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Camino Ingles - Day 2: Pontedeume to Betanzos, Tuesday 11th April

Today's walk was about 20 kilometres and started with a long climb out of town to get out of the valley that the town lies in - as you are walking so near to the coast there are a lot of valleys to go down into and to climb out of (more than in the last 100km of the Camino Frances) as you walk by the rivers that run into the sea.








It was a long walk in the dark but at least this time we didn't miss the turn at the top as me and Dad had when we had walked here last time meaning that we had walked for about half an hour along the road (with about ten other Pilgrims) before we found out that we had gone the wrong way. This turn is now much better signposted though and so was harder to miss.

We had set off earlier today, packing our bags downstairs in the dark and then sitting on a bench by the water outside to eat breakfast quickly meaning that we were off before seven today.

It was about 10:30 when we arrived in Mino and stopped at a bar just off the route for breakfast with Becky having toast and tomato again and me toast and jam.

We skirted around the inlet to the sea today.





 When we reached another hill around 12 we stopped at a shady area at the bottom and had a picnic of bread, cheese and ham and felt at least refreshed enough to get up the hill.




We arrived at the albergue in Betanzos at about 2 and we given the last three beds.
 We washed clothes and then set off into the town - last time here we had visited the Churches nearby and so went back to one of them for a look and did go to the other but it now charged for a visit so we left this and headed to the Tourist Information centre for a sello. We also found that the famous park had been re-opened - last time we had walked the Ingles it had been closed for renovations so we headed down to it.

The park had been built by two entrepreneur brothers who had made their fortune in America and so had returned home and built the park for the people of the city. This had given many of them jobs in its building and maintenance and then a recreation area. For many years it had fallen into a state of did-repair and even now is in a sorry state in many areas. This though did not detract from the Park's strangeness  - a series of caves with a dragon inside, murals of people (one of whom is now missing a head) riding camels and strange sculptures.






After this we went to the nearby supermarket to buy food for that night and the next two days - there are no supermarkets on this section and although both days are meant to have bars the menu at the next day's stay had not appealed at all last time we had been there and the bar for the next day was new and listed as opening 'seasonally' in the Confraternity's guide with no clue as to whether or not we were in that season.

That night the albergue had only a kettle and a microwave so we bought a Fabada soup and then a pizza as well as cakes we had bought from a bakery.

After sorting bags we went to bed.

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