I'd been checking the weather reports for several days before we set off and they had promised rain and a lot of it and yet all day it stayed clear and bright.
Both of our guide books (Cicerone and The Confraternity of Saint James) suggested walking from Ferrol to Pontedeume today a distance of 29km but both also promised us bars at Fene so we knew that we could have a rest at that point so we were up at half six and off by a bit after 7 - still in the dark but it was a city we were leaving so we were confident that the street lighting would be enough to guide us.
We managed to get back on the Way without any difficulty using the city map from the tourist information (it is worth collecting one of these from either of the offices and if they are closed then take a picture on your 'phone/camera of the one in the office by the water's window as it is invaluable for finding your way out of the city). The evidence of the city's Naval past was clear as you walked right past a Base's front, there were a few sailors milling about near the gate and for maybe half a second I was tempted to find out if they had a sello for my credential!
The maps do show you walking past a couple of small beaches and we found them easily - one had been freshly raked and there were two guys picking up litter but the view across the bay was very industrial: this wasn't really a holiday worthy beach despite everyone's efforts.
Just outside the town we came to an industrial area and in nthe distance I copuld see a McDonald's sign - if you've read my blog before then you know that I get .. slightly annoyed about only ever seeing siogns to McDonald's on the Frances and never actually seeing one but alack, as with the McDonalds we saw on the Portuguese route this one was alaos not open for breakfast.
The walk around the bay is not the prettiest of walks - the area is a working port after all and you skirt through the suburbs of the city a fair bit the only real bright spot being the Church of San Martin de Xubia dating from the 12th century which had a nice field of sheep just beyond it. Also here we saw a joint way marker for the Camino and the Way of Saint Andrew which seems to be a 40-50km walk from Ferrol to shrine of St Andrew shrine at San Andres/Santo Andre de Teixido which came about in 1775.
We were very grateful to reach Fene and stopped for a Cola Cau - my favorite drink on the Camino (although I haven't been able to work out how the bars expect me to use two of their sugars in my hot chocolate!). We had also hoped for some tortilla but there didn't seem to be anything to eat at all in the bar.
At 12:50 we found a small sitting area in a village and sat down to eat the second of the Boots meal deals we had bought at the airport - apparently the sight of two Pilgrims eating was too much as the local who been sitting in another seat got up and wandered off.
Cabanas when we arrived was abandoned - it looked to be a Spanish version of a seaside resort with a long promenade, lots of little ice cream stands (all but one was shut) and a lot of parking and the only people in view were pilgrims, either everyone else had stayed away becuase there was meant to be rain or early September is completely out of season for the Spanish (I guess they don't spend the day walking on the beach despite rain as I do!).
The bridge from Cabanas to Pontedeume was built in thye 14th century and was commsionedf by Ferbab Perez de Andrade. Originally it had 116 arches and a chapel between arches 21 and 22 but now is a busy road where the cars were sometimes uncomfortably close.
The albergue here is a municipal one but not a Xunta (and I didn't know that this was possible in Galicia) which brought a few problems - it was unattended but had a number to call on your arrival so that it could be opened and signs saying that Pilgrims should not allow other pilgrims to enter but we were waved in by a Spanish couple we had seen walking and took beds. All the beds were taken well before 4'o'clock and people were waiting outside as well. The hospitelero didn't come until half four but there was no notice about this so we were left hanging around waiting, afraid that were we not there to pay our beds may be taken by someone else. We managed to pay quite early (after our friendly Spanish couple of a group of two adults and five children from Germany).
The albergue had no kitchen but we needed food for the next day and so went and bought bread and cheese from the supermarket but the evening posed more of a problem as no where served food until eight and we were worried that, like the Xunta albergues, we would be locked out at ten.
The meal was good though - the startert alone was 18 sardines each! Then I had hake and chips and yogurt to finish.
Arriving back at the albergue we found that next door were having a drum .. well I don't think that the five or more people banging away were having a lesson, htey were just making noise and everyone in the albergue was quite obviously getting annoyed! Thankfully it stopped just after ten leaving us to have what we hoped wouyld be a quiet night. No such luck - our neighours did not get in until 13:40 and were quite noisy when they did so but then I suppose it is difficult to get your sleeping bag out of your backpack and get sorted when you are drunk! Add to this the lady who had three episodes of night terrors and it turned out to not be the most restful of nights
Images taken from http://caminodesantiago.consumer.es/llevatela-al-camino/completa/?camino=camino-ingles
Both of our guide books (Cicerone and The Confraternity of Saint James) suggested walking from Ferrol to Pontedeume today a distance of 29km but both also promised us bars at Fene so we knew that we could have a rest at that point so we were up at half six and off by a bit after 7 - still in the dark but it was a city we were leaving so we were confident that the street lighting would be enough to guide us.
We managed to get back on the Way without any difficulty using the city map from the tourist information (it is worth collecting one of these from either of the offices and if they are closed then take a picture on your 'phone/camera of the one in the office by the water's window as it is invaluable for finding your way out of the city). The evidence of the city's Naval past was clear as you walked right past a Base's front, there were a few sailors milling about near the gate and for maybe half a second I was tempted to find out if they had a sello for my credential!
The maps do show you walking past a couple of small beaches and we found them easily - one had been freshly raked and there were two guys picking up litter but the view across the bay was very industrial: this wasn't really a holiday worthy beach despite everyone's efforts.
Just outside the town we came to an industrial area and in nthe distance I copuld see a McDonald's sign - if you've read my blog before then you know that I get .. slightly annoyed about only ever seeing siogns to McDonald's on the Frances and never actually seeing one but alack, as with the McDonalds we saw on the Portuguese route this one was alaos not open for breakfast.
The walk around the bay is not the prettiest of walks - the area is a working port after all and you skirt through the suburbs of the city a fair bit the only real bright spot being the Church of San Martin de Xubia dating from the 12th century which had a nice field of sheep just beyond it. Also here we saw a joint way marker for the Camino and the Way of Saint Andrew which seems to be a 40-50km walk from Ferrol to shrine of St Andrew shrine at San Andres/Santo Andre de Teixido which came about in 1775.
Map taken from http://pilgrim.peterrobins.co.uk/routes/details/teixido.html and more information on this route (in Spainish) can be found at http://www.valdovino.com/comun/SUB-PAGINAS/sanandres.html
We were very grateful to reach Fene and stopped for a Cola Cau - my favorite drink on the Camino (although I haven't been able to work out how the bars expect me to use two of their sugars in my hot chocolate!). We had also hoped for some tortilla but there didn't seem to be anything to eat at all in the bar.
At 12:50 we found a small sitting area in a village and sat down to eat the second of the Boots meal deals we had bought at the airport - apparently the sight of two Pilgrims eating was too much as the local who been sitting in another seat got up and wandered off.
Cabanas when we arrived was abandoned - it looked to be a Spanish version of a seaside resort with a long promenade, lots of little ice cream stands (all but one was shut) and a lot of parking and the only people in view were pilgrims, either everyone else had stayed away becuase there was meant to be rain or early September is completely out of season for the Spanish (I guess they don't spend the day walking on the beach despite rain as I do!).
The bridge from Cabanas to Pontedeume was built in thye 14th century and was commsionedf by Ferbab Perez de Andrade. Originally it had 116 arches and a chapel between arches 21 and 22 but now is a busy road where the cars were sometimes uncomfortably close.
The albergue here is a municipal one but not a Xunta (and I didn't know that this was possible in Galicia) which brought a few problems - it was unattended but had a number to call on your arrival so that it could be opened and signs saying that Pilgrims should not allow other pilgrims to enter but we were waved in by a Spanish couple we had seen walking and took beds. All the beds were taken well before 4'o'clock and people were waiting outside as well. The hospitelero didn't come until half four but there was no notice about this so we were left hanging around waiting, afraid that were we not there to pay our beds may be taken by someone else. We managed to pay quite early (after our friendly Spanish couple of a group of two adults and five children from Germany).
The albergue had no kitchen but we needed food for the next day and so went and bought bread and cheese from the supermarket but the evening posed more of a problem as no where served food until eight and we were worried that, like the Xunta albergues, we would be locked out at ten.
The meal was good though - the startert alone was 18 sardines each! Then I had hake and chips and yogurt to finish.
Arriving back at the albergue we found that next door were having a drum .. well I don't think that the five or more people banging away were having a lesson, htey were just making noise and everyone in the albergue was quite obviously getting annoyed! Thankfully it stopped just after ten leaving us to have what we hoped wouyld be a quiet night. No such luck - our neighours did not get in until 13:40 and were quite noisy when they did so but then I suppose it is difficult to get your sleeping bag out of your backpack and get sorted when you are drunk! Add to this the lady who had three episodes of night terrors and it turned out to not be the most restful of nights
Images taken from http://caminodesantiago.consumer.es/llevatela-al-camino/completa/?camino=camino-ingles
Sellos for the day
Comments
Post a Comment