Monesterio to Zafra

There wasn’t much to see in Monesterio, population about 5000, elevation 755 m, unless you want to know everything about Iberian ham. It has a Jamon (Ham) Museum and a Jamon Day. But it was tidy little town and the lovely apartamento hotel, Oikos Apartamentos Turísticos (€77), - we had the room with the big balcony above Jim in the photo below - spa and nearby restaurant/bar made it a great route stop. The N630 awaited us and there would be no motorcycles that day.

After booking so many accommodations on Bookings.com, it tells me I have now achieved “genius” level! No reflection of my intellect for sure, but as a result, I am getting good discounts and sometimes free upgrades on some bookings, like frequent flyer benefits. I am not a fan necessarily of these online monopolies but I have to say, it has worked very efficiently for us on this trip, both for hotels and apartments. It always shows one nightly price that includes all taxes, etc. unlike Airbnb where you have fees and cleaning to consider.

After breakfast in the little restaurant below our hotel, we hit the road once again, bound for the larger town of Zafra, still heading directly north on the Ruta de La Plata. Below is a map with the route. We are hoping to make it to Salamanca but will see how it goes. We are not deviating at all from the N630 onto the parallel Camino track route, choosing to stick with a good quiet road and a smooth cycling surface, with no chance of getting lost in the great Spanish landscape.

We had a bit of a gentle climb out of Monesterio. We had some lovely views to begin with as we were now up quite high.

The cycle from Monesterio to Zafra was wonderful. We mostly felt like we were on a huge quiet cycle path. We continued through the cork forests, pastures and old stone walls of the dehesa. “Dehesa” comes from the Latin “defensa”, referrring to land that was fenced and usually designed for pasture.

We then left the cork forests behind and were riding through open, rolling and relatively treeless agricultural land except for olives. In places, the earth was really red, and there were the remains of old farm buildings in the hills. And the N630 continued on and on. On our first cycling trip in Spain, it un-nerved me a bit to be out in such vast expanses of land with no one else around, so different from our cycling experiences in other European countries, especially in France where you encounter lots of villages and see people walking, biking or fishing along the paths. But I am used to it now and there is a wildness that is kind of intoxicating.

Presiding over the land at one point was one of the Osborne bulls that you see in various places in Spain. In fact, there are 92 of them throughout the country. The bull was originally conceived in 1956 as an outdoor advertisement for the Brandy de Jerez made by the Osborne Group and has become a national symbol of Spain. Originally the Osborne name was on them but in 1988, a law prohibited all advertising billboards and the wording was removed. Public outcry prevented their complete removal and they have been declared to have “aesthetic or cultural significance.” The bulls have been the subject of various acts of political and artistic statements through time including the urban artist Sam3 reproducing Picasso’s Guernica on the bull in Alicante to protest the “sport” of bullfighting. I too am not a fan having attended one in 1971 out of curiosity and deluded romanticism from various novels. I thought it was a torturous sport for the bulls and for the horses involved. I feel the same way about some of our rodeo sports. There have been government attempts amid public pressure to restrict its prevalence but of course, it has its defenders and we see bullfighting rings even in very small places.

More fields of grapes were starting to appear too. We had to take a deviation onto a small country road in order to go through the small town of Pueblo de Sancho Pérez to get to Zafra off the N630 and stopped for a picnic lunch in a little shelter in the fields. There was a huge stork nest on a transmission pole close by so that kept us entertained. We were starting to see almond trees in bloom. They have a lovely scent.

Eventually, we cycled into Zafra and encountered this gorgeous old building, we think the former train station that looks from the signage around it that it will be restored. The “new” station is just across the street.

We rode through a nice park and found our hotel - the Parador de Zafra. Paradors are government owned hotels usually in buildings or on sites of historical signicance. There are about 80 throughout the country. They tend to be beyond our budget but when looking online for accommodation in Zafra, the rate in the parador (with my genius discount!) was only €116/night including breakfast. We seized the opportunity and because rain and wind were in the forecast for the following day, and we had a longer than usual ride ahead that we did not want to do in those conditions, it seemed a perfect choice for stay of 2 nights.

This parador was truly spectacular, located in the 15th C palace of the Dukes of Feria. Prior to that it was a Muslim fortress. It has towers and battlements, marble staircases, a huge open interior courtyard, a lovely bar and restaurant. Just entering through the main gate was exciting.

Our bikes got tucked away in a back room and we had an amazing room - huge with a foyer, an enormous bathroom and lovely old furniture.

Our room opened up onto the upper balustrade of the enormous inner courtyard - absolutely stunning in the daytime and at night.

Off the ground level of the courtyard was a little bar where we had a drink each night and a restaurant that was also the breakfast room. We didn’t eat dinner in the restaurant - just way too late for us - so had a bit of a picnic in our room. I wasn’t sure I ever needed to leave that room anyway!

It was incredibly quiet in the palace and we slept like royalty! I was already looking forward to breakfast in the morning.

Our day - 47 km. Mostly flat.