A brief break in a little stand of trees: to our left cars and farm equipment motor by, and at one point a concerned motorist honks at me, leaning over to watch through his window for me to wave if I’m ok as he drives away. To the right, pilgrims pass on the Camino, sometimes in conversation, sometimes making only the sound of their feet on the road. All around, a hundred thousand leaves shake and clatter in the wind.

I spent the night in a little hostel that lives inside the ruins of an old church. In the afternoon, pigeons busy about in their homes in the walls, pilgrims come and go, and somewhere nearby a swarm of bees, possibly belonging to the religious order of the old church, buzz in a flowering tree.

It’s week 9 in Spain’s second division, and Burgos is hosting their biggest and closest rival, Valladolid. Chants are chanted, hymns are sung, opponents whistled, and near misses are gutturally groaned about. If your mom asks, “puto” is just a very popular player, that’s why they’re singing so much about him.

It’s 8:30 on a Saturday night and the city of Burgos is out for a stroll before dinner. We stand in the middle of Plaza Mayor awhile and then walk down Calle de San Lorenzo, where all the best bars and restaurants are found.

5pm, a lazy Friday afternoon on a wide restaurant terrace next to a busy road. Waiters clear tables while folks sit and chat under trees that leave their tables dappled in golden hour sunlight. Also that is a nearby fountain, not someone peeing for 15 minutes straight.

At a restaurant in a sleepy corner of a plaza around 4 o’clock in the afternoon, my waitress, who has been caring for her son while working, welcomes her brother and his son. The four of them have lunch inside while a couple mostly silently reads their phones across a table from each other. A flock of sparrows serves as cleanup crew after the lunch crowd clears out.

Just outside of Logroño on the Camino you come to a damn built in 1883. It has created a wetlands area and park which is home for more than 50 species of birds, almost all of which I’m pretty sure you can hear in this recording. Also featured: a very chirpy squirrel who wondered if maybe I hadn’t seen all those “don’t feed the animals” signs.

The only cafe in Viana open before 7:00am slowly fills with regulars, old friends, guys dressed in fluorescent vests and heavy work boots. The equipment behind the bar whirrs and hisses in their effort to make exceptionally bad coffee. Spain’s version of COPS plays loudly on the TV in the corner.

In a grove of olive trees, the wind stirs the leaves (and blows a bit too much on the mics, sorry). Some pilgrims pass, in silence, or chatting, or singing.