In the Quiet, Misty Morning

 Hey all, Mitch here again. Seeing as we reached one of the highest points on the Camino today, and with it one of the most famous landmarks along the route, we decided to wake up early to get there in time for the sunrise. Our hosts graciously packed us a picnic breakfast to enable us leaving so early, and we set out. If you paid attention to the title, you may see where this is going though, here's a shot of the sunrise we were able to see from Cruz de Ferro, as well as a group shot there:

As you can see, the weather did not cooperate with our brilliant plan, so instead of a gorgeous mountaintop sunrise, we instead got a misty morning. It was still very peaceful, and our windbreakers and ponchos kept us plenty warm and dry in the end. The crossing over the top of Alto Altar was full of some great misty forests and some gorgeous blooming mountain flowers, all made more ethereal by the ever-present mist.

Finally, after a rather steep and treacherous descent from the peak (of around 500 meters, 1,640 feet for the metric impaired) we stopped to enjoy our picnic breakfast and get some Coffee in the town of Acebo.

By the time we had finished eating, enjoying a hot beverage, and getting geared back up to walk the rest of the way, the combination of time and lower altitude meant that we finally started to get longer and longer views towards our destination. The rest of the day involved several more relatively steep descents, bringing us down from a peak altitude of 1,515 meters to a mere 600, a couple of hundred meters lower altitude than we've been for weeks.

Since we were now of the windward side of the mountains we crossed, the vegetation also showed signs of being used to a less arid climate, with some areas feeling almost Seattle-like in their mossyness:

We're definitely still somewhere more arid than home though, as most of the hills looked more like this:

At the end of our long descent though, we made it to our destination for tonight, the lovely town of Molinaseca. Our early start this morning meant we made it all the way there by Noon, which has left a lot of time this afternoon for lunch and relaxation. We'll need it, as the final big climb of the trip is now only two days away. I'll leave you with a picture of Molinaseca that I was able to get as we descended into town.