Buen Camino (Bob)

Back in 1995, Robert and I used dial-up connections to send Spain reports to friends.

In 2024, Wendy and I will use this blog to post Spain reports for friends.

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Day 35: Lavacolla to Santiago (Guendolinam’s version)

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  Everything Bob said is factual, so I won’t repeat the story of our walk to Santiago, only to add that much of it was disappointingly similar to the walk into other biggish cities, standard suburban and urban sprawl fare. I also found that while Bob had an extra spring in his step today, I kept unintentionally walking more slowly, apparently unwilling to have the walk end. On the outskirts of town, we passed rows upon rows of what looked like bunkers. Bob hypothesized they were military, government, or industrial buildings. I guessed an albergue. When we came to the heart of the complex and saw they had a laundromat, store, cafe, restaurant, and farmacia, we knew I was right. We later passed two pilgrims squatting outside one building with an open door, next to lines of drying laundry. I’m grateful we are staying in the complete opposite to the albergue bunkers—a parador.  The Parador dos Reís Católicos was commissioned by Ferdinand and Isabella in 1499 as a pilgrim’s hospita...
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Day 35: Lavacolla to Santiago (Bob’s version)

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We finished! I had a difficult time staying asleep last night because I was so excited about finishing the Camino. We got up in our cozy bunk beds—Wendy and I each had bottom bunks in our own little four bed section—and we packed up and left in the dark. The sky was clear and we started the day climbing, so I was hoping for nice sunrise pics on our last day. Unfortunately, the path curved the wrong way and then ducked into trees, so that’s too bad.  [Imagine a nice sunrise picture] With a couple miles to go, we climbed a little hill to the side and spotted the cathedral in Santiago for the first time. You can barely make it out in the center of this photo.  We got closer… And closer… And then we made it! We picked up our certificates, which include the Latin versions of our names (Robertum and Gwendolinam), and then hung out in the large plaza outside the cathedral. This is where pilgrims enter from different portals depending on which route they took.  In the plaza, we g...
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Day 33: Melide to Salceda (Bob)

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There are 3 holidays that Americans do better than anyone else: Thanksgiving Day, the 4th of July, and Halloween. We’ll be in Spain for Halloween.  We still haven’t figured out the right way to do the stages From Sarria to Santiago, which is by far the busiest section. The problem we’re having is that the off-season just hit, so a bunch of albergues and cafes shut down for the year. But it’s not coordinated. We’ll walk 10 kilometers without seeing an open bar, and then we’ll see a cluster of 4 cafes open in the same town. We’ve been off stage for this section, but maybe we should have joined the crowds in the more popular towns.   Even though we occasionally need to eat makeshift picnic foods, the scenery is gorgeous. We wind along “tree tunnels” and pop out to view open vistas.  Here’s what I mean by a tree tunnel.  And I can probably take a hundred different pictures a day of scenery that looks like this.  If we wanted to walk as far tomorrow as we walked toda...
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