Day 37 - Lourenzá to Vilalba

Date: Sunday July 21

Start:  Lourenzà, Galicia

End: Vilalba, Galicia

Daily Mileage: 26.48mi (~42.6km)

Total Mileage: ~451mi (~725.8km)

Today we planned on a 13-14 mile hike and did nearly 27 miles instead. An on the fly change, if ever there was one. 

Waking up, there was no particular hurry since our (original) plan for the day wasn’t super long. When we decided yesterday that we wanted to finish the Camino a couple days earlier than we’d originally planned, we had already booked our accommodation for tonight, so weren’t going to start doing longer days until Monday. But... changed minds.

We left the hotel just before 8am. With no cafes open yet, we decided to hold off on breakfast until Mondoñedo, about five and a half miles further along the route. 

San Salvador Monastery

Setting out from Lourenzá, we passed the San Salvador Monastery once again, a low rumble of pigeon coos echoing through the plaza. Down the street, we turned right onto a small dirt track that climbed up and out of the city. 

The morning was overcast. The skies a flat white collage of clouds that only seemed to dull the landscape. No bright rays peaking through. No blue tinges long the cloud linings. Just flat white meh. The skies would remain like this until later in the afternoon. 

The walk to Mondoñedo was uneventful. Some climbing and undulating hills, mostly along dirt track with some shorter paved road sections. We ran into a few other pilgrims. One guy we recognized from yesterday’s large crowd at our midday stop. “He looks kind of like Finnick from Hunger Games,” I had said to Shawn yesterday. 

Today as we made the climb out of Lourenzà, somewhere within the first couple of miles, I looked back to see someone coming up from behind. Eventually they got closer. I could hear the crunch of their footsteps in the dirt. At the appropriate time as they went by, I looked over to say “Buenos dias.” It was Finnick. He was hard charging ahead as he briskly returned my greeting. A young man with an agenda. 

Shawn had waited for me at the top of the climb and after we set out again, he had hiked ahead, eventually catching up with Finnick. Later I would catch up with him as well, his pace now slowed substantially as he hiked along with a young woman, chatting. 

When I met up with Shawn once again down the trail, he mentioned how to had tried to chat with Finnick and the other hiker, but Finnick had just stepped out of the way to let Shawn pass by. Noting that they hadn’t been very friendly.

 “He doesn’t want to talk to you. Didn’t you notice how fast he was going this morning–“ I said.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“Well he’s sure slowed down now. He wants to talk to that chick. You’re cramping his style.” (Is that something the kids still say? Probably not.)

At this point we were to the outskirts of Mondoñedo. It was Sunday, so things were very quiet. We made our way to the bakery/cafe near the Mondoñedo Cathedral, which seemed to be the plan of every pilgrim on route. The interior smelled of warm bread and coffee. Though like our stop yesterday, it was also soon chaos. Some people trying to wait for their turn to order, while others would just waltz in and bark out what they wanted to the baristas. The cafe counters of Spain are a lawless place. 

Eventually we each had warm cinnamon buns and coffees in hand, which we took to eat on the patio. More and more pilgrims were flocking in. We had definitely become part of a ‘bubble’ the last couple of days. And, though we do like meeting people, it’s much easier when you just run into ones and twos. Everyone in this bubble seemed to already know each other from albergues and were now just moving down the trail as one big slinky amoeba, spreading out along the trail and reconvening again at every cafe/restaurant/bar along the route. For people outside of the bubble, it seemed an impenetrable mass. And it was making cafe time really annoying. 😆

Mondoñedo Cathedral

We missed Andy. Where was our tick whispering Zambian-convicted felon? It was so much easier when we were just running into one wacko on the trail vs. entire bubbles of them. At this point, we’re almost positive he’s no longer on the Camino. But, we could be surprised. Maybe he’s just a day or so behind us. It seems unlikely at this point though.

Finishing up our cinnamon buns, we hit the road again. 

I don’t know if the picture conveys how steep this road was. Trust me. Also Shawn’s submission photo for the calf club.

Leaving Mondoñedo, there were two route options. There was a new, shorter, mostly off-road route through the mountainsides (~13km) or the older route, which also wound its way uphill, though was mostly paved and went through a series of small villages (~15.8km). When you put it like this... the shorter, mountainside route sounded better to us. Shawn had overheard several people at the cafe mentioning they were going to take the longer route. Perfect. Bubble avoidance. 

This should be safe to drink, right? 

The one kicker for the route through the mountainsides was that it opened with a substantial, often steep, ~2.5 mile climb into the mountains. This was a bit of work, but worth the trade off of being tucked into the forest along gravel roads rather than pounding pavement along the other route. 

Just one small piece of a cute little farm diorama set along the roadside of an actual farm.

As I made my way slowly toward the top of the climb, I could see that we were basically hiking to the windmills along the ridgeline that we had not so long ago viewed from far down in the valley.

Once we’d reached the top of the climb (which Shawn reached over half a mile ahead of me), the gravel road undulated along more gradual hills along the mountaintop. We rolled along with vistas of a patchwork quilt of fields along the neighboring hillsides. 

We’ve noticed that the Camino has been really well marked through Galicia. Every turn/intersection is well marked with the concrete blocks with the scallop shell symbol and directional arrows. There are also a number of really nice signs that show a map of the route through Galicia. There is really never any confusion where you’re going through this region. There were many time through other regions that we had to check maps, but you could largely survive without maps here – at least if the signage continues to be this good. 

Somewhere along the last mile or so stretch into the neighboring towns of Gontón/Abadín, where we were planning to end for the day, Shawn had a new plan to propose. “It’s nice and cool today,” he said, “and the rest of the route to the next major town – Vilalba – is mostly flat. What do you think about hiking our big day today instead of tomorrow?” The “big day” would mean continuing to hike another 13 miles on past Abadín. “Vilalba is also a bigger city ...” He went on to extoll more benefits of this plan, which I actually needed very little convincing of. He was right. It was nice and cool today and the rest of the route looked pretty tame. It seemed logical to knock out more miles today. 

Once we’d hiked into Abadín, we were already happy about our change of plans. Everything was closed on Sunday except for a single restaurant, where we had a passable lunch. Abadín was basically a ghost town today. If we stopped here, we’d be twiddling our thumbs, wondering why we weren’t making more use of the day. 

Camino route sidewalk markers in Abadín.

As we ate lunch, more of the bubble began to arrive. ‘The Careers,’ as Shawn now called them – expanding our Hunger Games references to those that actually trained for the purpose of being part of the Hunger Games. Like, “If we continue hiking a long day today, we will get ahead of Finnick and the Camino Careers”. Lol. 

And so, after lunch, we hefted our packs on once again for another 13 miles of hiking. As observed on the elevation map, the entire afternoon was quite easy and pleasant walking. We walked mostly shaded gravel roads and dirt trails through the countryside. 

Sometime in mid-afternoon, the sun finally decided to make an appearance for the day. The sky turned blue. The dull greens of the hillsides and fields were now  brighter. Even the flowers perked up a little. Every landscape is beautiful under the right light. 

While the walking was pleasant, it was not terribly exciting, and we kept ourselves occupied with podcasts and music – there was an occasional burst of a Hamilton lyric through the afternoon. 

Despite being a long day, we kept up a good pace and the miles ticked by relatively quickly. Though my shoes have little support left to speak of, my legs and feet faired pretty well. I arrived into Vilalba tired, but not as demolished as I thought the nearly 27 mile day would leave me. Good work feet!

We had arrived not long after 6pm, making really excellent time. Originally Shawn had thought that we wouldn’t arrive until sometime between 7-8pm. Go us. 

After checking in, showering, and relaxing until Spanish dinner time, we went up the street for a burger/pizza for dinner. Most places we go to, the pizza sizes are made for one person. Not so much here I guess. Thankfully Shawn helped me out.

Tired and well fed, it’s time to manufacture the Zzzzzs...