Pilgrims wake up early. Understandably, they prefer to walk in the cooler morning hours, and most refugios have a curfew, which means you are in bed anyway at 22h00 at the latest and the lights really go out at that hour in the dormitory. The one we slept in last night had 30 bunkbeds, there is no way you can escape the rule in such an environment. Even if everyone tries not to make too much noise when waking up and preparing for the day, you wake up anyway. The most typical noise is that of plastic bags being put into backpacks.
So we had an early start, except for the fact that when loading our bikes we saw Jan´s bike had a flat tyre. Richard is our handy guy for bicycle repair (sic) and he got a new tyre setup in less than 15 minutes!
The landscape we cycled through today contained rolling hills with lots of wheat fields with a lot of poppy flowers to make it even more spectacular. Today we entered the Rioja region, so we also cycled through kilometres of vineyards. We even had the pleasure of finding the pilgrim´s fountain which does not only supply water but also has a wine tap for all pilgrims interested in a wine break. Good quality according to our professional winetaster, Sam.
To further challenge our capacity for repairing bicycles, Jan´s gear system (again him) broke down. You need gears on this Camino. Richard and Sam put all their knowledge together, opened the gear changing system (Richard calls it a "satellite" for some unknown reason) and after working on it for half an hour they succeeded in getting it back into working order.
If yesterday saw us cycling less distance than we hoped for, today was the other way round. We went on for an additional 15 km after the assumed finish. Good for our confidence (even if it does not help us with the small problems that are beginning to crop up in terms of sore muscles and posteriors)
Day 3 : 65 kilometres, 5 hours of cycling (it does not seem a fast ride but we promise you we are trying our best - this is not Holland after all).
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