Padrón to Santiago de Compostela 16 miles plus 2
We were the last of 38 to leave the Albergue Mungadan.
The manager treated us to a cup of coffee before heading out about 8:30. By the banging around, we know people were up and about by 6:00. There was a full blown breakfast party going on outside our door by 7:00.
The forecast was for temps in the 60’s and rain all day, so we had our clothes bags inside plastic bags and put the rain covers on our backpacks. Rain coats at the ready. Light mist and heavy traffic the first mile or so breaking free of Padron. At this point, the rain really picked up and we put on our coats.
For the next 3 to 4 miles we were in and out of forest on trails and rural narrow roads. Our first stop was in Milagrosa for coffee. Mark and Melissa were there and Melissa looked terrible. She came down with some bug in the middle of the night, and wasn’t keeping anything down. Felt so bad for her.
We trudged for a couple more hours with intermittent periods of heavy rain, light drizzle to even a shadow. Through the day, we had our raincoats off and on several times.
Might be a good time to explain the requirements to be awarded your Compostela. You have to walk at least the last 100 kilometers to Santiago, and you must have your credential stamped at least twice each day. These can be gotten at albergues, hotels, restaurants, shops, etc. As we predicted with such a rainy day, we witnessed buses and vans dropping “pilgrims” at an establishment to get their credentials stamped, only to get right back in the vehicle. These are the true “rollerbaggers”!
At about nine miles, first opportunity since coffee, we stopped for lunch in Milladoiro, at Casa da Cultura.
This was one place we saw the “Rollerbaggers” getting their stamps. It was a great lunch, they had a big outside grill barbecuing racks of beef, pork ribs and sausages. We spilt one order which was more than enough and a real bargain at 15 euros. It also included fries and salad!
With still seven miles to go, it was good to do it on a full stomach. This next stretch, as with most of the day, was more up that down and included two steep climbs, the last was over a mile up to the Cathedral. Up to this last urban climb, we pretty much were in wooded countryside. We had rain almost all the time.
You could feel it like the old cliche, ‘horses to the barn’. Pilgrims were getting excited and had a little extra zip in their step knowing we were getting really close. This was a very different approach to Santiago than what we had seven years ago on the Frances. Rather than all urban, we had a good mix of forest and rural before hitting the last mile of urban.
During this last mile, we were a little surprised at how few pilgrims there were and yellow arrows.
At one intersection, looking like two lost pilgrims, a young woman pointed the way for us.
The Cathedral Plaza was full of celebrating pilgrims. Knowing that Hotel Villar, where we needed to check in, was only a block from the Cathedral, we went there first. The Villar, was the host location for the Pension Rua Nova, our overnight (actually three overnights). The very friendly and helpful receptionist, checked us in, told us how to find Rua Nova (right around the corner), gave us a city map and pointed out all the highlights.
Before going to the Pension, we headed right back to the Cathedral Plaza for pictures with our full packs. Then, we dumped our packs (ahh!) at the Pension.
We decided to see how long the line was ti get our official Compostela. In 2016, we waited in a line that wrapped around forever and took us probably an hour. In today’s automated world, you scanned your information into either an app or a machine, received a ticket and walked right up. Everything was in order and we decided to purchase a separate document that showed our official kilometers walked (280 kms).
After more pictures in front of Cathedral, we looked for a sidewalk cafe for a glass of cava, this would be a tradition since we did the same back in 2016 after the Frances.
Walking the maze of little pedestrian streets, we did some window shopping and bought a couple of Camino patches for our backpacks. Walking the streets it was fun trying to pick out pilgrims - wearing open-toed shoes or flip flops, the bandaged feet always giving them away!
Looked for a market, but actually never found one.
We found on Trip Advisor what looked like the perfect pizza place. After following the GPS for more than a mile with a dozen turns, we arrived, except there was no pizza place! Working our way back to Pension Rua Nova, found Pizza Rao. Our minds and appetites told us to take it. We were the only inside diners, but they had a thriving carry-out business. Got two personal sized, could have gotten by with one. Four pieces went back with us and would be tomorrow’s breakfast.
We walked back to the Pension in a steady rain. It had been a long, long day - back in room, didn’t blog, didn’t shower, just crashed!
2025-02-07