18 miles hiked, for a total of 270 miles hiked, overall. I will try a new feature here. I will include a map of the route we walked and some of the statistics.
The forecast for the last 3 days has been for rain. Originally, Thursday was supposed to e the day it started to ease. We woke up to the following forecast: 
It did not disappoint! It rained all but 15 minutes of our 7 hour hike. At one point, the wind on the top of the ridge was over 40 knots. We thought we were back on our sailboat!
As we approached Gijon, the deluge let loose. It rained buckets and the streets were flooded, and our shoes were working unsuccessfully as boats, fording the streams. And then, with the hotel in sight, the rain stopped! We saw glimpses of blue off to the horizon. 7 hours of rain and now it wants to stop?
Diane and I were mostly prepared for this weather. For the first time in the hike we chose to use our rain pants.
Diane is convinced that in addition to her rain pants and rain jacket, next time she will be using her Poncho. Without question, this was the most significant rainfall we have encountered in eight weeks of hiking on various Caminos.
It wasn’t all about the rain. Villaviciosa is the Apple capital of Spain. We hike through Orchard after Orchard of beautiful apple orchards, and gorgeous valleys. I risked my phone in the rain to capture this shot.
It doesn’t do justice to just how beautiful these valleys are.
One other note, during our hike we reached the junction where the Camino Del Norte splits. If you go straight you will reach Santiago by way of the Del Norte. If you turn left, you will travel on the Camino Primitivo. If you miss this Junction, you may find yourself in a place you never intended to be!
We are slowly warming up after the long soggy day. We hope all is well with you.
Nice job making it through the rain! It looks you’re still having a lot of fun despite the added challenge.
Thanks Micah, we are having fun and it was good to be back in the road after our 2 days of rest. There were a couple of points where we were thinking that maybe the weather was a bit too intense, but at the end of the day, we really did enjoy ourselves.
Sounds like quite a day! Were there others out on the trail too? I imagine your feet got pretty soaked and soggy. Glad you both made it safely. Looking forward to continuing your adventure with you! Love, Willow
We counted about 12 others doing various portions of our hike. Some, the whole thing, others, a portion. On a typical day we would expect to see 30 or 40 others at various times throughout the hike.