Don Quixote doesn’t bother telling anyone of his intentions. He plans to leave immediately to set right the ills of world that needs him. He begins his journey in the hottest month of July.
However, another thought occurs to him that threatens his undertaking—he has not been dubbed a knight. Even if he had been, he should wear white armor without arms—which he has to earn.
However, this doesn’t deter him long. He’ll find someone to knight him, and he’ll scour his armor until it is white. He lets his horse choose their path, believing this is the way to have a true adventure.
He narrates to himself what future writers will say about him while accounting his heroic deeds. He begs these writers not to forget to mention his horse, and he cries out to Dulcinea to remember the one she has enslaved.
As the day wears on, he is disappointed that his journey has been uneventful. By nightfall, he and the horse are exhausted and hungry. He spots an inn, which he believes to be a castle. He sees two whores, which he sees as two beautiful damsels. A swineherder blows his horn, and Quixote believes he is the herald announcing his presence.
The women are afraid of him at first, dressed as oddly as he is. He tells them not be afraid. The women then start laughing at him when he calls them maidens. He becomes offended, saying that laughter is unbecoming in a lady because it leads to folly. The women keep laughing, vexing him further.
The innkeeper appears. Though he is amused, he restrains himself. The innkeeper tells Quixote they can offer him everything but a bed. Quixote, believing the innkeeper is the governor of the fortress, tells him that will satisfy him.
His horse is placed in the stable, and the whores remove his armor. They cannot remove his helmet without cutting the strings that attach it to him. He will not allow this.
He tells the ladies he is there to serve them. Though Friday is the day of fasting, he accepts food. He sees everything more luxuriously than what it is. He needs one of the whores to feed him, for he can’t do it himself with the helmet on. The helmet also interferes with him drinking. The innkeeper has to use a bored cane to get fluid into Quixote's mouth.
Quixote is content, except for the fact that he is not knighted.