Vitalie Ciobanu

Data Analyst as a Service

Author: Vitalie Ciobanu

  • Stage 6. Estella – Torres del Río

    Stage 6. Estella – Torres del Río

    What a day! Out of the 6 hours we were moving, I think we were under somewhat heavy rain 5 hours.

    About the night, all good. Comfortable beds, clean bathrooms, good service although laundry services a little too expensive – 7 euros per bag.

    Other than the rain during the day, the route passes through nice places and many green areas.

    The route passes through a nice place that works with metal – smithy – https://www.laforjadeayegui.com/.

    A few meters later you reach a wine factory that arranged a spring with running water AND a wine one 😀 there is a limit of 100 liters a day 😛

    https://www.irache.com/ if you have spare time, you can also visit the wine museum.

    Left – wine. Right – water.

    When we reached our planned destination and stopped to eat at the only open restaurant, since it was the Easter Friday, it was a challenge to find something open, we decided to go to the next city to sleep and thus do less the next day.

    The next city was about 7 km away, so we did almost 30 km this day. Luckily the rain stopped a little, because the road goes through open land with a lot of wind and muddy roads.

    We reached Torres del Río and stopped at the first hostel that we saw – Hostal San Andrés. The only good thing here was during the night nobody was snoring! 😂

    To summarize the hostel, during check in we were told there is a restaurant with some vegan options. We ended up ordering pasta with tomato sauces and rice with mushrooms, again, and Lucia ordered minestra de verduras, a Spanish dish with vegetables and ravioli with spinach, that I believe have eggs…

    Man’s bathroom and showers were “outside” the main building and it was quite average. The showers with no hot water, just enough to make you shower as quick as possible and leave, especially in a cold day and bathroom with no heating and the door widely open. The shower space was small with no place to hang clothes or towel, so it remained hanged in the door from outside. Did I mention the room had no heating and it had the same temperas outside because the door is always opened?! When I went to the bathroom during the night, I used lady’s room, it was closer 🙂

    Also during check in we were told they don’t have vegetable milk but they will get one for us from a store in the nearby city. Also they can toast some bread for us. Turned out in the morning nobody knew nothing about this, so there was no milk and no way to toast bread. We went to a small shop around the corner and bought a bagel that we put some olive oil and salt on it. And here we were, before the last day of our St James Way during this vacation.

    Agora Hostel
    Agora Hostel bathroom

  • Stage 5. Puente de Reina – Estella

    Stage 5. Puente de Reina – Estella

    The morning was hard. We got a the world champion of snoring near right near us and I barely felt asleep at around 1am and woke up many times until 5-ish when I no longer could sleep until 6, when someone’s alarm rang. Somehow that snoring guy stopped and I managed to sleep until 7.

    The bathroom, toilets, sinks, everything, was a complete mess this morning. Sometimes I still think “homo sapiens” is a compliment for us, as a species.

    Again, very shortly, we do not recommend Albergue Padres Reparadores in Puente de Reina unless you’re really really really short on money!

    Today was the first day with lots of sun. But, since it was windy, the cloudy moments felt chilly! I took my jacket off and put it on several times.

    There were not that many interesting or wow views today, so I didn’t take many pictures.

    What was nice though, we saw two places with some small things to eat free of charge, you leave a donation and that’s it.

    Other than this, at lunch time we stopped to eat the sandwiches with hummus made in the morning and headed to our destination, a small city named Estella. We stopped at a private hostel – Agora Hostel. 20 euros per night per person. Very nice hostel, with nice rooms, comfortable beds with a private curtains each, clean bathrooms and nice showers. They offer laundry services of one medium size bag of clothes for 7 euros. There is also kitchen available until 8:15pm (we did not enter to see how it is). They also have breakfast, don’t remember the price, that includes toasted bread, yogurt, outs and a juice. We did not order it. We bought some vegetable milk again (coco, this time) and cornflakes so we’ll have this only.

    For the dinner we wanted to go to a place called NamasTé but it was closed. We went to another place just next door called Mundo. They had some vegan options. Although not great, the food was ok. We had croquetas with mushrooms, guacamole with chips and olives separately, and a vegan burger.

    The bathroom from yesterday’s hostel
    The bathroom from yesterday’s hostel
    Main square of Puente de Reina
    The Bridge of Rabia
    Bridge of Rabia
    Today’s route
    Horse mobile maintenance service 🙂
    Sheep crossing a road

  • Stage 4. Pamplona – Puente de Reina

    Stage 4. Pamplona – Puente de Reina

    Ok, hard night. I woke up many many times…

    After having a quick breakfast, we started the walk at 8am. Crossing the city we enter a somewhat long asphalt road going up slowly. After about 7 km we enter the off-road path and start the heaviest uphill at about 10th km. We reach and cross the 700+m mountain – Sierra del Perdón, famous for its sculptures- at km 14.

    Sierra del Perdón

    The downhill part is steep as well and with some stones. Nothing too difficult but may seem like this for some people.

    Afterwards, it’s kind of straight road until the hostel. Ohhh, the hostel. We stopped at the one with the lowest cost – 9 euros per night – Albergue Padres Reparadores, https://maps.app.goo.gl/H9fVNskPhi8CbWqw7?g_st=ic. Well, you get what you pay for.

    The beds are well used. The pillows should have been changed years ago. Kitchen is, well, equipped let’s say but most of this equipment is also waiting for a new replacement. Bathroom and toilet, in the same room, are not very clean, to say the least. Either the washing machine or the dryer cost 3 euros.

    Will see how the night goes. Tomorrow we have about 22 km to Estella.

    Pamplona
    Pamplona
    Pamplona
    Today’s route
    Cizur – Zariquiegui
    The highest point
    Obanos

  • Stage 3. Llarasoaña – Pamplona

    Stage 3. Llarasoaña – Pamplona

    Rainy day 😂😂 luckily it was a short one.

    First, about the dinner and breakfast. The starter had maybe a 50% portion of hummus , for two people, with two 5-6cm sticks of bread. As main dish there was a vegetable soup, very likely to be frozen vegetables and only boiled some time. For second, we had a small portion of rice with champions, also seemed to be something pre-cooked and only warmed up or something.

    We shared the table with one Italian guy, Fabio, and one from Netherlands, Arnold, if I’m writing it correctly. Very nice guys with whom we shared the dinner and some discussion. Both plan to reach Santiago de Compostela. Good luck to them!

    Breakfast topped it all 😀 a sandwich with hummus, where we hardly noticed the taste of hummus and when opening the sandwich it looked like someone “cleaned” the fork only, because there was no hummus there 🤣 to summarize, paying 15 euros for the dinner and 5 for the breakfast at Pension San Nicolas in Larrasoaña does not worth it.

    It started raining yesterday during dinner and continued until today afternoon. That means we got the cold and somewhat wet boots today and started walking through the rainy snow 🙂

    The route is pretty nice and easy. Not much to say or show in photos, as we made fewer pictures than usual.

    After the rain stopped, the sun showed up and started shining brightly. I had to change my socks because I felt my feet would not last long in the wet boots.

    Other than this, we reached Pamplona and checked in the municipality’s hostel, Jesus and Maria. Quite big I can say, with long corridors with few 8-beds compartments. Shared rooms for the bathrooms and toilets, so anyone use any cabin available. The hostel has laundromat either free laundry and 1euro dryer (which works whenever and however it wants). We put our clothes 3 times to have them fully dry.

    For lunch we went to Baratza Makrobiotika vegan restaurant. Daily menu changes so we started with croquetas and tortilla de patatas. Then we had a very tasty vegetable soup fennel cream. Then we had a dish with a mix of other things which delicious as well. For desert we had lemon pie and chocolate cake. Everything made in house! We got another tortilla in a sandwich to do and 2 empanadas (dumplings) for tomorrow. Overall, a place to recommend!

    For dinner we made another soup from a packet we bought in the first day, added some chickpeas and fideos. We also toasted some tofu to accompany the soup.

  • Stage 2. Roncesvalles – Llarasoaña

    Stage 2. Roncesvalles – Llarasoaña

    Well, this day was much nicer than the previous one. Much more wild and beautiful.

    Roncesvalles

    Straight from the start we enter a nice path through a forest. It’s kind of short but energizing to start the day with.

    Overall, the entire day passed through nice areas, with many nice views and trails. It was mostly going down today, not lots of uphill some short and steep parts but very manageable. I’ve enjoyed today’s walk.

    We planned to finish in Zubiri, after about 22km. But we reached this city relatively quickly, by lunch time, and since there was no stores or much things to do here, we decided to go to the next bigger city after lunch, Larrasoaña.

    We had lunch in a bar-restaurant. They ran out of falafel the day before so all they could offer was some salad, potato chips, olives and a big sandwich with avocado and tomato. Not a lot but ok to replenish the energy for 5 more km.

    After having lunch we entered a small shop and bought almond milk and biscuits for tomorrow’s breakfast and chickpeas for tonight’s dinner then we moved on.

    We stopped at Pension San Nicolas, a private one, because we wanted to do the laundry and cook. Here we were told they can make us something for dinner and picnic as breakfast as well.

    Laundry: 4 euros. Dryer: 3 euros.

    Other than this, the pension is nice, clean, and bit cold. There is a fully functional kitchen, although no accessories (towels, paper etc). The hosts are nice!

    The boots hace to be left outside. Under a roof, but outside. So in the morning I expect them to be almost frozen 🙂

    Roncesvalles
    Distance to Santiago de Compostela
    Tomorrow’s plan, short route

  • Stage 1. Saint Jean Pied de Port – Roncesvalles

    Stage 1. Saint Jean Pied de Port – Roncesvalles

    First day of the walk. As mentioned in the previous post, today was about the “backup” route, or winter route. Veeeerryyy boring, long distances on asphalt and sharing the road with cars. The entire distance is mostly going up, with the last kilometers having a steeper incline. Only the last 1.5 km is all going down 🙂

    So, today, exactly 15km of asphalt before entering the first trail. 1km+ of beautiful forest trail that ends in the same road with cars. Luckily today was Sunday and there were no trucks.

    Afterwards, shortly after passing the 18th km, we enter an amazing forest with beautiful views, trails, river bridges, small cascades with mostly positive, steep, elevation until the 22nd km, where we get off the forest for few hundred meters to enter another trail. Warning, the water from the spring that you can find here is not treated. Meaning you can drink it, but it’s on your own risk.

    From here, we’re following the same trail, that peaks at 1050m, until the hostel in Roncesvalles.

    The hostel is nice and looked after by volunteers. The kitchen is well equipped. Lots of tables to eat and space to prepare something to eat and then wash everything. We didn’t go to look for lunch options, since there are only 3 places nearby so vegan options are quite limited.

    After about 7km there is a commercial area with few stores, including a supermarket. The prices are very low because the store is treated as duty free, since it’s at the border between France and Spain.

    We got a can of beans, a can of artichokes and some cooked rice. With the half of the onion soup left from yesterday, we made a quick soup to which we added the beans and the rice. It ended up being more solid dish that we enjoyed a lot.

    For dinner went to Hotel Roncesvalles to see what vegan options they have. They were kind enough to make us a quinoa dish with vegetables out of the menu. With a vegetable soup as a starter, it wasn’t that bad. 2 vegetable dishes 🤦🏻‍♂️

    Start of the St. James Way
    Nice house 🙂
    Some drawings on an old building
    Pilgrim monument
    Another monument to pilgrims
    Today’s track and elevation
    Mostly all day like this
    And this, less cars though
    And this
    The first forest trail
    A nice bridge crossing the river
    The last hundred meters of uphill
    A panorama from the highest point of the route
    Map and distance left from here to Santiago
    Soup make in progress
    Our vegan lunch today

  • Stage 0. Pamplona – Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port

    Stage 0. Pamplona – Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port

    Well, the time has come. My heart soul and I decided to spend another week of the Camino de Santiago. However this time, starting from the beginning of the French Way, from Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port in France.

    We took the train from Barcelona to Pamplona on Friday evening and arrived at about 10pm at the hostel Albergue Plaza Catedral. I will not add many details about this part of trip because nothing much happened. Nice place overall but, geez! Those beds would really need some WD-40 lubricant. All beds! Other than that, the eating area is kind of small for the amount of people that are checked in and could use it.

    Anyway, let’s go to today’s trip. Since it’s still considered “winter” by someone here, there is no direct bus from Pamplona to Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port (this year the bus service starts in March 25), so we had to take one bus from Pamplona to San Sebastián (1h 15min trip); from there another bus to Bayonne, France (1h 30min aprox) and from there a train to Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port (1h).

    The thing is, we got off the first bus one stop earlier by mistake and had to take a local bus to get to our next destination. This local bus had 50+ stops and took 1h+ to reach our needed destination. obviously we missed the train 🙂 and the next one was 4 hours later 😅 so we had the take away lunch besides sitting on some stairs besides the river with some nice views. We then did some walking around the city and had an incredibly good vegan ice cream from an Italian ice cream shop.

    At 7:20pm we arrived to Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port. We went to the pilgrims office to get the pilgrim passport and then to the hostel – Gite Bidean. A very-very cozy place with amazing people, Joe and Pascal. In this specific location, there is no kitchen for everyone’s use, but they can prepare something on request. Since we’re vegans, we had an instant onion soup with some boiled lentils from the supermarket. Afterwards we have a somewhat long but very pleasant discussion with the Pascal, the owner. I enjoyed the conversation a lot and it reminded me about our previous trip when we also encountered very nice owners in almost every hostel.

    It was a long day due the bus issue but it was a nice day spent together. Can’t wait to start the journey tomorrow! We’ll not do the “Napoleon” route because it is closed due to bad weather, so I hope the “backup” route will be nice as well even though it has lots of asphalt roads.

    Walking through San Sebastián
    Train station in Bayonne
    My bag. For real, no BS. Less than 15% of my weight. They said 15 is ideal. 20 is the max!
    Getting the first stamp at the pilgrims’ office
    The onion soup
    Total number of people by nationality who passed through the pilgrims office in 2023
    Total number of people passing through the same pilgrims office by years
    Our route from today
    “Normal” route from Pamplona to Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port if there is a direct bus connection.

    Featured image by Jon Tyson (@jontyson) on https://unsplash.com/

  • What is an expense/budget category and how to use it

    What is an expense/budget category and how to use it

    An expense category is a group of expenses within the budget that helps you gain a better understanding of your spending habits and make informed decisions about your finances.

    You can think of it as a way to organize your expenses into different groups. This can help you identify areas where you are overspending and adjust your budget accordingly. While the fewer categories you have, the easier it will be to get insights from your budget, there are a few categories that are “a must”.

    Housing: This category includes expenses related to your home, such as rent, mortgage payments, property taxes, and home maintenance costs. Some people add utilities to this category, other don’t. Try and see what’s best for you.

    Transportation: This category includes expenses related to getting around, such as car payments, gas, maintenance, parking, tolls, ridesharing costs, and public transit.

    Food: This category includes expenses related to groceries, dining out, and other food-related expenses.

    Personal/Lifestyle: This category includes expenses related to personal care, entertainment, hobbies, and other lifestyle expenses.

    Insurance: This category includes expenses related to insurance premiums, such as home, car, and health insurance.

    Debt: This category includes expenses related to paying off debt, such as credit card payments, student loans, and other loans.

    Savings and Investment: This category includes expenses related to saving money and investing for the future.

    Following the Excel file from the Expense tracking spreadsheet post, our expense tracker/budget would like this:

    This Excel file can be downloaded from here. No subscription needed, it is available to download freely 🙂 just right click on the link and select save as.

    Featured image by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash.

  • GR-131 Faro de Orchilla – Tamaduste Trail Running

    GR-131 Faro de Orchilla – Tamaduste Trail Running

    The GR-131 hiking route is a must-try for hikers, as it crosses the entire island and offers breathtaking views of the volcanic landscape.

    According to the Ministerio de Agricultura, the GR-131 trail runs through the center of the island, from the far north to the south, and is charged with a cultural and religious symbolism like few other trails of Canarias. The trail is generally considered a challenging route, taking an average of 2-3 days to hike.

    Also according to local websites, El Hierro has more kilometers of trails than roads, with trails that invite hikers to walk through unique scenery, which changes radically the further you go with lots of changes in altitude.

    It’s also worth noting that the island is known for its volcanic and sharply mountainous terrain, so you can see volcanic rocks everywhere you go, and I mean it.

    Also, according to Wikipedia, the line of longitude running through El Hierro, the westernmost of the Canary Islands, was known in European history as the prime meridian in common use outside of the future British Empire. In fact, it was used as the prime meridian for more than 500 years in various parts of Europe, especially outside of the future British Empire.

    • Distance: 41.19 km.
    • Moving time: 6:06
    • Elapsed time: 6:58
    • Avg moving pace: 8:54 /km
    • Total ascent: 2040 m
    • Total descent: 1940 m
    • Min elevation: 16 m
    • Max elevation: 1500 m
    • With: Alone. Some 10 km before the peak with a nice stranger. We ran together until the peak, where he turned around. Nice guy, too bad we did not exchange contact details. Proof that trail language can be used everywhere.
    • Track: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/12650072929
    Faro de Orchilla
    Meridiano 0 monument
    Santuario
    Malpaso peak. 1501m
    Airport
    Tamaduste city

  • Teide peak hiking, from cable car

    Teide peak hiking, from cable car

    Teide, or Mount Teide, is a volcano on Tenerife in the Canary Islands, Spain. Its summit at 3,715 m (12,188 ft) is the highest point in Spain and the highest point above sea level in the islands of the Atlantic, according to Wikipedia. The summit of the volcano has a number of small active fumaroles emitting sulfur dioxide and other gases, as can be seen in the video below.

    Having a short visit to the island recently, we reached the 3500m with the cable car and from there did the short hike to the peak. It is an easy hike for those used with high altitude. Otherwise, like my girlfriend, this hike may seem complicated and hard-ish due to the altitude, no technical difficulties.

    If you want to visit it and hike to the peak, make sure to buy tickets in advance as there are limited daily passes. The official page is: https://www.volcanoteide.com/en

    • Distance: 1.72 km
    • Moving time: 0:14
    • Elapsed time: 1:45 (yes, we stopped a lot)
    • Avg moving speed: 8:13/km
    • Total ascent: 167 m
    • Total descent: 166 m
    • Min elevation: 3528 m
    • Max elevation: 3695 m. (peak is at 3715m, Garmin was not calibrated probably)
    • With: Lucia
    • Track: https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/12593765260
    The crater

    Feature image credit: https://volcanofoundation.org/