Date: 4th June 2019
Route: Larrasoaña to Pamplona
Distance: 10.5 miles / 16.5 KM
Accommodation: Albergue ‘Jesus y Maria’

I was excited to start walking to Pamplona as it was only 10.5 miles to the city from Larrasoaña. The terrain on this stretch of the Camino is mostly through flat urban areas, with a few uphill sections and so it only took us from 6am to about 9:30am to make it to the city. Even though it was pretty easy walking, my back was killing me for some unknown reason, so I was glad for a short day.

Pamplona is famous for “San Fermín” which is the Running of the Bulls festival, where groups of cattle are let loose in the city streets and locals and tourists then run in front of the cattle and try to make it to the safety of the stalls without being hurt. The cattle who ran the streets are then included in the bullfight later that afternoon. Thankfully, the festival doesn’t start until July and so I didn’t have to witness this (in my opinion) rather sad and pointless event.

As we got to the city so early, we were able to treat it like a rest day and get our “Camino chores” done. Queenie and I had bumped into our friend Rob earlier that morning and we had some breakfast in the nicest spot called Cafe Iruña while we waited for Miri to catch up. She was struggling with her blisters and knees, but she caught up to us at around 10 am. Rob decided it was too early to stop for the day and headed on another 5KM to Cizar Menor.

Pamplona would be a good place to have a full rest day if you needed one as it has all the facilities expected of a large city. One thing to note is that the main albergue doesn’t open until about 12pm and is somewhat notorious for having crappy security, so make sure to carry all of your valuables with you if going out to explore the city. It was a nice place to stay though, with bunk beds lined up in big, open dormitory style rooms. They also let you use the washing machine for free (the dryer is about ‎€2.00) and they have a pretty decent kitchen.

Admittedly, I didn’t do too much exploring when I was in Pamplona which I now regret. We did walk around the city for a while and spotted some interesting art pieces, but I was so tired from our first few days of walking that after cooking dinner and showering in the albergue, I was fast asleep by about 9pm. I also knew we had a big day ahead of us with the climb up to Alto del Perdon and it was forecast to be torrential rain all day, so I’m glad I switched off early.

Buen Camino,

Jasmin