Suddenly we came across a few low rough huts of unhewn stone huts sheltered by a rock-wall. There at last we could spend the night. But my guide wanted to go on. “Stop!" I cried. “Can we get to Cain to night?"--“I don’t know." “Well then we’ll stay here!" Suiting the action to the word, we crept into one of the huts, crouched down, and slept fitfully through ten endless hours of night. But even they passed. The morning meant a dangerous and nasty descent. We waded knee-deep in wet grass, clambered over ledges with fog all around us. Woe to us had we slipped! Then we got lost and had to stop and climb back with the greatest care. Then we slid down a stony gully in which nearly every step set rocks thundering to the depths below.
At last the moist grey mist began to lift. A rift showed the bed of the valley far beneath us, and, as we thought, houses. But no, we were mistaken. They were huge boulders, the wreckage of some avalanche that filled the upper hollow. Down and down we scrambled till finally we broke through the foggy screen. Our goal was at our feet. Cain, strangely walled in by precipitous rocky cliffs rising sheer 1500 metres high. We were there! And we could rest. Some bread and butter was all we could find in the whole village to appease our hunger. We would gladly have rested there a day, but the place was too inhospitable. We had therefore to shoulder our _rucksacks_ again. The distance we had climbed down the day before, we had to climb up again on the opposite rocks of the Peña santa. Hours and hours of strenuous efforts passed till we reached the ridge. We re-descended valleywards in a drizzling rain. Lake Enol was the last spot of beauty to be hidden from our view. It was there we struck the main road, and then marched another 10 kilometres down to Covadonga which we reached as tired as dogs.
Night had already cast her shadow over the valley, and the stars were beginning to shine forth. Welcoming lights were seen burning in Covadonga. But it seemed as though we should never reach them. However the prospect of a bed lent us strength, and at half past eight we stumbled painfully over the threshold of a clean hospitable house. I went to bed exhausted, and my restless dreams were haunted with the beautiful and terrible wanderings in the Picos de Europa (266-274).