Sunday , May 22, Camino Day 11: Caldas de Reis to Padron

Sunday , May 22, Camino Day 11: Caldas de Reis to Padron

Miles per garmin: just about 12. See here for map, splits, etc. Fitbit says 31,479 steps (so far..the day isn't over, 14.67 mikes, and 83 floors).

A perfect night at the perfect hotel. Except for sleep. Well, some of us awaken briefly during the night, break wind, and roll over. Others toss and turn despite the soothing white noise of the river tumbling over rocks. A cool night, too, with the windows open so one would want to curl up under the covers. One does want to do this, but actual sleep is illusive.

Dinner last night was excellent, including a Spanish Omelet (eggs and potatoes, no onions and no peppers; in fact, we’ve seen no peppers at all in our time here) as an appetizer. We again had hake, the national fish of Spain. Then to bed, perchance to sleep. In the morning, a smashing breakfast buffet, plus eggs cooked to order: feather-light croissants, a half dozen other pastry options, a half dozen cut fruit options, fresh-squeezed OJ, and good coffee. Alas, we had to pry ourselves from the groaning board and resume our journey, pausing to walk through the hotel grounds we missed yesterday due to fatigue and the expectation that, ‘So what? It’s another hotel in an old building.’ We were wrong. The grounds included a half dozen spots to sun oneself or just to gaze at the river as it tumbled towards its destiny. (Staff would, of course, provide vino or any other beverage the indolent visitor might want in any of these spots.)

This place is called Torre del Rio (Tower of the River) and here’s the kicker: another couple we met rented their room on a single night basis (ours is part of a package and, one presumes, an on-going relationship between the hotel and Camino Ways). Their cost, including a first class dinner for two and the excellent breakfast, was $155 for the night. Muy barato.

But enough about the past. Our path today takes us through more winding, hilly, and, since the rain blew through yesterday evening, sunny woodland. We start off walking with an Irish couple out for a holiday. As our cab driver said on day one, Europe has discovered Spain and Portugal as travel bargains and so have our new Irish pals. Pat cautions us that western Ireland is about to be priced out of the stratosphere because the upcoming Star Wars movies are to be filmed there. (Nothing says a galaxy far, far away like Ireland.) We don’t get their entire story, but Pat’s a blacksmith and farms. Carol works too, of course. They have two kids in college and a 15 year old, and real lives, but, did I mention that the guy’s a blacksmith? Ireland is the new Star Wars, but still has blacksmiths! (Ah, but as Pat says, he gets his work by word of mouth like most blacksmiths, so he doesn’t have to advertise. "There are more blacksmiths around than you’d think," says he. True, since I didn’t think there were any. (Okay, maybe in Poway.) )

Since Pat and Carol have Irish brogues and lots of interesting stories to tell, we quickly decide that they’re making our pedestrian lives seem drab by comparison and dump them. It’s us being hopelessly self-involved, of course, but really interesting and adventurous people are a drag. :-)

This day is a good one, with (mostly) good footing and Caminars to pass (mostly people we passed yesterday, who didn’t dawdle over breakfast like us). We finish in/near Padron, a small town with an Eroski supermercado, where we buy the usual lunch stuff and, because our Camino Ways info sheet says we can, we call the hotel to dispatch a taxi. The "taxi" is the desk clerk for tonight’s hotel, the Casa de Antiga, a can-do, no-nonsense woman who tells us, when we say we get lost easily, that we cannot. It seems not to be an opinion, but a statement of fact: "You will find the Roman bridge that I rocketed past a mile back." We look at our feet and mumble that we will obey.

Our room is a hybrid of "Antiga" and modern with a wooden ceiling, yet a hand-held device for controlling heat and a/c. There is, as in every place we’ve stayed, a flatscreen TV on the wall. Some are only 13 diagonal inches, but, like in India, every room has one. We never turn them on. On restaurant TVs, we note that the Spanish king, an earnest and imposingly tall fellow, is forever visiting factories and shaking hands with local people. His wife does the same, only without the height. Not sure if being king is a good gig or not. Did Franco ever wear a safety suit and hard hat while visiting a bottling plant? Pretty sure Ferdinand and Isabella, who started The Inquisition, did not.

It’s chillin time now, the blog almost done, the pictures done, and we’re one day from Santiago, having almost finished a trek that an old German man told us about last year. He was the guy who, when thinking about doing his first Camino, decided to visit a doctor for a check-up. That’s when they found the heart disease they quickly operated on. No Camino, no check-up; no check-up and he’s dead. So the Camino saved his life. (Not sure if he was eating chocolate and drinking wine every day like us.)

There isn’t much good to be said for hurrying past other Caminars or taking short cuts; being separated from one’s usual life is, on the other hand, a little bit of liberation, a little bit of disruption in the lives we’ve chosen. As they say in western Ireland "We are not the droids you’re looking for."

Mileage for today: 12.0. Caminars passed 34. It would have been 36, but we blundered through a mile-long Sunday flea market; they looped around it. Seems to me like they cheated.

Scout voice for a minute: We are less than 25k or thereabouts from Santiago de Compestela and will arrive there tomorrow. We'll spend the night at a supposedly 5 star hotel and fly out the next day to Brussels, Belgium, and take a short train ride to Bruges, a city I know nothing about but have wanted to visit since seeing the movie In Bruges. Not interested in the noir side of the story, but the fairy tale look of the city seemed amazing and I'm excited to see it. Not so excited about the rain that's forecast both days, but we'll survive. And, we haven't even arrived in Santiago and I'm already starting to feel a bit melancholy that the trek is over. For those of you who followed us last year, you know that it took me awhile to get over my "Camino Blues." As Dave said, we walked with a couple from Ireland today who walked the Camino Francais last year for 5 days and are doing the same on the Camino Portuguese. Carol talked about the same thing and said she couldn't imagine being on the Camino longer and what it must feel like to get back to real life. Anyway, that's a few days off, and once I get home, I know I'll be happy to sleep in my own bed and know where the bathroom is.

A few photos:

You can see why we didn't want to leave

And more of Scout and this great place

Dave and Dave and Pat on The Way

The kilometer countdown

The Way: not just for Caminars

Along The Way

Not seen in U.S. markets recently

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