October 10, 2022
- Route: Abadin to Vilalba
- Distance: 21.1 kilometers (13 miles)
- Cumulative Distance: 722.4 kilometers
I had a positively easy day planned today. The mountains separating Spain’s northern coast from the interior of Galicia were now behind me, and I was walking my shortest day on the Camino yet (if you exclude my zero back in Llanes).
Today’s mileage was a meager 21 kilometers, which was only about two-thirds of what I usually try to walk. And this short stage meant I’d remain in the bubble of ‘new’ pilgrims for at least another day’s time.
If it had been 100% within my control, it would have been nice to walk 10 kilometers further. But that distance wasn’t feasible because there just weren’t any accommodations to support it. I could either stop after 21 kilometers in the moderately large town of Vilalba, or I needed to push on for 40 kilometers and walk to Baamonde, which was the next town with any albergues or services.
Given the modest terrain I was currently walking in, I knew could have made the full 40 kilometers. But I’d promised myself that I was going to dial it back and savor this final week on the Camino. Besides, today’s forecast promised a day full of rain. So I caved to convenience and made my albergue reservation for Vilalba.
With such a short distance to walk today, I didn’t even worry about what time I got started. Leaving before sunrise was completely unnecessary. It might even be counter-productive. I couldn’t check into the albergue until 2 p.m. So why race out of town super early?
Another wet day
It was only lightly raining when I departed around 8:35 a.m., and the inclement weather was expected to continue in fits and spurts throughout the day. The pilgrims around me donned ponchos and rain gear under the eave of a building. So I waited for the crowd to thin out before I departed the albergue. It was far easier to suit up in rain gear when there weren’t a dozen errant arms flying around trying to do the exact same thing.
Only walking 26 kilometers yesterday put me right on pace with the pilgrims following their pre-planned stages in the guidebooks. So I spent my first mile or two working my way through the same bubble of slow-moving people I’d passed once already.
I recognized several of the same pilgrims from yesterday morning. There was the short, squat woman who constantly cleared her throat every 15 seconds. The tall man who swung his hiking poles wildly from side to side. The young couple bickering with each other in Italian.
About half an hour in the morning, the rain picked up for a bit. Then it slowed to a thick drizzle as a low fog settled over countryside.
The Camino’s terrain seemed to repeatedly switch back and forth. Sometimes I was on quiet paved lanes, and other times I found myself walking through muddy, puddle-covered trails. The only constant was the moisture in the air.
Eventually the sleeves of my rain jacket clung to my arms like I was wrapped in a layer of plastic Saran Wrap. The outside was wet from the rain, while the inside was saturated with my sweat from the effort of walking on this humid morning.
I could hear the fast moving cars driving on the Autovia off to my left. The fog obscured any views I might have of the motorway until I neared the pedestrian bridge that crossed over it, and then I was crossing back under it less than a kilometer later.
Roughly 10 kilometers into my morning, I spotted a large yellow sign announcing there was a cafe just 100 meters down a side road. Yesssss! It was time for my mid-morning coffee. Time to get out of this rain for a bit.
The inside of the cafe was tiny. There were only three tables, all of which were occupied on my arrival. A group of pilgrims was gathered at one table, enjoying their breakfast, while their wet backpacks were lined up against the entry wall and on a low bench.
I appreciated that they didn’t want to leave their bags dry from the elements, but there was barely any space left to move with them all piled there. Rather than wait for a table to free up, I sidled up to the bar and ordered a hot coffee to warm me up.
I was sitting on a barstool waiting for my coffee when two older local men wandered in and sat on either side of me. The proprietor wordlessly poured each of them a few fingers of some brown liquor, as if it were happy hour. Was this their standard drink order at 10 a.m.? I shuddered inside. I don’t understand how anyone’s stomach can tolerate alcohol in the morning.
Twenty minutes later, the cafe became even more crowded as the horde of pilgrims I’d already passed this morning arrived at the cafe too. That was my signal to get moving, and I headed back out into the rain.
Heading to Vilalba
After my coffee break, it was mostly gentle walking through the wet Galician countryside. I caught up to Nicki (the German medical student from a few days ago) walking with a redheaded Dutch guy who’d stayed at the same albergue as me last night.
The rain was transitioning to a light mist now, and the air temperature was finally warming up a bit. So I took a chance. I stripped off my rain pants about 7 kilometers before I got to Vilalba, figuring, what’s the worst that could happen?
If the rain returned, I could stop under a tree to put my pants back on. Or I could show up at the albergue with wet shorts. Neither option was so bad that I needed to continue sweating inside my thin nylon rain pants.
As noon approached, my stomach was grumbling with a fervor. My mid-morning snack of a carrot and three cookies was no longer holding me over. (Hey, don’t judge me. At least I ate the carrot, and wasn’t running on 100% sugar.)
I spotted the municipal albergue on the outskirts of town, but there were no cafes or stores nearby. I’d have to walk three or four kilometers into Vilalba’s center, with nothing to look at but the side of the rural highway for the remainder of the way.
The one interesting outlier on this dull walk into town was a green metal pedestrian bridge near a roundabout. It took me over one of the busier roads instead of forcing me to leap across busy traffic like a game of Frogger.
Unfortunately, the metal bridge was so long that the span over the roadway seemed to bounce with every step I took (or whenever a whoosh of air from a large freight truck drove under it). The experience had my heart racing until I was safely back on solid ground.
Are you open?
Vilalba would turn out to be the biggest city I’d been in since departing Ribadeo three days ago. Restaurants, cafes, and vinotecas (wine bars) lined the city’s main boulevard, and road construction made the scene feel even more chaotic.
I’d scouted out my potential eating options on the internet at the albergue last night and bookmarked two options that sounded good for a late lunch. One was a pizza joint, while the other was an American-style hamburger restaurant that served plant-based Impossible burgers.
I kept my eyes peeled for the pizza restaurant. But I somehow walked right past it and got an extra 100 meters down the road before I realized my mistake. I swung back around to retrace my steps (looking like a lost pilgrim, I’m sure), but when I arrived at the correct spot, their door was closed.
A sign reading “Cerrado” hung on the glass. Below the sign, the business hours were posted, and the restaurant opened at 1 p.m. I glanced at my watch. It was ten minutes past 1 p.m. already. They should be open. However, the sign said ‘closed,’ and the shades were still drawn. Had they gone out of business?
I stood there debating my options while looking up directions to the other restaurant. I’d give the pizza place just a few more minutes, then I’d move on to Plan B.
At a quarter after 1 p.m., the door quickly opened, then it immediately shut again! Ok, people were definitely inside. I gave it two more minutes, and then an employee came out and propped the door open for real.
Sweet! They were open for lunch. Better late than never. They were operating on Spanish time, it seemed. Or perhaps it just didn’t make sense to open earlier, because I was their sole customer for the next hour as I devoured half a five-cheese pizza and drank a draft Estrella Galicia beer.
WHAT DO YOU EAT?
On my way to the albergue, I stopped to take photos of the Parador Hotel, which was a newer hotel built onto the refurbished remains of an old castle tower. A shade of cornflower blue was starting to emerge into the sky above the castle, and the sun was doing its level best to provide a bit of bright afternoon warmth.
Even with my leisurely lunch, I was still at my albergue by 2:30 p.m. This seemed to be such a luxury to walk to town after such a modest distance. I’d had time to sightsee and just wandered around town instead of immediately tending to my town chores and resting.
Was this “easy, breezy” life what it was like for people who only walked 20 kilometers per day on their Camino? The pilgrims who took six weeks to enjoy their walk to Santiago, and who probably never got a single blister or tight calf muscles brought on by long, hard days of walking?
It made me wonder if I could trade my more intense, physical Camino experience for their more relaxed vacation pace?
Probably not. Even if I had all the time in the world, I truly enjoy ending the day feeling tired. I loved the bigger miles and seeing as many things as possible in a day. I didn’t see the Camino as a walking holiday, but rather as one more adventure where I pushed myself to see what was physically possible.
As the afternoon wore on, I headed out to a nearby grocery to get some for tomorrow’s walk and a salad to supplement my leftover pizza for this evening’s dinner. This albergue had a kitchen, and the majority of the pilgrims decided to stay in for the night and cook dinner.
No one made a big communal meal. It was just several smaller group meals instead. My leftover pizza and salad were boring by comparison to most of these pilgrims.
First, there was a trio of pilgrims who prepared a multi-course meal consisting of shrimp cooked in garlic butter, a giant salad, bread, and flan. It smelled divine! Then, two different couples took turns boiling pots of water to cook pre-made tortellini and ravioli, paired with a red sauce and colorful vegetables.
There was a younger German woman who made herself an enormous portion of pasta with a cream sauce and sautéed vegetables. She ate half of it, then put the remainder of the food in a plastic container that she would carry ahead and eat for lunch the next day. So I nicknamed her “leftovers.”
The most notable pilgrim, though, was an older Spanish woman with a weirdly eclectic meal. She started with a container of marinated artichokes, which she topped with gobs and gobs of mayonnaise. Then she pan-fried herself a hamburger, before slathering a half cup of ketchup on top of it. I’ll probably always think of her as “the condiment queen.”
Everyone had to cook their meals and wash their dishes in shifts, since there was only a three-burner stovetop and one sink in the albergue’s kitchen. But the albergue was simply humming with activity and good energy.
