16? Miles , 5,300 feet elevation
One crosses the Deba Rio and climbs up out of Deba and joins the national forest. They cannot mark the national forest with the yellow conch shells or the yellow Camino arrows, the typical Camino markers, so I wandered around in the rain forest. ( I don’t know if it is an official rain forest, but it was pouring down and everything I’ve ever seen green grew in this forest:fern,ivy,fauna and flower of a multitude and trees of a wide variety.
I was rescued by Anthony, a Basque electrician, who was on his normal Saturday hike. He reminded me of my cousin Andrew, Andrew’s namesake. My Polish cousin who had the congenital heart difficulty. Anthony stopped at one point to adjust something that helped control a pacemaker he had. This is by way of pigeon English and Spanish and him showing me his massive chest scar. He has a 15 year old son and a 13 year old daughter and a wife he called “boss”. He let out an affectious laugh when he said “boss”.
He showed me the correct path and walked with me to Olatz. My first Spanish friend. We parted ways and I stopped at a quaint Basque home/ cafe and had a torta pintxos, an espresso and a bottled water for 3 euros. The Spanish/omelet/torta was to die for. How does anyone make any money charging so little.
There were 5 ,that I counted, extremely steep ascents and more painfully 5 very abrupt downhills. Some so steep coming down I thought I would slip and fall. The down hurt much worse. Along the way, deep in the forest, I saw a couple banana slugs the size of small cats. (if that is what they were?) A handful of light green tree frogs and a lizard-gecko, bright green with black spots a little bigger than the geiko gecko, zipping around like he was on crack or something. And one very curious pony who wanted badly to eat my backpack.
I limped into Markina and landed in an Irish bar. I had an address but no idea how to get to Casa Rural Intxauspe at Barrio Atxondoa, número 10. When I showed the gal bartending the name and address, she immediately took out her cell and made a call. In 5 minutes the lady running the 17th century Basque farmhouse came and picked me up. It’ s a couple minutes away overlooking town but way cool. I have some pics but they have to wait, I have no wi if.
ljm22 