Sarria to Portomarin

Hello, everyone.  Yesterday's post didn't quite catch us up. Today's post will cover the next day. 

We left our barndominium in Sarria at our usual time, about 0700. The weather is no l9nger so cold that I need gloves in the morning, in fact it seems that spring is finally springing up for real.

In Galicia, the official route has kilometer distances to Santiago marked on the mojones. (A mojon is,an official marker, like the one in Bentsen park that is half of the border market, with the othar half being in Mexico and the actual border point being the center of the two.) If there are two routes, one will be "official " with distances and the other will be "complementario" and no distances are displayed. (In 2018, walking the Norte route, we elected to take the old route, paved, instead of the new, cool route, through a higher altitude meadow, and we spent the entire day with Complementario markers as we walked past houses. There weren't any bars or restaurants,  and we were pretty sure the new path had none either, but our path did have an impressive log to rest on at one point.) There was only one route out of Sarria, so picking the way was basically keeping an eye out for arrows, shells, and morons.

I thought the color contrast between the blooming broom shrubs and the green trees was pretty cool.

Galician cattle resting and probably chewing their cud.

There is one thing that wasn't photographed but maybe should have been. Just before Portomarin,  there was a split sign. One sign said "historic route" and pointed left. The other sign said something like "new route" and pointed right. I foolishly went with "historic" instead of asking the conveniently loitering road conservation guys about the choices. Should y'all find yourself in a similar situation,  ask the nice man hanging out there next to his work truck. The way we followed wend to a narrow, water-carved slot with slippery stones and very little room for a pole tip. Some people turned around to crawl backwards down the steep rock "stairs" which I was not able to do. I did make it down, using my hiking pole that was already out and grabbing the rocks at the side with the other hand. But it was really scary and so I think if there is a choice that isn't described in guide books, y'all should ask questions before deciding. 😉 A word to the wise and all that.

Good progress today

Hello, everyone. After a very busy day yesterday,  doing errands, we started walking  about 7 this morning.  We passed over about 26 km and saw many beautiful flowers. 

It was good walking weather today, too.

Remembering some of the paths

Hello, everyone. Now that we have completed our pilgrimage to Santiago, and have some moments to reflect (sitting in the laundromat) I will share something about the paths we encountered in Galicia.

The province does trail maintenance in some places. This place is somewhat low lying and after rain, as we can see, there will be standing water. They added a row of stone down the middle for walking on.

After the amount of dancing around flooded trails we had done already, we were grateful for this steady place to step.

Monasterio, and a little more about yesterday

Hello, everyone. 

Yesterday it was impossible to post from my phone as the wifi at our sleeping place was not working. 

We walked up to the restored medieval castle, viewed the town of El Real de la Jara, washed a lot of clothes by hand at the patio of our sleeping place, ate and went to bed.

Today we headed out at 0715 en route to Monasterio.

The famous pigs of the Dehesa, running to (maybe) their breakfast. There must have been more than 50 of them.

Complejo Leo, Spain's answer to Buc-cees! Excellent coffee, 2 restroom areas in the self-serve cafeteria, also anything a Spanish person might want for breakfast. Y'all should have seen all of the buses pulling in. There is also a 3 star hotel and a more formal restaurant. 

It rained off and on from when we left there until we reached Monasterio. We're staying in the municipal albergue Las Moreras tonight.

Recap: Camino Primitivo--After Lugo, to Ferreira

 Hello, everyone.

We return to the recap of the Camino Primitivo. At this point, as Lugo is the 100km town, we were in the final stage of our Camino walk.

This Roman mile marker was near the one bar we were able to have a rest and sip at during the day.

Later that day we encountered this trail mark with the usual Galician distance estimate.

The path was often a quiet road.

Another look at the quiet road, this time with less leaf litter on it.

We slept at the Albergue A Nave in Ferreira and we ate at the bar/cafe next door. I had tortilla de verduras, which was promised to be made with the produce of the owner's garden. We had walked past a lot of vegetable patches that day and almost all of them were well supplied with kale. Was there kale in the tortilla? No! There was, in addition to potato chunks, some eggplant and tomato. Even though it wasn't what I expected, the tortilla was good.

The following morning, we woke up at a suitable, early, time, dressed, and tried to head out. Fail. Not only was it still full dark at 8:40 or so in the morning, there was also fog on the road. We had to go back inside and wait for almost half an hour until there was light enough to walk by. (This is what happens when you walk into the shortening days--it was approaching the end of October by this time.)

Recap of Primitivo, Days 3 and 4 (updated: Days 4 and 5)

 Hello, everyone.

Today, since much of what was to be said about the walk to Campiello has already been said, I thought I would combine that with the following day from Campiello over the Hospitales route to Berducedo.

First off, the walk to Campiello was deliberately a short day. We got there about noon and immediately had a coffee with a egg-and-chorizo bocadillo tapa. Then we got with the people about a bed to sleep in and the washing protocols (bought tokens) and got after the laundry. Then we had a snack of "seafood-rice salad" from their little grocery and finished off the laundry. At suppertime we ate a pizza in their cafe and also got jamon and cheese bocadillos for the next day's picnic lunch. These turned out to be huge.

A bit of scenery after leaving Tineo. (By the way, Tineo had installed street lights on the walking trail out of town. By the time we ran out of lights there was starting to be walking light from the sky.)

I think pictures from the Albergue Casa Ricardo in Campiello have already been included in the en-route post about this stage.

The next morning, we left before actual light, but there was no traffic on the road and we were able to follow it.

The sun came up while we were walking. (Actually that tends to happen with us. Even more so when we walked this time, into the shortening days.) 

We passed through Borres and didn't locate the little bar. Well, we passed it, but after considerable discussion didn't try the door to see if it was actually open or not. After Borres we came to the split in the routes. A number of the people who were walking at that time had mentioned that they were going to take the low route, as it has a lot more facilities en route. They were still going to end up in Berducedo, probably as there is precious little in the way of lodging along this stage this year. (I think there may have been an option to sleep in Pola de Allande on the low route, but as we took the other one it didn't matter to us.) The low route has more kilometers and, significantly for us, a lot more climbs and descents according to the information we had. We went the high way because once we got up there is would be mostly ridge walking. Which is fairly even. And it was.

Y'all will note that while there is a real slope here, the trail isn't sloping a whole lot.

That little grove of trees in the background, and the famous ruins, are about the only place one could take shelter from a big wind up there. And with the said wind, the pine branches might fall on one's head. Other than that, it's a whole lot of open area.

This is an interesting bug that we saw along the way that day. It looked a bit like it was laying eggs in the grass. We had never seen this critter before.

Later we passed along the very dooryard of a farm in the hills, large friendly dog there, and through the village of Lagos, lovely water fountain at the church, no bars at all, and arrived 5:30 in the evening at Berducedo, for a 30 kilometer day. We were so tired. We ate the remnants of our bocadillo picnic sandwiches (most of them, we had only nibbled at lunchtime) for dinner along with a bottle of Spanish wine from the little grocery there and went to bed.

Recap of Camino Primitivo, Day 3

 Hello everyone. I had located photos for this day of travel at the same time as I located photos for the previous day of travel, so I thought I would get after it and make the post for the walk from Salas to Tineo.

One initial thought: apparently the meal served at the albergue in Salas was vegan. It had no meat, no cheese, and while there was some rice in the vegetable soup, there was no bean element so no complete protein at all. And it was awfully low fat for people who are hiking all day. I completely ran out of energy and hit the wall around 2 hours into our walk. But we made it into Tineo and it wasn't super late in the day after all. Though we did arrive during siesta time so not much was open until later.

This was part of the path towards Tineo.

We also passed black raspberry plants, some of the berries ripe, but didn't take pictures of them. The berry I ate had a sort of dark, musky flavor. (Pick your wild berry above the height of doggy investigations if you try one! Just saying.) I never picked a berry that appeared to be under cultivation, as that would be an utterly tacky thing to do.

We passed an amazing growth of mushrooms along the way. They appeared to be growing on the roots of some dead trees.

This sundial is on the outskirts of Tineo, along the hiking path. There is actually a sort of "parks belt" along there before you enter the town. The whole town is clinging to the side of a mountain/huge hill and they also have at least one terrace below the nearby street that is used for a vegetable garden by someone there. I saw large plants that looked like asparagus, busy storing up energy to turn into lovely spears in the spring. The little bar we were sitting at, through a little tunnel across the square from the Palacio de Meras, and on the left, had terrace seating with a beautiful view of the town. Also very tasty croquetas for a snack.

We stayed in the albergue space of the Palacio de Meras hotel which was quite nice. You go to the main entrance and ask and they check you in. Also ask for your sello! I did and DH forgot, so for that day I have 2 stamps and he has one (the little church dedicated to SS Saturnino and Justino I think their names were.) The albergue space there has little 4-bed (2 bunk-stack) cubicles with a heavy curtain across the door to somewhat contain the sounds of snorers. I remember lockers and electric plugs, too. The hotel offers a pilgrims' meal at I think 8 pm, for an extra fee.

We had a (really big) hamburger in their bar for dinner. Very nicely done and filling, too. We didn't think that we could do justice to a full 3 course pilgrims' meal so skipped that option. 

Returning to the San Salvador--Last Day

 Hello, everyone.

View back toward Mieres in the dawn

Today's post returns to the pilgrimage for the last day of the walk into Oviedo.  This is a shorter day than many, but the middle portion was a very steep climb that was signed as a "greenway". The first portion was a gentle climb over switchbacks on the road and third portion was also gentle hill going through and around farms.

View of Oviedo in the distance

When we were walking through the farms, we met some of the farmers. They were very friendly and reminded us of the old saying, "He who visits Santiago and neglects to visit Oviedo, visits the servant and neglects the Master."

The actual entry into Oviedo was a gentle slope down suburban streets, passing the official albergue in Oviedo and arriving in the Cathedral square downtown. 

We had reserved a room at Hostel Fidalgo, the same pension we had stayed at when we bussed to Oviedo in 2018. This time, being mid October, it was a bit chilly in the room; the lady explained to us that the heat in the building is controlled for the whole building by the overall management. 

The tourism office wants everyone to know that Oviedo is the origin of the
 Camino de Santiago. Which it is, as Oviedo was the capital of
Asturias when the bones were found.

We paid our respects to the Sudario and the Cross of Victory from Covadonga when we went to the Cathedral to get our Salvadoranas.

The reliquary of the Sudario, the head cloth mentioned in the Gospel of John
 description of the apostles discovering that Jesus had been resurrected

The credencial for the Salvador, the bottom stamp is upside
down as the credencial is unfolded here and the
final stamp is on a different page.

The Salvadorana
It had to be weighted down to uncurl the shape of the carrying tube.

We took a rest day in Oviedo.

The Camino stays with us

 Hello, everyone.

Even though this year we have not been able to walk the Camino--not even a short route--there are things that stay with us.

We have been watching Camino videos on Youtube. (Sarah Dhooma's videos give a pretty good idea of path surfaces.) 

Occasionally we make tapas for dinner. We use a baguette recipe to make the barra bread. Sometimes we make garlic soup, too.

And we drink the Spanish and Portuguese wines.

These are three we have tried recently. The first is a lovely white, the other two are reds. We liked the bad rabbits a little better than the other red. (All found at Spec's.)

Wildlife on the walking trail

Hello, everyone.

A few days ago we were walking on the Hike and Bike Trail in our town. We often carry cameras in case something interesting turns up.

I almost stepped on this one.

He doesn't have a visible rattle--the first thing we thought to wonder about!--but he's rather small. (Around 18 inches?) He does have a line of brown spots down his back. His head is triangular, the wide part being behind his eyes. No pits were visible in his cheeks, at least to our glance. (But we didn't give him an all-over look.)

A view from another angle.

He was lying in the sunshine trying to warm up for the day, minding his own business right out there on the paved path. We passed on by, live and let live, and continued our walk. When we returned through that spot he had moved on.

Israel pilgrimage: Fifteenth in series

Hello, everyone.

By now, we were close to the end of our visiting in the Holy Land. It was the day after the Stations of the Cross, which had been a lot of standing and a fair amount of walking on pavement. On this day we began by visiting the last surviving wall of Herod's Temple in Jerusalem.

(Herod's temple was I believe an enlargement of the second temple that was built by returnees during the Persians' rule. I think we're talking about the book of Nehemiah here, but am not completely sure. At any rate, later after the Maccabees pushed the imperialist Greek colonizers--who insisted that the occupants of this area become Greek pagans like themselves instead of letting them live their own lives with their own religion--there was unrest and much turnover in the kingship of the area. The Romans having come along by then, they grew impatient with the fighting over the king's seat and put in place the family of Herod as kings. One of the Herods decided to make the temple in Jerusalem really impressive and added on to it.)

The western wall foundation is the last remnant of Herod's temple. The rest was torn down during the rebellion of about 100 AD when the Romans rolled through in force and sacked the city.

Pigeons in a niche in the wall.

Ladies praying at the wall. (The local custom is for the ladies to have a section that is theirs and the gentlemen to have a section that is theirs.) It is the strictly observed custom for all the ladies to wear hats or scarves and all the gentlemen to wear a kippah, the Jewish mens' cap, while visiting the Western Wall.

Ruins in the vicinity of the wall.

There were a lot of people there. We saw a number of groups processing in to celebrate the Bar Mitzvah of their young man, carrying canopies and singing and being accompanied by drummers and other musicians. Some of them were dancing as they went. (To respect the privacy of the various people in these groups, I am not putting those pictures up.)

After that visit, we went by bus over to the church of St Peter in Gallicante, St Peter of the Crowing Rooster. (So named because here St. Peter was called out by various persons as part of Jesus' party and in an attempt to remain low profile he denied that he knew Jesus. And the third time he did so, the rooster crowed.)

A good look at the front of the church of Gethsemane, which is too close to the sidewalk for a view of the mosaic above the entrance, but from across the Kidron valley shows beautifully.

St Peter in Gallicante is built over the ruins of the house of Caiaphas the High Priest, who as y'all will remember was the one who interrogated Jesus after His arrest and convened a (kangaroo-style) court to judge Him. After the group of elders they had on hand condemned Jesus to death, they stored Him in an old grain cellar, lowering Him by rope, until morning. Then they dragged Him over to Pilate to convince the Romans to permit the death penalty.

These days there are stairs down to the grain cellar. Groups take turns paying respects to the site.

After this visit, we went to Ein Kerem, which is not pronounced in the German fashion like I expected but instead as if the I in Ein isn't actually there, and visited the Church of the Visitation. (The Visitation is the second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary, it is when Mary visited her cousin St. Elizabeth and is described briefly in the Gospel of Luke.)

Ein Kerem is in the hills and we had a very respectable walk uphill to the church. It was the longest continuous walk in our visit to the Holy Land.

There was a very peaceful outdoor chapel there where our pastor offered Mass.

When we returned to the parking area at the bottom we discovered that there is a walk in the hills around the area. The trail mark was oval and two-colored; it looked to me like the eye of Sauron from the Lord of the Rings

but I'm sure the people who picked it out were probably unaware that a movie would pick that shape for the eye years later.

This was the last stop of another full day.

Walk report: Guadalupe Mountains National Park

Hello, everyone.

This is the last of the walk reports from our drive to California. On our way home, instead of clinging to I-10, we cut off at El Paso to visit GMNP. This was our first visit to the park.

Guadalupe Mountains National Park is one of the wilder parks in the system. They have a small visitor's center with bathroom. They have some camping facilities. There are no concessions with food, drinks, gasoline, etc.

A number of the visiting trails are convenient to the front entrance. We picked up a map and headed out onto a short-to-medium length hike: The Devil's Hall Trail.This is an out-and-back trail, not a loop. The whole trip is somewhere around 4 miles. (About 6.4 km)

Approaching the park on the highway. The day was coming onto pretty warm, as the hard blue sky and isolated white cloud show.

We carried water bottles with us and were glad we remembered. We had not brought our hiking poles, but they would have come in handy a couple of times.

At the start of the trail, a marker naming the various trails that connect to this point. Where trails diverge, there is a marker indicating which goes where.

After following the trail for some winding about between hills, we found a metal sign advising us that the trail continues on in the dry wash (the creek bed) and I wondered if they close the tail when there's a big rain in the area.

We saw an interesting tree whose roots are going into the rock between the layers of stone.

The wash became extremely rocky. There was some clambering around. (We missed our hiking poles!)

At the end, there was a rock formation called a natural stairway.

 It was layers of hard rock, eroded to somewhat resemble a steep marble staircase. As one might expect from the location and kind of rock, the surface was somewhat slick. Past the first little "stairs" there was a pothole, a pool that appears to have no outlet, with some water in it. Proceeding past the pothole, there were a few more steps of "stairs," wider to walk on this time, and then we reached the "Devil's Hall."

The Devil's Hall is a very steep-sided canyon with walls that resemble dressed stone. The park administrators had closed the area beyond the entrance due to "sensitive wildlife," presumably nesting creatures of one kind or another. It is very important to conserve the beauty of the park by not going into prohibited areas.

 On the way back, we discovered that the little trail mark symbols we remembered from youth came in very handy to find the return route. Oddly enough, the way back didn't look quite like the way out! If you visit, don't disturb the little rock stacks. They are an important part of making the park enjoyable for anyone who can walk the trail.

Trail mark, meaning "go straight ahead here." The only really tricky part of finding our way back to the parking lot was picking up the trail where the way leaves the wash and goes onto the hillside again. These little rock markers are invaluable!

Due in part to the climbing over and around the various boulders and rocks, the trail took about 2 to 3 hours. At the car, we pulled out a snack (Dukes links) and drank some of our newly refilled water bottles and headed on down the road.

This park is somewhat off the beaten path, and one must fill the gas tank and get drinks/snacks before going as there are no facilities at the park entrance, but it is very enjoyable and well worth the trip.