Camino Frances - 2014
Day 6 Monday 21st April 2014
Puente La Reina to Estella
22km - 6.5 hours
The other albergue in Puente La Reina... PP Repardores
Calle Mayor
Church of St. James
From the distance, the immense bell-tower of the Church of Santiago el Mayor rises up. As slender as a lighthouse, it guides pilgrims to Puente la Reina, one of the most interesting spots on the Navarrese section of the Pilgrims' Way to Santiago. Standing on the main street, the church offers visitors a monumental doorway with a Moorish influence. Its sculptures, worn away by time, invite you to reconstruct in your imagination the biblical tales that were masterfully carved by those medieval artisans. Inside the church, two Gothic sculptures, the apostle St. James across from St. Bartholomew, scrutinize the curious visitors who admire the high altarpiece with expressions of timeless serenity. The church of Santiago el Mayor, built in the 12th century and reconstructed in the 16th, rises straight up like a bold and monumental stone arrow, soaring over all the buildings in Puente la Reina, a pilgrims' town par excellence that stands in the Central Zone of Navarre. The church stands in the centre of the narrow Rúa Mayor, along which the Pilgrim's Way runs. |
Doorway to the Church of St James, Calle Mayor
Puente la Reina
Glenn chatting with Tayeb, who we heard suffered bad blisters and left the Camino after Puente la Reina
Looking back towards Puente la Reina
Approaching Ciraqui
A well deserved rest in Ciraqui
The way ahead after Ciraqui
Canal de Alloz
Medieval bridge just before Lorca
The Church at Lorca
Coming into Estella
Glenn, Jane, Maria, Alan, Marlies, Marike and Marja
(Marike, Marlies,Marja and Maria.... all from Holland became known as "M-people" for
their sterling rendition of the 1975 Dutch Eurovision winning song "Ding-a- Dong")
| This parish church of San Miguel is the most important building in the village of Villatuerta. The first Romanesque church was built in about 1200, but the Castilians burned and pillaged Villatuerta in 1378. The fighting was fierce in this remote outpost of the Hundred Years’ War, and the Church was badly damaged. Construction of the present Gothic-style church began in 1378 and continued for almost hundred years. Only small gate in the northern wall survived from the previous Romanesque church and is known as the Romanesque gate of the San Roman hermitage. |
San Veremundo
Basque separatism has not gone away completely!
| The building of the church of Santo Sepulcro, Estella, began in the late 12th century.
In the tympanum of the Gothic doorway are represented the Crucifixion, the Entombment
and the Resurrection of Christ; flanking the doorway are fine statues of Apostles. |
Entering Estella
The Bull Ring in Estella
Accommodation Notes
| Hotel Yerri is located just outside of the main central part of Estella, just past the Bull Ring, and is easy to find. It was a comfortable hotel and reasonably priced at Euro 45 for a double room for single occupancy. They did a reasonable breakfast for Euro 4. |
Hotel Yerri
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