Day 74 / Santiago de Compostella

May 16, 2018

Day 74 / Santiago de Compostella - Lago / 47.5 km

After 2 day’s of Santiago I’m somewhat overdosed with pilgrims and St.Jacques. Santiago is a beautiful city but the number of tourist shops selling Chinese made pilgrim stuff is outside my comfort zone. Rue de Boucher-like streets with staff outside trying to lure pilgrims with cheap, but in reality overpriced “local” menu’s. It’s time to move on. The plan is to go to Muxía and Finisterre. Not sure in which order. Finisterre is considered as the endpoint. For the Romans Finisterre was the end of the known world. For me probably the end of my journey.

I wake up early and leave the city. Bars are not open yet to provide breakfast.No people on the street. One moment I’m in the city, the other moment I’m running through a forest on a small path. I was expected the path to be lined with pilgrims but I’m most of the time alone. The Camino is a mix of small roads, path trough fields and forest.

The morning is uneventful, I run through farmland and forest. The sun is shining. I pass some pilgrims, some are walking in the direction of Santiago. It takes more then 10 k before I encounter a bar where I can have coffee and a bocadillo with cheese. I pass a small village, a beautiful old bridge.

After 20 k I enter the city Negreira. For a lot of walking pilgrims the first stop on their way to Finisterre. The small city has some nice old buildings but I’m not in the mood to wander around. When exiting the city I pass a the statue of “Il emigrante”. On one side you can see a father figure leaving. A kid, probably his son is pulling at the pants of his father, wanting him to stay, or maybe wants to go with him. The other side depicts a mother figure feeding a small child. More then 500.000 people left Galicia for economic or political reasons in the past. It’s a sad statue. Until today this is a scene happening daily around the world.

I exit Negreira. During the day I cover around 2500 height meters. The landscape goes up and down. Around km 40 I start looking for a sleeping place. Not a lot of options seem to be available the next kilometres and I decide to call an albergue which is promoting itself through rather big billboards. the albergue is somewhat of route but the owner will pick me up in a small village, Lago. When I arrive at Lago I have done 47.5 k somewhat more then what I planned in the morning.

The albergue is in reality an apartment. Big, clean, even a swimming pool. I check in a have a siesta. In the evening I go for the only eating option in the small city, the pizzeria which is owned by the owner of the albergue. To my surprise the pizza is more then acceptable. At the pizzeria I talk with 2 Swedish ladies who are walking from Santiago to Finisterre. They have done 3 day’s over they 47 km and inform me that they have more blisters they can count and considering to stop tomorrow. I try to motivate them to continue but they don’t seem to have a lot of appetite to continue.