Author: mewalsh1

April 27 – 28. Maine to Maryland

After doing some last minute packing and securing the bikes on the back of our camper, we left around noon on Monday April 27 full of excitement about our upcoming adventure.   We drove through Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts and spent our first night near Newburgh, NY at a KOA campground.  Many campgrounds in New England are not yet open for the season.  There were very few campers in the campground as it is still early in the season but it looks like the place is hopping in the summer.   They have several pools, miniature golf,  wine shop etc.  It looks like it would be fun for kids.   We cooked supper and had a walk around the grounds.  

The next morning after a quick breakfast, we left and headed south thru New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.  It was a long day driving thru traffic, construction etc. and we were very glad when we made it to a campground in Maryland.  We called ahead to get a site and when we arrived, the office was closed but information about our site was left on the door.  As we looked around, we saw that almost every one of the 250 sites had a camper on it but there was not a vehicle or a person to be seen. It was like everyone vanished.  I felt like I was on an episode of the twilight zone.  In hindsight, it appears that most people who stay at that campground had seasonal sites and since it was a Tuesday in late April, no one was there.   We made the best of the situation and headed off on a bike ride.  We were looking for the C and O Canal Towpath that ran close to the campground.  We found the Western Maryland Bike Trail first – a beautiful paved bike path thru the woods that runs parallel to the C & O Canal Towpath for 28 miles.  From there we did find the C & O Towpath and rode on that for a while.  The C @ O Towpath is mostly dirt and stone and runs 184 miles from Cumberland Maryland to Georgetown, D.C.    There are lots of primitive campsites on the trail.  Interestingly, the path was built for the mules that used to tow the boats thru the canal.     

80 kilometers to Santiago

We spent a pleasant night in Vilalba and headed off to our next destination, Baamonde. We are now in Galacia and traveling inland from the coast toward Santiago. This is the 5th autonomous community in Spain that we have traveled through on this trip (similar to states in US). Each one has the right to self governance. On this trek we have traveled thru the Basque Country, Cantabria, Asturias and now Galacia. Each has their own identity and dialect and the Basque Country even uses different letters.

the walk into Baamonde was pleasant but fairly uneventful. Baaamond itself was a small town that seemed to exist for the Camino. It had a very small grocery store and farmacia, 3 cafe/bars, a municipal albergue and the Pensión 101k which was where we stayed. Iywasat the Wewere now 101k from Santiago. Apparently it had the best food in town. While there, we met up with Sylvia and Eugenio, who happened to be staying at the municipal albergue and we had dinner with them.

The next morning we resumed our trek. We headed out past the beautiful and ancient church in Baamond which started being built in the 9th century, Once again the Camino took us up and down hills but the hills were now less steep. Shortly before arriving at our destination we stopped for coffee and met Dick from the UK who was out for a walk. He and his wife were volunteer hospitaleros at the donativo hostel run by the Confraternity of Saint James, a UK organization that promotes pilgrimages to Santiago in the UK. It sounds like a really nice hostel and I wish we had been able to stay there instead of the hostel we stayed at. Next time…. I think I would enjoy a two week stent volunteering as a caretaker for an albergue. Maybe when we are unable to walk long distances any more. It seems like a great any to meet and talk with people from all over the world, similar to walking the Camino.

Our albergue for the night was in a very rural small town. It had a small room which also served as the grocery store for the town. It also was the only cafe in town and they offered a pilgrim meal at night. While we were on the Camino the pope died which often came up in conversation. The funeral and services were on TV in almost every cafe we stopped at. Of course Spain is a county with many devout Catholics. While we were eating dinner at the albergue in A Lagoa with 3 Irishmen, two Italians and a handful of locals, the conclave elected the new pope. We all sat glued to the TV to see who had been chosen. When they announced that it was an American, all eyes turned to us as if we had some explaining to do. It was a bit uncomfortable given the dislike for our current administration from everyone we met. But in the end.almost everyone agreed that maybe an American pope would somehow help with the current situation.

I woke up and took a quick walk down the street to check out the view in the morning light. It was still amazing.

Today our destination is Barcia and most of our walk is on farm roads with rolling hills. We will end up back near the coast. John left our Pensión with Hank, our new friend from Belgium, while I stopped at the store to buy bread, ham and cheese for out lunch. It didn’t look like we would pass many services today. I also bought a small bag of olives, a bag of walnuts and fruit. These have become staples of ours to snack on as we walk. It took longer than e pected at the store and I didn’t catch up with John and Hank for over an hour. I enjoyed my solitary walk but was happy to catch up with them for some conversation. . We finally reached Barcia, where we had a reservation at an agriturismo and said goodbye to Hank who was heading to the next town. We were sorry to leave him as we enjoyed talking with him. We checked in and thankfully, the owner offered to let us use her washing machine. We showered and washed most of our clothes and hung them on the line next to hers. The closeline was under a roof which was good as it started to rain soon after I hung them on the line.

The village was very small and there was only one restaurant in town that did not serve food until 8:00 so we headed out for a walk to find the beach and the train station. The FEVE train stops here once a day but does not look like it is used very much. It is located at least a kilometer from town. There was a nice coastal walk that ran along the beach.

At 7:30 we headed to the restaurant, hoping they would let us order food a little earlier than 8:00. We had walked over 20 miles and were hungry and tired. But the bartender told us the kitchen did not open till 8:00 pm. There were several tables of men playing cards in the restaurant and several women sitting outside. We were the only non local people. At 8:00, the owner’s wife came in and promptly waited on us and then cooked our meal. She was very nice and recommended the regional specialty, Cachopo. This is a dish made with two large veal fillets, breaded and fried, and stuffed with ham and cheese. Of course it is served with French fries and some pimentos. We ordered one and split it but still were unable to finish. It was very good but a lot of meat. After our late dinner we headed back to our room and tried to fall asleep. Unfortunately, the owners large extended family was staying in the horreo (house on stilts) that was converted into lodging and their kids were yelling and running up and down the stairs right outside our window well after midnight.

Despite the noise till late at night, it was a great day once again on the coast of northern Spain 😊.

261 more kilometers to Santiago

We woke up and decided to take a slight detour off the Camino to visit the fishing town of Cudillero. It was about 1 kilometer straight down hill to the sea from where we were staying. I thightbI had read we could follow a scenic coastal trail back to the Camino Norte but I must have read about a different town. The walk down to town was worth it. Cudillero is a town built right into the hillside with the ocean on the other side. Unfortunately, the only way back to the Camino without backtracking was a 2 kilometer hike up hill on a winding road. Needless to say John wasn’t happy about this – I wasn’t either. But it is was still worth visiting Cudillero.

After the long hike out of town we headed inland for a couple hours. We decided to take a bus 8 kilometers to shorten our walk. We consulted Google and found there was a bus coming in the next hour to Soto de Luina. We made it to the town in time to get a bite to eat and figure out where the bus stop was.

We found the bus stop and found it was no longer in use. Alsa is the big bus line in Spain and their busses are clean, large with Wi-Fi and usually on schedule. Since they built the highways, the Alsa buses now do not go into the smaller towns but instead stop at the rotaries at the exit. There is no actual bus stop, the bus gets off and directly gets back in the highway. In this case, the exit was 2 kilometers up a steep hill. There is no sign or shelter. We asked a woman out walking her dog and we thought she said to just stand at the rotary on the exit. We hiked up the 2 k and found the exit and just prayed the bus would show up. Luckily it did. 😊. We got off at our planned village but again the bus stopped on the highway and it was 2 k to the village and another k to our pension. We had to wonder if this time taking the bus to save some kilometers was worth it.

We got to our pension and after a quick shower I headed out to see what was around. . I had seen some people walking down the road. I looked at the map and saw the ocean was nearby. When I got to the end of the road I saw the most amazing views. I was standing on a cliff and below were beautiful beaches – one with some surfers but the others were deserted. It was quite amazing. We headed down to the bar for supper and saw Hank from Belgium. We had talked with him a few days ago. We invited him to join us and ended the day with great conversation. This is what the Camino is about – finding beautiful unexpected places and meeting friendly interesting people. I love it !