO heritage site. 

Here, too, we had our best meal in Spain so far.  A lovely Eggplant dish which I know as the Moorish Imam´s Secret but is simply called baked Aubergine here.  It is made not only with eggplant but also with a variety of other vegetables and spices and topped with béchamel sauce.  Delicious!  We ate it for both lunch and dinner.  After being hungry for almost two weeks it was quite a treat.

Today we are in Burgos, a large city of 190,000 people.  I will write more about this tomorrow when I find a better computer.  This one is old and eats euros like there is no tomorrow!!!!