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Stage 5 · Vía de la Plata y Camino Sanabrés
Monesterio → Fuente de Cantos
Before you set off
No water, no food
Between Monesterio and Fuente de Cantos. — Leave with 3.7 litres of water.
Down to Zurbarán's countryside
After three stages in the sierra, this one comes as a relief: 21.4 kilometres with 220 metres of ascent and 420 of descent, low difficulty. You leave Monesterio to the north and the route soon takes to dirt tracks through the last of the dehesas, the holm oaks ever more widely spaced and the ground turning from pasture into cereal.
By halfway the landscape is another one altogether: open ridges, ploughland, olives and vines in the distance, a huge sky and not a village in sight. There are no bars and no fountains along the whole way, but no climbs either: gentle undulations that tend downhill, and a wide, well-marked track that lets you keep a good pace. You cross several streams that carry water in spring and none in summer.
Fuente de Cantos is visible from far off, white above the plain, and you come in along its broad streets to the centre. It is the birthplace of the painter Zurbarán, with a house museum devoted to him, and it has everything: shops, bars, a chemist and places to sleep. A good stage for arriving early and resting.
Tips
Have breakfast and fill your bottle in Monesterio: nothing is open until Fuente de Cantos.
The stage has almost no shade at all; cap and sun cream even when the heat is not fierce.
At a good pace you arrive around lunchtime: use the afternoon for Zurbarán's house and the square.
If the ground is wet, the mud on these tracks sticks to your boots; carry something to scrape them with.
Where am I?
Your phone says where you are; the guide tells you how far is left and where the next water is.
Create the free account It is free and forever. An account is needed for the guide to place you. I already have an account
Your position is used to answer you and is not stored anywhere.
Walk with me
It crosses where you are with the time, the daylight left, the water, the beds and the notice board. Three things at most: the ones that actually change your afternoon.
Create the free account It is free and forever. An account is needed for the guide to place you. I already have an account
It checks GPS every 6 min while you keep it open. GPS drains the battery: if yours is low, switch it off.
Your position is used to answer you and is not stored anywhere.
Profile and services
The elevation for this stage has not been loaded yet.
What's there today
Nobody has reported anything on this stage.
Tips from people who walked it
The things that do not expire: where the fountain actually is, which bar opens at six, where not to go in the rain.
None here yet. If you have just walked this stage, you know something tomorrow’s pilgrim does not.
Emergencies
Call 112112 is the same number in Spain, in Portugal and across the European Union. It works with no credit, with no SIM, and over any operator's network, not just yours.
Say where you are I am walking the Vía de la Plata, on the stage from Monesterio to Fuente de Cantos.
- Farmacia García Porras Pharmacy km 0,0
- Farmacia Pardo Camacho Pharmacy km 0,0
- Health centre Health centre km 20,0 +34 924 50 09 51
- Farmacia Toribio Pharmacy km 20,5
- Farmacia Godoy Pharmacy km 20,5
The map
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What to see on this stage 4
- Iglesia de San Pedro Apóstol Church km 0,0
- Iglesia Church km 0,7
- El Carmen Church km 20,5
- Parroquia Nuestra Señora de la Granada Church km 20,5