Sequels nobody really wanted to see: Rocky V, Jaws V, and now....CAMINO II: The Porto-Geezers

Sunday, 22 May 2016

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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Saturday, 21 May 2016

Saturday, May 21, Camino Day 10: Pontevedra to Caldas de Reis

Miles per garmin: 13.8 here along with maps and splits. Fitbit Information per screen shot:

Dinner last night at the Paradores was a classic Deb and Dave experience. The restaurante ("Down and to the right") was so utterly deserted – though set up for a banquet – that we went to the bar next door to ask the hundred-year-old lady there what was up. She gave us the Spanish version of "Dinner? You’re shitting me, right?" Uh, no. Turns out that, though we’d been told that the dinner service started at 8:30, the entire room had been reserved for a High School Graduation dinner at 9:30. Accordingly, staff wasn’t to arrive until 9:00. Uh, the young and smug guy at the front desk got things going: i.e., he told the old lady to make it work, which she did, setting up a table intended as a busboy’s staging area into our Hotel Paradores Dining Experience. Scout has a photo or two of Dave, the only person present, seated in a room set for 95. We ate as fast as we could and got the hell out.

As a nice coda to the dinner experience, the new Grads didn’t start showing up until 10:30 and kept up a racket until well after midnight. Our room, you see, overlooked the street in front. Heh, heh. Yeah, we got the loudest room in the house…again.

After our fifth, tenth, or whatever, fitful night, we arose late to a very good breakfast buffet, with quiche, juice, lots of good coffee and – it is only fair to reveal – hot dogs. European sausage, with blood clots and chunks of snout, is a lot more disgusting to look at than the American version (though probably no more or less unsafe to eat), but, as a tourist with an unrefined palate, one had to taste, right? Yeah. It looked like a hot dog and it was one.

Thus fortified, we embark on another fine day of countryside walking. Rain is predicted for the afternoon, but, as of 16:00, has not arrived. (For those of you who were lit majors and had, thus, given up on any hope of success in the real world, 16:00 may remind you of George Orwell in "1984," when the clocks struck 13. For the rest of you, this is yet another pointless digression. So, Europe is on a 24 hour clock cycle, though, if a tourist says "You mean 7:30 pm," locals will nod and say patiently, as if to a child: "Yes. 19:30."

Our day, starting in the very restaurante where we were yesterday a nuisance, has been a good one. The footing, terrain, and walking have been fine: lots of countryside and wild flowers (Queen Anne’s lace? Mustard? Columbine?). And, following yesterday’s relative traffic jam, we are joined by more and more walkers, some from before and some new. After having said we encountered no Asians, we see lots, both from Japan and from Texas. We chat a little ("Gee, that World War II was a bummer") and move on.

We encounter no problems until Scout, in attempting to cross the road, was struck by a semi and thrown into a vineyard, scraping skin off her palm and opening a bloody gash about the size of a pea on her leg. Huh? Sorry, just meant to sex up an otherwise modest incident. She was stepping over a highway safety rail when – oops! - down she went. Dave was close by, but too slow to prevent the tumble. He did snicker some, which probably helped speed the healing. (What were you doing?) As might be expected of veteran Caminars, we had See’s suckers and diarrhea pills, but no bandaids. Maybe next year Scout will travel with a better-prepared – and more empathetic – companion.

We reach the idyllic village of Caldas de Reis (named after something relating to rice) for a Pilgrim’s Lunch (salad, chicken and fries). The chow is okay, with a full bottle of wine, although, halfway through the meal, staff place a partition between us and the rest of the establishment. Jeez. Turns out, a back room wedding banquet was scheduled and guests were guided through so they wouldn’t dawdle with us walk-in customers. As with all such occasions, checking out the clothing people chose to wear for a "special" day was both amusing and sad. Many men in suits and black Nikes, the women in impossibly high heels and dresses that, for the full-figured gal, seemed, well…wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong. The bride – typically – seemed happy; the groom seemed baffled.

Lunch concluded, we taxi (in a Mercedes, no less) to Torre de Rio, the highest rated (9.7) stop on our Camino. This is a place where, not only do they have toothbrushes and paste in the bathroom, but also big, fluffy towels embroidered with TDR, and bathrobes on the bed. There are yummy chocolates in the room and a hand-written note of welcome. Our room overlooks the kind of rushing stream that lulls one to sleep. And dinner? When would we like it to be? Gee, it’s been so long since we had a choice. It’s only 17:00 and dinner is yet to occur, but we already know we don’t want to leave. (Oh. A bottle of wine @ $15 and well worth it, came with quiche and bread.) Mommy! Don’t make us go back out there!

Mileage: 13.8. Caminars passed 48. Caminars who passed us: 4 (one impertinent fellow passed us twice!) We are now about 26 miles from Santiago. The last few days, despite the usual number of mishaps, have been the best we’ve had on this Camino, much better than the mean streets of Porto.

A few more photos from today....and...the rain has finally made its appearance. It may be soggy tomorrow.

A few Camino signs and a little extra

Only 50K until Santiago

A sample of some cuisine including squid:

Today's version of lovely trails, paths, and vineyards:

Heading out of town this morning

Of course I had to take a photo of a runner

And, our final stop for the day:

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Friday, 20 May 2016

Friday, May 20, Camino Day 9: Rondodela to Pontevedra

Friday, May 20, Camino Day 9: Rondodela to Pontevedra

Another short mileage day: 12.4 miles per garmin: splits, maps, etc. here

And, screenshot of Fitbit data

Ok, before Dave gives us all his account of the day (always a surprise to me, too), I want to share some technical information. Last year, early in the trip, I got a bit frustrated in the blog process: specifically the uploading of photos, due to bad weefee. I let it go and uploaded the photos when it was easy and I'm doing that again, but have streamlined the process as best I can.

I blog in an app called "blogsy" which interfaces with blogger, wordpress, and others. I like since it has options that blogger itself doesn't have. For those of you still half way interested, the first problem is that the app doesn't work on my android phone - the device I use to take pictures. (Yes, I could take photos with the iPad, but seriously.....). So I have to get the photos to my iPad - I do this via email to myself, text to myself, and a program called Instashare (Bluetooth device to device) that works wonderfully most of the time. I'm also using wireless this year (4g, 3G, or whatever is available) to sometimes email them since wireless is often faster than weefee. However, I have to rely on weefee once the photos are on the iPad (to upload to the web) once I'm blogging since I'm not going to pay for wireless on another device. Just too expensive. Ok...that's it on that front. Are you asleep yet? I'm sure any of you who have traveled understand the limitations we face. :-) I also like that my iPad serves as a back up for my phone and the opposite. Maybe, some day I'll get an iPhone and the problem will be solved. (No, Jody, I don't plan to do that in the near future).

The Day's Events

The day began last night with a nice-enough looking room facing the river, not the street. Seems okay, although those railroad tracks look shiny from frequent usage and, yes, it’s the Baiona-Pamplona-Barcelona Express that rumbles through, but only at night. And, if street noise isn’t a factor, casual conversation from our neighbors in nearby rooms is. The walls are paper thin. Fortunately, none of the women were Irish soccer fans or we’d never have slept.

Our culinary tour of Spain and Portugal seems to have settled into a cod or hake, veal, or lamb rut. The veal was especially tough, but we were advised that it came from Franco’s own ranch. Perhaps the animal was a calf when Franco was alive, but it must have lived a hard life. We see lots of lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and French fries, but no spinach, squash, cauliflower, broccoli, or many many other fine vegetables.

We met two young women from Germany (and later listened to them brush their teeth while we tried to sleep), and a ménage a trios from Albuquerque, two of them frail. We passed them on the Camino early Friday despite them having a 2.5 mile head start. As the heartiest of them, Johnnie, a Camino veteran, said "You’ll pass us for sure." While we are fast-ish walkers, the Camino has room for all kinds of paces.

That’s not as true as last year when we saw more younger, faster walkers – and more young women, who always prompt the young men to walk faster. Today, the busiest so far, we passed 37 Caminars, only 3 of them (perhaps) being under 40. This must be the Senior Citizen route.

Another good day for it, though warmer than before; mostly through forest with good footing, birds chirping, and plenty of wild flowers. We chat with a few folks, asking the usual questions: Where are you from? Is this your first? Do you think the U.S.A. will spiral into a Nazi apocalypse if Trump’s elected? (All think it’s inevitable. Ah well, that’s a shame. After a century of being the world’s "cop on the beat," perhaps it’s time for America to embrace chaos and infamy.)

What do we talk about on the Camino? While Existential Angst is a continuing subtext, the most frequent comments are "There’s an arrow." And "I see it." Another one is, "How can I continually emasculate you if you never had balls in the first place?" (Hm, probably oughta edit that one out.) Mostly we make fun of other people, just like we do at home. (Absolutely gotta edit that out.) Oh, and Existential Angst.

We actually do pass more walkers today than on all the other days combined. Powering past them means absolutely nothing, of course; it’s just something to do to help pass the time. Obviously, there’s a bit of "I’m a Lumberjack and I’m Okay" in it, too, but everyone gets to the next stop in one piece and no one really cares how quickly the work got done. In this case, it’s a town of about 80,000 called Pontavedra (it takes its name from a 12 arched Roman bridge). We are, as always, in "Old Town" which means lots of stone buildings cheek by jowl. Lunch (though we have left-over apples and Corn Nuts) is at a taverna. We have the "Menu de Dia," which is a really, really good lentil soup, rice and turkey. A tasty meal, especially the lentils. This place is something of a young folks spot with a fair amount of pink and blue hair. Here’s a good Existential Angst question: If a guy dyes his hair blue, why doesn’t he do the beard, too? Is he emasculated or did he never have balls in the first place?

Our hotel is the Paradores, a place we upgraded to for some good reason. It’s a few hundred meters from a square where we dodged school kids at play, all in grey smocks over their clothes, as if this was finger-painting day. For people who have not had small children in their lives, the sight of fully-formed humans, who happen to be three feet tall, is always a little unusual. Why are they so small? Why are kickballs so big? How can kicking a ball be so much fun? (Easy: These are latent soccer players.) The hotel has an old, European feel to it, as if the pace of modern American life has been disregarded: ‘No, we’re slowing it down by a factor of fifty percent. Thank you.’ A place where they give you a comb and shower cap in the bathroom. We have, for example, two sets of windows about six inches apart and shutters on the inside of them, then curtains behind the shutters. How many layers of protection from the courtyard below do we really need? Dunno. The good news is, our upgrade included individual pillows.

Mileage for the day: 12.4. Caminars passed: 37. We passed two women from Finland and one from Anchorage, Alaska. Since we haven’t seen any Asians or Pacific Islanders, Anchorage now has the lead in the "Farthest-From-the-Camino" Sweepstakes.

A few photos of the day:

Ok, call me an awful person, but I couldn't resist taking a picture of this woman at our hotel this morning. I wasn't sure if she was a Caminar (yes, some smoke: see the pack of cigs on the table) but we passed her along The Way. Like Johnnie, she started at the hotel while we backtracked to the Camino, a few K back). Not sure how comfy a short dress with leggings is on the Camino, but Caminars come in all varieties, as this woman illustrates.

Obligatory animal shots of the day: Mellow cat and dog we saw at an impromptu stop along a dirt path. The owner probably could have charged Caminars as many euros as he wanted from his little house/shop along The Way, but we each had a soda and banana for about 3€. Just like in the states. Not.

Anyone who travels knows that English translations often leave something to be desired. This is a small example.

Dave on The Way today:

Camino signs today: Now that we're in Galicia, they will note how many km until Santiago. On the left, we have about 80 left.

Just a couple of the Caminars we passed today.

Other sights of the day

Some more cool graffiti

Loved this gate

Damn tourists get in the way of the scenery

Our hotel and awesome lentil soup

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Thursday, 19 May 2016

Thursday, May 19, Camino Day 8, Vigo to Rondodela

Thursday, May 19, Camino Day 8, Vigo to Rondodela
Short day: per Garmin 10.4 miles. See route and splits here
And, our Fitbit data through our arrival here in Rondodela.

Dave's voice, of course:

What can you say? Sooner or later everything evens out. After an aggravating day, a mellow one. Dinner last night was woefully short on continental sophistication (as are we) but got us to lights out with no lasting harm. As is sometimes the case, our thoughtful, (and, dare I say it? Splendidly endowed) hotel clerk put us in a Turistico Americano room facing the urban street with it’s yodeling pedestrians and busses that sounded like freight trains. This is what locals in the hospitality trade call CB accommodations (for Cheap Bastards). What the night lacked in peace and quiet, it made up for in length: we dragged ourselves awake, seemingly around noon, but only at 6:40 am in time for orange juice, coffee, and croissants.

From there it was an urban crawl for a mile or so until, with yellow arrows (fleche) ahead, we began a brief, but pleasant day through woodlands and alleys behind people’s homes. A good number of these homes are newly-built, though few are on large lots or are themselves large. For empty-nesters, maybe. Saw a few swimming pools, mostly square. Why do they need to be rectangular? Why not a rhomboid? Or a tetrahedron?

Again cool weather that threatened to clear but never did, so, a little humid, but good for walking. Saw more runners today than usual and more altacocker walkers, usually lively old guys who wished us well on the Camino with the Spanish version of "He’s too old for her." Thanks guys.

Arriving early at Redondo Deli, our stop for the night, we inadvertently wander into an "artisanal" wine shop. As in the U.S., "artisanal" is a bullshit term for over-priced. We buy the cheapest (CBs, remember) wine we can find, then discover the same stuff for half price at the nearby Froiz Supermercado. Dang! Froiz is a chain ala Vons. One difference is, you bag and weigh your own fruit on a machine that produces a ticket noting how much the weighed item costs. What you then do is, stuff a few more bananas, apricots, or whatever into the bag and hand it to the checker. If you already have enough fruit, simply slide in a ham or similar item.

For once, we arrive at our hotel before our luggage, which contains our electronics and, most importantly, the corkscrew. Since we’ve already had sex this month, we are trapped into hour after hour of nothing but relaxing and talking amongst ourselves. It was brutal. Thank God, we had apricots, bread, and a ham to eat while we suffered.

Since our hotel (one with a Spanish "x" in the name so we have no idea how to pronounce it), is a few miles away and not near the Camino, they send a cab to pick us up. Oh, the shame! One moment, we’re standing near our unwashed brothers and sisters, our Caminar colleagues, only to have a cab, the rusting symbol of everything non-Camino, swoop in to take us to our luxury accommodations! Our faces burn at the treachery of it! Do the others spit at us or turn away in disgust and sorrow? We don’t know; we dare not look.

Total miles: 10.4. Caminars passed: 2 (in Redondo Deli, as they looked in bewilderment at a map. We could have stopped to offer help, but then we might not have passed them. Priorities, right?) We finish our walk at the peregrino albergue, one of a system of hostal-type places for pilgrims. Albergue is pronounced "old burger," because that’s how they smell - the peregrinos, that is. This is the first time we’ve seen a herd of them together with their grey hair, the blurry I-voted-for-Gene-McCarthy eyes, and clothing they’ve worn on 14 of the last 16 days. We pity their weary faces, but there’s admiration for their tenacity and willingness to keep going despite what the years have done. The years, as we all know, can really bring some shit.

A few pictures for today and a note to Mary and Gerry: when you get here, you will love today's trek. I also believe we join the inland Portuguese (traditional) tomorrow and it will be much better marked.