Retirement trip - Days 13 and 14

 Unfortunately I wasn't able to post yesterday as my firewall reported the hotel's wifi as 'suspect'.

Day 13

A shorter day today as I only have to ride for about three and a half hours. I left Salamanca and travelled through a lot of very flat farmland with few villages to break up the ride. Frankly, it was a bit dull after the roads I had been on.

Spotted this castle and stopped for a look. It wasn't open, all I could find out about was that it was built in the 12^th Century.

Roads were good and deserted and I arrived in my destination, Burgos, at about 13:30. As this was too early to check into my hotel, I headed for the city centre and had a rather hot and sweaty walk around in bike clothes!

Look pretty authentic - you could almost be in Ireland!

Not as spectacular as Salamanca, but quite a few interesting buildings.

When riding to my hotel I spotted a shopping centre (something which is very thin on the ground in Spain). I haven't been posting many videos as I lost the charging lead for my video camera and haven't been able to but one. It's the early type 'mini USB', so quite rare now. I had to try 3 shops before I found one, but it now means I can make more videos.

Later I went to find my hotel, although it describes itself as a 'hostel'. This usually means dormitories, but the floor I'm staying on has regular hotel rooms. At first I couldn't get in as the door was locked at 15:30, with a telephone number to call about the rooms. I was trying to call the number when a man inside spotted me and asked 'booking?', and said yes and he ushered me in. I quickly worked out that 'booking' seemed to be the only word he knew in English, so it was a good time to practice my Spanish. I managed to make myself understood and he showed me the room, gave me the entry card and the Wi-Fi code. Unfortunately my firewall blocked the Wi-Fi connection as 'suspicious', so I wasn't able to attend my Spanish class, which is held over Zoom, and why this post is late.

The 'reception' of the hostel is actually a bar! It hasn't opened at the time of writing this – hope it isn't too loud as I'm immediately above and next to the stairs!

Day 14

Didn't hear anything from the bar downstairs so either the soundproofing is really good, or they didn't have any customers!

Left Burgos and headed for my next destination, Zaragoza. Route was almost as boring as yesterdays, dull countryside, most which isn't used for agriculture, deserted roads and rundown villages few and far between. There were some hills in the middle, but that was all to break up what was a very monotonous day. Just before I got to Zaragoza, I stopped for food and drink at a Lidl at the side of the road. You know what it's like in Lidl, you go in for one thing and you end up looking at welders in the middle aisle!

I carried on and found my hotel - one again in a street I couldn't ride down! This time it was trams only, but I found a (not entirely legal) route to a lane alongside. Booked in and found they had an underground parking accessed from the lane!

Was really tired today and fell asleep when I got to my room. When I woke up I had to write a report and make a video for my Spanish class, so I haven't been out into the city, so no photos. I'm staying here for two nights so will take some tomorrow. Saw some interesting buildings and Zaragoza must have the highest level of scooter ownership in the world - there are millions on them!