Author Archives: Steve Walker

About Steve Walker

Once a tech in-house PR type, now professional photo/videographer and recreational drone pilot. Violinist. Flautist. Occasional conductor. Oenophile.

Camino Finisterre, Day 8: Lires to Muxía – Mainly Jane Again In Spain

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Thursday 9 May 2024 – I was feeling better than yesterday, but discretion, valour, you know?  So once again we formulated a plan whereby Jane would do the hard yards on foot while I would do the easy kilometres in a taxi.  The weather prospects for the day

seemed similar to yesterday’s, which made a prompt start desirable (for her, at any rate), and so she departed at about 8.30am, leaving me to skulk first in my room and then in the hotel bar, which, for some reason, features a counterintuitively massive meat fridge.

I skulked until it was time to catch a taxi (and, it must be said, see what fallout there might be from eating moderately for breakfast, something of a novelty for the last days. Spoiler alert: no fallout; phew!). As yesterday, I have nothing to add about the journey, so here’s Jane….

It was much cooler and lightly overcast when I started out, leaving Lires and heading off on woodland and farmland paths of varyingly good going…

There were some striking sights along the way

and much evidence of spring planting and preparation.

I walked for a while behind this interesting variation on a horse-drawn carriage…

I wondered if the farmer was taking her to be shod, as she didn’t appear to have shoes and he was positioning the tractor very carefully as he drove so that she could walk where possible on the grassy verge, and avoid areas of broken road surface. [Not shoddy treatment, then – Ed (temporary)]

The way was unremarkable in many ways, although there were some great photo opportunities…

until the steepish bit up to the high point of the walk on Monte Lourido.

What goes up must come down, and the views opened up all around as the way descended (with what appeared to be a forest fire in the distance).

There were abrupt changes in the quality of the surface –

not so much of a problem for me on foot, but a bit of a sharp intake of breath for these Italian bicigrinos!

At a spring on the outskirts of Muxía this chap was doing his keep fit exercises, before filling his water bottle and passing me on his way back into town.

The descent into the town skirts the beautiful Praia de Lourido, with the less then beautiful (IMHO) Costa da Morte Parador on the slopes above.

The town is not particularly noteworthy, although there are some interesting murals

and the harbour area is quite picturesque.

I reached our hotel before Steve wafted in, so was able to check in and await his arrival.

Ah – here he is now!

The taxi ride passed without incident, except the one which happened before it started.  At 1235, I asked the nice lady behind reception at the hotel to request a taxi to take me to Muxía, and she told me it would be there in 20 minutes.  Accordingly, at 1255, I was sitting outside the hotel, ready to depart, and a taxi rolled up.  He looked grumpy when I approached and said, in my best Englishman-abroad-attempt-at-communicating-with-the-locals, “Muxía?”  I was disconcerted when he simply replied “no” and walked off into the hotel.  I thought at first he was going to, as it were, pick me up inside the hotel, but actually he’d just rocked up for a coffee. I sat back down, somewhat disconsolately, wondering if there’d been a cock-up, when another taxi turned up, and it turned out to be mine. The journey proceeded at Spanish taxi pace, i.e. slightly faster than is (a) legal or (b) comfortable.

Once we were both safely ensconced at the Hotel a de loló, we could relax for a while before going out for lunch.  For a change, there was no worry about finding a meal, as María, on the front desk, had pointed us at a restaurant, A Marina, whose kitchen was open all day.  The room was one of those excellent, well-organised hotel rooms which are not expansive, but which are beautifully designed to have all that’s reasonably needed, all reasonably within reach.  That included a kettle! We were thus able to treat ourselves to a Nice Cup Of Tea. When we were in Finisterre, Jane had spotted some local Earl Grey,

so, in order to conserve our precious stocks of Twining’s finest, we tested out this “precious black tea” and found it to be satisfactorily restorative, giving us the energy to go to lunch. Then we went for a walk. Obviously. (It’s so nice to be able to type that, as today is the first day I’ve felt capable of walking with any degree of pleasure, dignity or pace since Monday.)

Lunch was also an opportunity to reintroduce my digestive system to proper food (OK, and gin), in an experiment which – so far, writing some hours later – seems to have been a success, or at least not a noisome failure.  Before we embarked on the walk, we picked up our Compostelae Muxiannae, our certificates for completing what, in our case, is Phase II of III.  And I suppose it’s somewhat cheating for me to claim a Compostela, since I didn’t actually walk the whole way.  So sue me.

Our objective for the walk was to go to the “0 km” post which marks the Muxía end of the Camino, by the sanctuary dedicated to the virgin.  As with Finisterre, we visited last Autumn, but by bus.  The site is quite impressive, as you’ll have noticed from the video I shot last year.

Last year we had approached the site from the coach park, which, obvs, is designed to show the whole area to its best advantage, and I was very taken with the charisma of the place, and left with the impression that it was somehow on a remote promontory.  This year, though, we just walked 10 minutes up the road from the town, and discovered that it isn’t.

You just walk up the road and there you are.  It’s still a lovely site, though.

On the way there we passed the Igrexa de Santa María de Muxía, which is the site of a yearly pilgrimage every September,

and, rather less spiritually, drying rails for conger eels,

which are arranged in a square, rather than the conger line I’d expect.

We spent a few minutes at the site reacquainting ourselves with its Camino-related aspects, but particularly, of course, the “0 km” marker, to show we’d completed this stage.

There are other decent views across the site, too,

including the “sail rock”, which was part of the stone boat supposedly sailed there by the virgin Mary to reassure St. James that his work was successfully completed.  The Camino is full of symbolics like this.

We walked back into town round the other side of the headland, past dry stone walling which we at first thought might have been the remains of ancient habitations

but, it soon turned out, were simply allotments.

One final conger eel rack

and we were back at the hotel, getting ourselves outside more of Sir Winston’s finest.

The morrow?  Too soon to be certain, but the omens are favourable; tonight will be the acid test, possibly in a literal manner, as to whether my digestion really was ready for that meal.  If it turns out that it was, I think I might be ready to rejoin Jane on the road as we walk the 10km or so to Quintáns. If she’ll have me, that is. It’s a short walk and, one hopes, not too arduous. The current forecast for the weather is (whisper it) good, with cooler temperatures but no rain. So, stay tuned and see how the day unfolds, OK?

Camino Finisterre Day 7: Finisterre to Lires – mainly Jane in Spain

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Wednesday 8 May 2024 – It was clear, immediately we awoke, that I was not going to be able to cope with a 17km  walk, even if it were on the straight and level, which it very emphatically wouldn’t be.

I was therefore going to take a cab. As Clint Eastwood said, “A man’s got to know his limitations.” Given that the forecast for the day was benign – sunny, mid-20s Celsius, It seemed selfish to rob Jane of the chance to hike what we had been told was a beautiful walk by suggesting she come with me. I was worried that I wouldn’t have enough efectivo (cash) and so we buggered about for a bit with how to get to an ATM first, but the hotel reassured us that the fare would be just €20, which was fine.

The hotel staff, I have to say, were magnificent in their support for us, and in particular me. They provided isotonic drinks, arranged the taxi, allowed me to have a late check-out so I could stay in my room and thus within sprinting distance of a loo, and took our bags down to the taxi (I’m not sure why the normal baggage pick-up didn’t work, but that’s not important right now). So I was entirely sorted and comfortable with the plan for the day.

The only ripples in the otherwise smooth current of my transfer to Lires occurred at the “getting into the taxi” stage.  The taxi had turned up and been loaded and the hotel manager had come with me down the steps, but the taxi driver was Over There, apparently having a chat with someone.  When he turned round, it transpired that he’d been importuned by the leader of a group of three people who couldn’t be arsed to order their own taxi, as they wanted to get back to Finisterre town.  So it was that three somewhat overweight people joined me in the cab. I don’t know where they were from (somewhere like the Philippines, at a guess), but their leader was obviously accustomed to taking things over and running them his own way. He even asked the driver what would be the fare to Santiago, which alarmed me. But they eventually got out Finisterre and left the driver to take me to Lires.

That’s my contribution to the day. Let me hand you over to Jane, who has a much more interesting narrative.

Secure in the knowledge that Steve was all set, I started out with a spring in my step into a glorious morning. Blue skies, a cool breeze and beautiful valedictory views of O Semaforo, the lighthouse, and Cape Finisterre.

There were not many peregrinos walking in either direction so I was able to take my time as I retraced our steps of yesterday back down the Cape into the town of Finisterre; the views and especially the colour of the water in places were wonderful.

Curious to see nasturtium flowers running wild, nowhere near any gardens!

The route led up through the town past some colourful artwork then out into open country.

From our previous experiences on the Camino we are used to the kilometre-posts showing distances to key points (usually Santiago for the main paths, or Finisterre or Muxia for those heading to the coast). On this road, between the twin “end-points” of the Camino, Finisterre and Muxia, they do things differently: as peregrinos might be travelling between the two points in either direction, they simply make sure you continue heading the right way!

The going at this point was quiet country roads through farmland and tiny hamlets. Lots of horreos – some even being used for their original purpose!

I was quite pleased when, around halfway through my walk, the nature of the way changed from open country – it was getting hot! – to shady woodland paths

although I was mystified by the appearance of small pilgrim rock “statues” all of the same general design with a stick for a staff. They were perched on the kilometre-posts, sitting on the verges and the walls, for quite a distance. Then the mystery was solved when I passed a ramshackle building proclaiming itself to be “The House of Pilgrims” and displaying a bewildering selection of the little stone pilgrims!

Soon the way opened up views of the coast and the sea

and continued through woodland (mostly pine, a relief after the relentless eucalyptus)

to the outskirts of the village of A Canosa. It was at this point that my personal GPS map, courtesy of our organisers Walk The Camino, let me down. The map has a black line (sometimes more than one if there is a choice of route) which exactly indicates the route we should take. At a T-junction, the black line went left, the signposts most emphatically went right. Since we had always found the black line to be a reliable and sometimes preferable route to the direction markers, I decided to follow it.

This proved to be a mistake as the path went from bad, to worse

to impenetrable, so I had to retrace my steps and shamefacedly follow the arrows… which led through the village and onto a much better path which eventually rejoined my black line. Ah well, serves me right for trying to be clever!

Eventually I reached the outskirts of my destination, Lires

and our hotel

where I found Steve with his taxi story to tell!

[Steve again…]

Once we were reunited, we spent a little time resting in the room, me because I was still feeling somewhat ropy and Jane because she’d just toiled over 17km in hot sunshine,  As ever, this led us to fall foul of the Spanish eating calendar and the local restaurant had stopped serving until 7pm.  Our hotel does have its own restaurant, but its closed on Wednesdays.  However, the friendly and helpful chap at front desk sorted out a couple of snacky items which, as it turned out, were all we needed for the rest of the day.

And so to the morrow: for me to walk it would be too ambitious, based on our experiences so far – weather maybe a degree cooler, but with a reasonable ascent and steep descent to be undertaken – for me to contemplate it.  So the profound hope is that the hotel can help us with a taxi, and we’ll travel independently and meet up in Muxia.  Why not come back soon and find out how it went?

 

Camino Finisterre Days 5 & 6: Sick Transit, Glorious Monday – and Tuesday

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Tuesday 7 May 2024 – The observant among you will notice – because you read this thing daily, don’t you? – that there was no entry for Monday 6 May.  And yet, given the apparently improving weather, you have a perfect right to expect a load of photos and my usual amusing commentary to accompany them.  We did walk yesterday, and indeed took photos, but force majeure has made it difficult for me to update you until now.  During Sunday night, I was stricken with what my brother, in his blog pages, might call “the collywobbles”. I am less euphemistic.

Reader, I got the shits.

My fault, I suppose, for eating a salad, when one is continually enjoined to avoid raw vegetables when travelling in the more suspect parts of The Foreign, but I had let my guard down, based, I suppose, on the seven weeks of safely eating salads in northern Spain when we walked the Camino Francés.

I didn’t feel too bad at the outset, so we decided to walk to Finisterre, partially on the basis of the weather forecast

and the view out of our window.

The route out of Corcubión was steep; we took a small Brierley recommended variation, which took us past the Capela de Santo Antonio

and a very appealing view back over the town.

We passed another couple of lavadoiros, again showing little evidence of modern usage

and, as we breasted the rise, we caught our first view of the lighthouse which marks the end of the Camino.

The next village on our route was Estorde, where we saw a couple of unusual horreos, one painted white

and one that was actually in use, as its door was open.

I suspect that horreos, where they are usable, are like garages in the UK – never used for their originally-intended purpose.

Shortly after, we reached a town called Sardiñeiro, which was not at all crowded, but did have a couple of engaging points: one very nicely-decorated house

and someone’s remarkable garage.

Its owner bade us come in for a chat, but we demurred, mainly because we were near a coffee stop, which was, to be honest, a more alluring prospect.

After Sardiñeiro, our path was in decent condition

but was, once again, uphill, and I was beginning to labour at this point as a result of the depredations of my digestive system.  There were some nice views such as this of the town of Finisterre,

this of an attractive little cove,

and some quirky things beside the path

(I assume that some kind soul left this for us peregrinos; unsurprisingly, I really wasn’t attracted to this paella) but they failed to lift my spirits much. We made our very slow way past the sweeping beach at the top of the Finisterre bay, the Playa de Llagosteira,

with its unusual installation, dediated to garnering public support for keeping the beach clean,

and toiled along a very nicely-laid pathway through what might have been everglades or might just have been waterlogged land, I’m not quite sure which.

We soon reached Finisterre, or Fisterra as it’s called in the Galician language (Galego, if you’re from Galicia, or Gallego if from the rest of Spain) and discovered that it’s a great deal more extensive than I’d realised.  It seemed to take for ever at my enforced slow pace, but we eventually reached our rather nice and very boutiquey hotel, Banco Azul.

Fortunately, they had a room ready for us, despite it being only just after midday, and even more fortunately it was on the ground floor, as I really don’t think I had the energy left to hoick my suitcase up any stairs.  The 12km had taken us three-and-three-quarter hours, and I was done in, so spent the rest of the day trying to recover. Jane went out though to get our official certificates to show we have completed the walk from Santiago de Compostella to Finisterre.

This left us with just the 3km to cover to the “0 km” marker today.  We could, I suppose, have taken a taxi, but I thought I felt well enough to walk it, despite it being almost ceaselessly uphill.

Shortly after we set out, we passed the Igrexa de Santa María das Areas

which, to our surprise, was open, so looked in.  Almost all of the small local churches we’ve passed in northern Spain have been what we’ve come to call “Spanish Open”, i.e. closed. But here there was a lady volunteer who was part of a team keeping the church open in the mornings. It’s an attractive interior,

with the chapel of Christ of the Golden Beard

 

with the usual cemetery at the back.

(and it was an opportunity for me to take a rest, as I was labouring even more intensely than yesterday).

There are a couple of other things of note on the short journey to the cape:  a pilgrim statue

and a “fishermen’s cemetery”, with several cavities that, presumably, enable a fisherman to be buried in view of the sea.

A less momentous installation awaited us as we neared our destination for the day.

and then we had arrived

at the famous lighthouse at the end of the cape,

where one can find the 0 km marker

various symbolic statuary such as the boot and the cross

and, the Lord be thankit,

our hotel, O Semaforo, which is small but perfectly-formed after being modified from its original purpose as a marine observatory.  It’s also part, we suspect, of a group which also includes the Banco Azul.  Again, fortunately, they  allowed us into our room with minimal waiting around.

There’s a lot to see here, but I was in no condition to be out and about at this stage, so Jane took herself off to find food and to refresh her acquaintance with the site, which we’d visited last Autumn, only by bus.  Above are some of the photos she took. On that occasion I hadn’t got my drone with me, but today I did, so, having rested, I whizzed it up to capture an aerial view.

That’s it for Phase I, then; we’ve reached Finisterre and our onward journey takes us to Muxia, further up the coast, an alternative end point of the Camino, also with its own 0 km marker.  Given my condition, I doubt that I’ll be able to walk it, but we have A Plan to ensure that you miss a minimum of the Camino scenery.  Keep your eyes peeled on these pages to find out how it unfolds.