October 16, 2023
I’ll start today’s blog post without photos due to lack of wi-fi, and later fill them in.
Our morning started at our smart apartment in Caldas. We stepped out into the dark streets at 7 and headed over to the Hotel we had tried to eat at last night ( but couldn’t due to forgetting Spanish restaurant hour). Now, for morning breakfast it was fantastic, and our cafe con leche, croissant sandwich and orange juice was just what we needed. Street vendors were setting up their stands in the dark wet streets as we turned north onto the Camino. I partially would have liked to see their market, but not enough to delay our departure. We had a good day of 25 km planned and wanted to get it in while heavy rain held off.
There were quite a few pilgrims on the Camino as we left town. Their lights guided us and we did not bother getting out our own. The pre-dawn light was already enough to see the light colored crushed gravel path that was fairly flat. We meandered back and forth across the N550 highway that leads towards Santiago, passing through small towns of O pino and SanMiguel de valga. At San Miguel we were needing a second breakfast and saw a very promising bar-cafe high up above the camino. There we had some house-made yoghurt and honey, coffee and orange juice. The coffee was so good. We sat outdoors under a very overhang that protected us from the light rain. I saw a young man in the next table with a U of M hat. He was not from the States and did not know where Michigan was. I think he was amused to encounter someone from there.
We continued north, coming to a town of Ponte Valga, where we came upon a historic market.
After leaving the market we found a bench to take one of our every 4 km rests.
As we walked on we ran into increasing rain. We hoped to get to a restaurant around 24 km to have the Spanish merienda, or mid-day meal that is served between 1;30 and 3:30 pm Fortunately the was a restaurant Buen Camino just as we got to the town of A Esclavitude. We felt a little freaked out that the town was named for slavery, but were happy to enter the restaurant. There we had a wonderful two course meal plus wine plus dessert for 12 Euro.
Leaving the restaurant, we only had 1 km to go to find our hostel It was a little hidden, but we followed our map and soon were let into the front door to happy welcoming pilgrimgs. Being in hostel we will sleep in bunk beds, but in a really pleasant environment and very nice people from around Europe — Ukraine, Italy, Germany, Poland .
