The German girl, Julia, left about 45 minutes before me. I passed her about two and a half hours later. We met up again in the village of Montamarta but the bar was closed which forced me to eat a meager lunch while sitting on a park bench. The village was devoid of life as we did not see a single person during the half hour we were there. I said goodbye to Julia not expecting to see her again. Her plan was to walk a lesser distance than me that day and the following day when the trail split she was going north to Astorga where the Via de la Plata joins the Camino Frances and I was going northwest through Ourense on the Camino Fonseca.
Past Montamarta the Camino skirts the Ricobayo reservoir. Central Spain has been under a severe drought for several years and the virtually empty reservoir attested to this.
Near the end of the reservoir are the ruins of medieval town of Castrotorafe. The town was abandoned in the 17-hundreds and only the slowly eroding walls remain.
A not uncommon sight on the Camino are abandoned hiking shoes. At least the owner of this pair took the laces.
A couple of hours after I arrived at the albergue in Riego del Camino the door opened and I hear "Hola!". It was Julia, who had changed her plan. She had enough leftover food from the previous night but decided to accompany me to the one and only bar where a simple supper was served at 9 pm. She had a hot chocolate and I had a cafe con leche while we waited. The woman who served us was not pleased when only I ordered a meal. She was quite snotty and served Julia a second hot chocolate that was tepid and with hardly any chocolate. She refused to add more chocolate or to heat the contents. We decided that we weren't going to have breakfast there in the morning.
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