Castilblanco de Los Arroyos to Almaden de la Plata

We woke up early and packed our packs. After some breakfast in the dark, we set off with Karl the German. After sorting out my pack I am glad that it is now several kilos lighter but it also has become clear that we will need to carry the maximum amount of water with this heat. My water bladder hold 3 litres and it has been filled to capacity this morning. The walk to Almaden de la Plata started with a 16 kilometres walk on an quiet road before turning off into a National Park. In this National Park we can potentially spot a deer or two and  some Spanish pigs. Well we did not see any deer but we did see some Spanish pigs. These pigs have a bluish colour and are on a strict diet. The town where we are going serves a local speciality using these pigs. I believe it is spare ribs and was hoping to try some as spare ribs is one of my favourite meals. Unfortunately this did not happen. The walk through this National Park was very pleasant.

Karl was taking some photos of a Cork tree and explained how the cork was harvested, I also made a photo to remember this particular tree. We rested several times as this walk was

very tiring and with 10 kilometres to go, I was not at all confident that I was going to make it. The last 3 kilometres were the toughest with a 100
metre steep climb, followed by a descend on slippery rocks but we all made it safely to the bottom. Almaden de la Plata is one of the better towns in Spain and we stayed at the only albergue in town. This was a clean albergue with hot water again. However there was one thing missing, toilet paper. Both Gary and I had an upset stomach from the previous night's meal and were thankful we brought a roll of toilet paper from home. In this albergue we met some other people who were doing the Camino on their bikes , most of them were from Spain but we also met a couple from Doetinchem and they went to the local bar with us for dinner. So now we had Karl, Inge-Marie, Arie and Letty in our group. Somehow, I really don't know how, we got talked into another pilgrim's meal. I was really worried but was delighted as this one was absolutely fantastic. The  bar's owner was the loveliest and most generous guys. He
gave us a sweet wine after dinner and some Madeira cake for the following day.  All this for nothing. I was more than happy to give this guy a tip. Letty gave me her e-mail address as she will also be walking the 4 day walk of the world in Nijmegen and we thought it would be nice to catch up after the walks for a drink of beer. We also exchanged e-mail addresses with Karl from Germany as he was
planning to walk to Monasterio the following day (a 38 kilometres hike). Initially we were thinking about doing this as well for training purposes but decided against this after today's walk and finding out that the way to Monasterio was mostly uphill once again. I just did not think I had it in me to do that hike in 1 day. We decided to do the 16 kilometres walk to El Real de la Jarra instead and take it easy for a day. Another good night in the albergue and we even managed to sleep in until sunrise, we said our goodbyes to Karl, before heading off to our next destination.