You leave Nájera behind while the red cliff face above the rooftops is still in shadow. Soon you’re walking between fields and vineyards, and this is Rioja just as you imagine it: red earth, rows of vines, a wide sky. The climb is steady and never really steep. You feel it mostly in your legs, not in your breathing.
It’s around six hours of walking, mostly across open country. There isn’t much shade, so the sun decides how tough it gets. In Santo Domingo de la Calzada, pilgrims from the Camino Vasco del Interior join the route. From here, they walk along with you. In the town’s cathedral they keep live chickens, an old legend that is still very much alive. And just before you arrive, the church tower rises above the cornfields.