PostScript - Getting to Santiago de Compostela

As I wrote yesterday, we managed to walk into Santiago for the last stage of our Portuguese Camino.

We started the day early as we had decided to try to walk the whole way from Padron into Santiago in one go. We'd been uncertain right up to yesterday morning about that stage. It's quite long, over 20kms, and gets increasingly hilly as you get closer to Santiago which makes it even more difficult. However, we decided to go for it. If we hadn't, we would probably have lost contact with a number of people that we met, and got friendly with, who we knew were definitely aiming to walk in yesterday.

We'd both had a interrupted sleep at the hotel. It was an interesting building and looked impressive, but it was also noisy. It seemed that anytime anyone in the building moved it created creaks and bumps that echoed all around the house, very strange, but meaning that both of us had awakened several times during the night. We also awoke at about 6:30 to see that it was raining, and raining quite heavily. We'd had a little rain yesterday afternoon, but only slight, this morning it was serious looking. We left the hotel at 7:00am, creeping out as everyone else seemed to be still asleep, we'd paid our bill yesterday as we knew that we would be leaving early, out to a cafe we knew would be open. There we had a good breakfast and we hit the road at 7:30.

 It was raining enough to require ponchos from the start, this was the first rain ever that we'd had in Galicia. We have had none at all on our previous visits, and Galicia is renowned for its rain.

The rain continued for the rest of the day. Our walking was initially along the main road but then we turned off into more country areas with a mixture of small roads and tracks. At our first rest/snack stop a whole gang of familiar faces showed up, including Jean and Colette, Bernard and one of two others that we were familiar with by sight. As this was the last day out it was all very matey.

Onwards, a few slopes and small hills. Barbara's lower back was beginning to ache somewhat, she'd had some foot trouble previously due to a twisted ankle but that was now fine. On to the next rest break where some people ordered sandwiches for lunch which, when they arrived, were enormous.

Onwards again, but this time the hills were getting steeper and more fiendish and seemed to be never ending, Barbara's back was aching even more.

All along the way we'd been passing distance marker stones and these were steadily counting down the distance. We'd got down to one showing about 6.4 kms when, suddenly, the distance plates were no longer there.

We initially though that they may have been taken as "souvenirs" but later came to the conclusion that the route had been changed and the original distance scale didn't apply now. Coinciding with this lack of distance markers came a total loss of any refreshment places. The signing had also become less reliable, in some places signs were missing, or were just plain confusing.

Which way now?

We went for many kms, more than the 5 or so that we were expecting, before we eventually found a rather scruffy looking cafe that provided us with the most delicious tasting cheese and bacon sandwich and some drinks. At that point we thought we must be near to the end but checking the map showed that there was still about another 5kms to go. By this time we were definitely in the city suburbs but the hills continued and the final drag into the centre was really hard work.

We met Daniel, the German guy that Barbara had "rescued" way back in Ponte de Lima. We couldn't understand how he had passed us, as we'd passed him many kilometres back when he was having a break. He confessed to catching a bus part of the way. We all walked the final kilometre or so into Santiago centre. Just before we arrived at the cathedral we made a small diversion to check into a hotel for the night and then, finally, we arrived in front of the cathedral.

It was then 4:30pm, and it had taken nine hours, including breaks, to do the walk.  It had been a very hard, and wet. We'd never really taken off our ponchos all day, we folded them back from time to time but had needed them virtually the whole time.

As we arrived in front of the cathedral we were greeted by a hearty French couple who we had seen fairly often before but never got to know as such, but they gave us a great welcome.  It was still raining, and being so late in the day not many other pilgrims were arriving so we returned to the hotel to get showered changed and have a good rest. Later, we went out for something to eat and then returned for a long sleep.

No more walking tomorrow.


All of the above refers to Friday, it's now Sunday and time to catch up. 

Since Friday we've had time to rest, catch up with friends; say goodbye to most of them as they've now left Santiago on their way home, and we've made our arrangements for our journey home. We're heading out for a couple of nights at the coast in Baiona before flying back to Manchester on Wednesday. We've also been to the pilgrim office to claim or certificates.

This afternoon I went on a fascinating guided tour of the rooftop of the cathedral, in the rain of course, it's still not stopped for very long.

It's a real shame for the city as this weekend is a festival time in Santiago; for the Feast of the Ascension. There have been concerts, exhibitions and markets arranged for the whole weekend, all of which must have been affected by the constant rain and low temperatures. Currently, as I write this, there is the sound of a large firework display nearby, and it's still raining hard. Shame.

By the way, Barbara's back is now much improved having had time to rest it.

Overall it's been a very good Camino, and much different from our previous "Camino Frances" one. We've walked just about 600kms in 31days, from April 6th to May 6th, through two countries, Portugal and Spain.

This, the Camino Portuguese, was along, what felt like, a much less established route than the Camino Frances. The lack of suitable pilgrim accommodation, at reasonable distances, in many places was sometimes a problem. The constant cobbled roads and main road walking sections, particularly in Portugal were also very tiring, and sometimes rather scary.

But, the wonderful countryside and places, the cheerful and very friendly people, again particularly in Portugal, made it very enjoyable. Above all the fantastic pilgrims that you meet and get to know, if only for a very brief time, or in more depth, make the Camino a most memorable experience.

We've had a great, and most memorable, time.

Thanks for reading this blog and thanks for the comments either here on the blog or sent directly to me as emails.

Bye for now!

Tony and Barbara

Day 31 - To Santiago de Compostela

We did it!

After a long, hard and wet day, of 26kms, we finally arrived in Santiago at 4:30 this afternoon, having left Padron at 7:30 this morning.

We're now relaxing in a small hotel before going out for something to eat.

More later..

Day 30 - To Padron

We think that we've solved the mystery that stopped us having a meal in the hotel last night. I mentioned in yesterday's blog that while we were waiting for the restaurant to open the adjoining bar became full of football fans for the match between Manchester City and Real Madrid. Apparently, the chef for the restaurant decided that he wanted to watch the match too, so he didn't turn up for the kitchens until the match finished. A Dutch couple that we know, and are staying in the hotel, were also booked into the restaurant for a meal.  They decided to wait until it opened, which it did, eventually, at 10pm rather than 8:30pm. Apparently the meal, when it finally arrived was very good. By that time we were already asleep, ready for an early day today.

When we looked out of the window this morning the sky was rather grey, very overcast, with hardly any sign of the strong sun that we've had for several days.  We had a very good, but simple, breakfast in the hotel bar, where we learned about last night's fiasco from out Dutch friends. After breakfast we set out, in much cooler conditions than lately, through the town. We hadn't seen much of the town yesterday when we arrived. Then we had been very hot and tired, just wanting to find somewhere to stay.

Today we were leaving from our hotel, which wasn't directly on the Camino, and so we had, inadvertantly, bypassed most of the centre of the town.  We did, though, go over a nice bridge near the centre of town.

Just as we were looking at it we heard a call, it was Bernard who had stayed just nearby and had seen us going by and came out to wish us "Good Morning". We saw, and walked with him several times later in the day.

Walking was much easier today for at least two reasons, firstly it was much cooler and, secondly the route was less hilly than we've had for a while. Also leaving early helped.

We were soon overtaken by our Dutch friends, but we saw them later. Similarly we saw and talked to Clare from Toronto a few times. It's a feature of the Camino that you meet friends on and off as you progress, we didn't see Colette and Jan today, but probably will tomorrow.

The route had several up and down sections, but nothing serious. It did have lots of shady sections through woodland, they would have been useful yesterday.

When we were about half way along the route, and passing through a small village, we heard a call from the open window of the local school. It was the teacher of what seems to be the first class, a man, asking us where we were from. We answered, rather surprised, that we were from England. "Is this your flag then" he asked, holding up Union Jack. It seems that the teacher, every time he sees likely pilgrims coming past, enquires where people are from and then uses the information within his lessons with the children. He invited us in to see the display of flags in the classroom, and also the large collection of postcards from all over the world that previous pilgrims have sent to the children. He asked us to send them one from Yorkshire when we get back home again.

Overall it was quite an easy walk, especially as we are now less than twenty five kilometres from Santiago.

We are still undecided whether we will break the "last" section in two, so as to have an easy last stage into Santiago, or to "go for it" and do the last 24 kms in one section. This last stage is rather hilly and rather longer than we normally do. We'll see what happens.

We arrived in Padron reasonable early, not a terribly attractive town but reputed to be the place where St James's body first arrived in Spain, so is significant on the Camino.

We didn't see any obvious hotels and the albergues didn't really really appeal, the ones we saw looked rather run-down. I enquired at the tourist office and was given a list, and map, of all accommodation in the town. We found  a Pension nearby, the "Hotel Jardin" and checked in.

It is a very interesting building, in a not terribly interesting town, and we've got a very nice room for the night.

We soon showered and changed and went out for a drink and snack, only to find that there was a little drizzle in the air. This had been forecast, but was a first for us. We've been in Galicia fit the last five days, since we left Valença, and also spent about three weeks here on our previous Camino, and this is the first rain we've had in Galicia, Spain's rainiest district.

Day 29 - To Caldas De Reis

Pontevedra was just about beginning to come alive with people going to work when we set out this morning. A few "normal"  people were around but as we walked through the old part of the city it was mainly Pilgrims setting out in small groups, all heading for the bridge over the river.

At the bridge we met Bernard. He had spent last night at one of the hotels. We chatted generally as we crossed the bridge, through the last of the suburbs and out into the countryside. 

Getting out of Pontevedra was much quicker than getting into the city and we were soon walking through farming areas, after some struggles in passing an area where the whole road was under reconstruction.

As it is often the case the first half of the day was spent climbing a long hillside and the second half descending again. That was the pattern today. The actual hill climbing wasn't really a problem but the sun and heat that accompanied it were. Today was yet another cloudless sunny day with the temperature this afternoon when we arrived at Caldas De Reis being 30°C again.

  A lot of the time we were walking through wooded areas, such usually offer good shelter from the sun, but today all of the tracks seemed to be on the edges of the forest so that we didn't benefit from much shade most of the time. At the very top of the climb there was a very good cafe where we had fresh squeezed orange juice whilst chatting to  Colette and Jan. From there into Caldas was totally open countryside and fully exposed to the sun.

A few odd items we passed today.

Today we passed the 50kms marker, not much left to go!

The weather forecast for the next few days is to be cooler with some rain. That could be good news as long as the rain isn't too heavy.

We were very glad to reach Calda De Reis and fairly quickly found a place to stay, another small hotel, similar to last night. A very helpful man soon had us checked in and we then went straight to the bar to get something chilled to drink, even before changing and unpacking. A Dutch couple, who seemed to recognise us invited us over to their table to chat as we drank our beers and snacked on the complimentary tapas. Then it was back to our room for a very welcome shower and a rest.

This evening we planned to eat in the hotel's restaurant.  We went down to the bar at about 7:30pm expecting the restaurant to be open. There was no sign of activity, so we asked the barman if it was in use. "It opens at 8:30" we were told. Rather than going anywhere else we decided to wait, and ordered some beers to drink outside, as we waited.

At 8:30 we went back into the bar, which is next to the restaurant, and waited, having told the barman that we would like to eat. 8:45 came and went without any sign that the restaurant would be opening. At 9:00 we started discussing finding somewhere else but couldn't be bothered now with trying to find an alternative nearby. At 9:15 we paid for the soft drinks that we'd had whilst waiting and left.

So, instead of having a nice meal that were been looking forward to we've had nothing. It's too late now to go anywhere else. Particularly as we wanted to get the bed early, ready for a reasonably early start tomorrow. We could possibly have had something in the bar, but by 8:45 that was already packed with very loud football "fans", not my chosen environment at all.

Perhaps we'll find somewhere that does a good breakfast in the morning.

Day 28 - To Pontevedra

We both slept well last night although the bed wasn't the most comfortable we'd every slept in. Up and packed reasonably early and along to the restaurant for our breakfast. This consisted of a simple menu of toast, jam and coffee. Then we set off, or at least tried to. Our first problem of the day was crossing the main road to continue the Camino trail up the road opposite. The crossing point was at the cross-roads of the main road and and a busy minor road. The main road has nearly endless, fast, traffic into which drivers from the minor road were trying to join by suddenly slipping out of the side road into any sort
of gap in the main traffic. We, the poor pilgrims, were expected to somehow cross amongst all this chaos. There were no crossings or traffic lights. Just take a deep breath and go for it.

We did manage a safe crossing eventually, only to read in one of the guides later that they considered that this is the most dangerous crossing on the Camino. Nice!

Once onto a more sensible track we started up the hill we had partly completed yesterday. It was a steep drag for some distance more before partly levelling out. At this point we came across a Camino art "installation" consisting of a wooden frame covered in a large number of cockleshells.

Apparently if you had a marker with you it was suggested that you would write your name, make a comment or whatever else you wanted. We didn't have any form of suitable marker so made do with just looking.

Eventually, after several kilometres of climbing through nicely wooded country we reached the top of the hill started yesterday, only to then descend of course.

The route passed through very nice countryside but very few villages, but the increased number of pilgrims from previous days was noticeable. At times it felt as if we were back on the Camino conveyor belt again, delivering a steady stream of pilgrims towards Santiago.

Eventually after another hill we arrived at Arcade, a small town set on a mouth of a small river flowing into the sea. It was a lovely little town with a steep descent into it and a rather steeper ascent out again.

Where a narrow and old bridge crossed the river it formed an ideal place for a break. At a small cafe I went in to order some orange drinks and was also given two free portions of empanada. They were very nice and very welcome. As we sat outside drinking our orange juice and eating empanada we were joined by our friends from France, Colette and Jan.

We have managed to see them once or twice a day for many days now, and it is always a pleasure. Before we had finished our break they moved on, but we were then entertained by a crocodile of about twenty very young children, escorted by several adults setting out to cross the very narrow old bridge. Quite a complicated process as the bridge was fairly busy with traffic. One of the adults stopped the traffic at our end, to let the children start the crossing, with ( I think) another one at the other end of the bridge stopping traffic at that end.

It was quite fascinating to watch.

After our break, and entertainment, we started off again. This section was almost a replay of earlier in that we had yet another large hill to climb and descent before a fairly level stretch into Pontevedra, our destination for tonight.

This was a hot but otherwise uneventful walk but, as I mentioned earlier, enlivened by the additional numbers of pilgrims on the trail.  Earlier in the day we passed the 80ks marker and later the 70kms marker, so we are now getting very close to Santiago.

Tonight we are staying in quite a nice hotel just outside the centre of Pontevedra. We managed to find a special deal, in a three star hotel for only a few euros more than we paid last night in a very mediocre place.

We arrived earlier than usual and had time this afternoon to find a laundry nearby and managed to get all the clothes we weren't wearing thoroughly washed and dried. We still had time to have a look around the town itself.

We'll see more in the morning as we walk out through the old part of the city, on our way to Caldas de Reis.