scores on the doors 28.1 km up 500m down 236m altitude 1300m
Again it was an 8am start, the description of this part of the walk from "Travels with my Donkey" "I'm off now" and various of the guide books was going to be hairy to say the least. There were three options, the longest 40k was totaly out of the question, the second involved a climb and then a rapid down, not much fun with blistered feet, so we went for no 3 the road route.
Three roads occupied the valley floor, the old road, the new road and the shinny new moterway towering above us on stilts. The camino follows bits of the old and
New roads, and all the books had said that you would be walking along side the carriageway being narrowly missed by cars, that might have been then but now most tragic is on the moterway and secondly the authorities have put a wall between pilgrims and cars on the worst bits.
But most of the time we walked through lovely villages on very quiet roads
After about an hour we stopped for breakfast and met a pilgrim dog, who like us carried his own kit
The road carried on in this manner and miricle of miricles most of the churches were open and offering a stamp for peoples credentials. At about 1 the road began to rise and rise with a vengance! Leading to the mountains that seperate Galicia from Castilla Y Leon. When we stopped for lunch my feet needed cooling down so I plunged them into one of the roadside fondas
Which was certainly bracing, after lunch it was back to the climb, fortunately all on soft tracks, we then passed the border between the two regions
And were then we were in Galicia and on the home stretch, just around the corner was our destination of O Cebreiro a village who's only real purpose is the camino.
It has a wonderfully simple and peaceful church, maintained by the Spanish Franciscians. Which you could sit in for hours. We popped into a gift shop to buy cards and bumped into the English quartered we met last night, who had walked up the last couple of miles and got a feel of what the pilgrimage is like.
At 7 we went to the church for the Mass for St Michael and all the Angels, where they made an effort by having the responses in four languages on a large tv screen so we could al join in in our own languages. And they didn't say anything about who was in who was put at the distribution.
In a side chapel there was a wonderful pilgrims prayer, the prayer of La Faba
A lovely prayer not just for pilgrims but for anyone who aspires to the Christian life.
Again it was an 8am start, the description of this part of the walk from "Travels with my Donkey" "I'm off now" and various of the guide books was going to be hairy to say the least. There were three options, the longest 40k was totaly out of the question, the second involved a climb and then a rapid down, not much fun with blistered feet, so we went for no 3 the road route.
Three roads occupied the valley floor, the old road, the new road and the shinny new moterway towering above us on stilts. The camino follows bits of the old and
New roads, and all the books had said that you would be walking along side the carriageway being narrowly missed by cars, that might have been then but now most tragic is on the moterway and secondly the authorities have put a wall between pilgrims and cars on the worst bits.
It has a wonderfully simple and peaceful church, maintained by the Spanish Franciscians. Which you could sit in for hours. We popped into a gift shop to buy cards and bumped into the English quartered we met last night, who had walked up the last couple of miles and got a feel of what the pilgrimage is like.
At 7 we went to the church for the Mass for St Michael and all the Angels, where they made an effort by having the responses in four languages on a large tv screen so we could al join in in our own languages. And they didn't say anything about who was in who was put at the distribution.
In a side chapel there was a wonderful pilgrims prayer, the prayer of La Faba
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