When I booked the place at the hostel in Puente la Reina yesterday, the staff member advised me to start early, “It’s going to be over 30° in the afternoon, so it’s best to do as much as you can in the morning.”

I set off at 06:40 in the dark. I reckoned that Pamplona’s street lights would keep me safe. And so it proved.

Pamplona has a well-regarded university, now on a dazzling new campus, which I walked through. The path took me up to and through Zizur Major, a dormitory village that shows signs of being swallowed up in greater Pamplona in the next generation.

Once outside the village, we were in open country, the kind of which I believe we will see a lot.

Then the road started to rise before us as we began the climb up up to a gap on the ridge that guards the southern approaches to Pamplona. These days it is marked a huge number of wind turbines on the ridge. But the pass is still the the Alto de Perdón, or the Heights of Forgiveness.

I realised, at the top, that this was the last I would see of the Pyrenees. They have been a constant visual feature of every day’s walking from Hagetmau to today. I worked out that that this has been about 146 kms of travel! They are both a barrier and a connection for the Franco-Spanish provinces of the Basque country, and Navarre. But hereafter, the country through to Burgos is undulating, with no big hills to give long-distance views.

Coming down the slope from the Alto was tricky, with a path with drops, covered with loose stones – most unpleasant.  But eventually it evened out and I was strolling along flat field paths into the little village of Zariquiegui. There were two little shops there doing a roaring trade in various items for breakfast, which, as we were 9kms from Pamplona and had started early, was much needed. There was a very pleasant square to sit out in, by the tiny ancient Romanesque church.

On I went, passing a wayside shrine of a different kind

It was, by now, starting to get hot, so I stopped in Uterga for an ice-cold coke zero. At the next point, Muruzábal, there was a choice; go straight on to Puente la Reina, now only 6.5kms away, or turn left for a detour to see the remarkable church of Saint Mary at Eunate. I turned left. It was a hot and dusty road past open fields, but at the end was this:

The octagonal church stands alone in the countryside. It is made of dressed stone (you can still see the masons’ marks), and its existence is a mystery. Perhaps it was a Templar church, but there is archeological evidence suggesting it might have been a hostel run by the Order of St John of Jerusalem for Camino pilgrims.

It was by now 12.45 and very hot. I loaded up with water and set about the remaining  eight kilometres to Puente la Reina. I arrived at 13.55, and found my hostel for the night. Quite a few pilgrims had stopped at Pamplona, but this place was still full to bursting. Shower, change, do hand-washing, siesta – the rhythm is the same when you arrive anywhere. A few hours off my feet was restorative.

The church was, like so many round here, sturdily Romanesque with later additions and dedicated to St James. The golden altarpieces were strongly on display here, too.

There was one other feature worth noting:

Yes! A gallery with a working organ that was in tune, and a choir practising – a decent parish church sound. You could have knocked me down with a feather. Very heartening.

In the cathedral in Pamplona there were signs everywhere bidding one to be silent, but they played piped music. To start with it was some chant, perfectly pleasant, but then the play list went on to some vaguely jazz piano – real lift music. Very jarring. And how odd that no one thought, if piped music was deemed necessary, to fill the space with Victoria or Morales!

Just past the church in Puente la Reina was a restaurant with pilgrims sitting in it, and a menu to match, so I ate and drank by myself, until I was joined by G, my Kosovan friend, Matt from Arizona, and Horst from Köln, a 77 year-old, whose idea of training for the walk was to climb the Zugspitse! Conversation then bed at 21:00.