So after a brief interlude in the UK, packing up the contents of the house ready for the tenant to move in, listening to the cricket for four days, watching the rain dance its way across the Pennines, we arrived back in Asturias on Monday afternoon to a lethargic, humid heat.

That lasted all of two days, because yesterday it rained a bit... a lot... it caught a lot of people off guard (even though the weather forecast was right on the money), girls in strappy tops and gladiator sandals trudging round looking miserably wet.

On the TV weather last night they showed Murcia having a top temperature of 42C. Oviedo had 18C (well, it felt a little warmer, but not, you know, hot). I'm all in favour of this sort of thing as 40C is not a temperature for Anglo Saxons (or Celts)...

The other thing that seemed to change is Nemesis the seagull, he's not so agressive now, and we noticed the other night that there are three chicks (well, they're a bit big to be called chicks) on the roof opposite. They flap their wings ineffectually and make whingy teenage-seagull noises while mum and dad flap around being proud. So we have our terrace back. Just in time for the rain...  ¶ 1:09 PM 1 comments

  The encierro (running of the bulls) this morning in Pamplona's San Fermín festival was a bit more violent than the others. They just announced on the news that one of the runners died after being gored in the neck. It was a pretty fast and crowded run, and one of the bulls (the smallest, at 550Kg or so) got a bit distracted and spent some time not running. There were another half a dozen serious injuries caused by the bulls' horns (other injuries, of which there must be loads, mainly caused by falling over, are not reported as much). Nutters, the lot of them.

The whole run can be seen here...

What you don't see in that link is the forty minutes of commentary afterwards, slow motion replays, commentators trying to identify if this guy or that guy had actually been gored or if the horns had missed him, the ambulance guys at work.  ¶ 7:32 AM 0 comments

  The phone rang on Thursday, it was Julio, one of the walking group. He wanted to know if I fancied going for a walk this weekend. I said where and he said something about San Melchor and the Aramo, we'd walk on Saturday and stay overnight at an albergue, then walk a bit more on Sunday. Sounds good, I said, okay.

We took the bus from Oviedo at 8am yesterday, one of the city buses. We went to the end of the line and started walking. The plan, eventually was this.

Walk from Puerto (the end of the bus line) to Pedroveya, about 7km on country roads. Pause for a drink in the bar there.

Walk up over the western end of the Aramo (the big series of hills you can see to the South of Oviedo) via a pass at La Rebollada, head down into the village of Bermiego where we'd ask if they'd do us some lunch (Julio had been raving about the egg and chips there). Take our time there, have a rest (after another 10km or so).

Down into Arroxo (7km more) to stop at the albergue (hostel) there, have dinner, sleep.

Sunday, walk along the Senda del Oso (the bear path) to Proaza and catch a bus back to Oviedo.

Which is exactly what we did. The only downsides were; on the way over La Rebollada there was mud that was knee deep and it was a bit of an adventure. Then, when we got to Bermiego, the owner said his wife was at her mother's house and she was the one that did the cooking. so we settled for a plate of ham and chorizo and cheese instead and spent a couple of hours talking with him (he told us he used to go up over the mountain for parties in Pedroveya (but on a horse, of course). And the weather, we were walking in mist for much of the time (Julio's phrase of the day: 'me cago en su mar' which can be translated as bloody hell, and is literally a scatalogical maritime mashup... I crap in it's sea... mar can be replaced by leche (milk) madre (mother) and for maximum offense dios (god)). Still, it was good fun. He's already talking about a four day walk from Oviedo to Covadonga by the mountain routes...  ¶ 5:14 PM 0 comments