Valdovino to Santiago de Compostela and Beyond

Sunday 7^th September

We drove down to the seafront to look at the waves, and it started raining on us. This continued and got worse. This was about 11.40am. We went looking for a large supermarket or similar – such as Carrefour, as we were getting low on toilet liquid, and thought that a larger supermarket might have it. ‘Carrefour five minutes from this roundabout’ the sign said. Fifteen minutes later we were still nowhere near. At least the satnav had given up by then and had adjusted the route to fit where we were going. We eventually saw the supermarket go past as we disappeared down the slip road to the motorway. We came close to getting there.

We wanted to get to Santiago de Compostela. We were heading for an aire there, fairly close to the town centre. We thought that we would stay for two nights to do the town justice. The aire was 3.50 Euros to park until 8.00pm, then 12 Euros to park overnight. We arrived at the aire about 1.45, and had some lunch. The weather had been atrocious all the way, with really heavy rain. We broke out the wet weather gear and decided to walk into town – about 30 minutes away – to the Cathedral.

As we walked away from the van the rain stopped. We even had an umbrella. We took the satnav, set to walking, as we knew that the place was a bit of a maze. Being a Sunday the roads were relatively quiet, and that was a bonus. We managed to mostly follow the satnav, and after a few dead ends (not really), and after about 30 minutes we ended up at the cathedral. We seemed to have come in the back way – but even from there we could see that the main towers were covered in scaffolding – bit of a let down – but maintenance must be done.

We went inside, following the multitude and skilfully avoiding the (surprisingly) lone beggar holding out his paper cup. He didn’t seem be particularly needy – being about 30, quite well dressed, and looking fairly fit.

Lots of people inside. Lots of people taking photos of everything – everything. We noticed the big thing that contains incense (humidor?), alongside an older version. To be honest – most things looked dowdy and worn with lots and lots of dust. I suppose with the level of faith that this place has thrown at it 24/7 it must be pretty wearing, and entropy will be having a good time with all that extra energy being bandied about.

I wandered amongst the throng – but not being Catholic, or even a person of faith, I felt a bit lost. I didn’t want to queue to embrace the apostle, or visit the sepulchre – nor did K – and she’s more religious than me. I particularly didn’t want to place a euro into a box to see the end of an electric candle come to life (seriously). If they had given us a chance light a real candle, then I would have done so for my Mum – who wasn’t a Catholic, but was definitely undecided about the whole God, Heaven thing.

We wandered around for a while, took a few photos, and then found our way outside to watch some Pilgrims arriving on bikes. It was good – they didn’t seem to be put off by the scaffolding. They had their sticks with gourds and shells, their ‘certificate’ duly stamped to say that they had followed the route. Other Pilgrims had obviously walked the route and we were surrounded by all sorts of people in many garbs. It made me in my shorts and walking boots feel right at home.

Leaving the front of the Cathedral we walked down a street of restaurants selling seafood, particularly octopus, and many large cuts of beef – all displayed proudly in their windows. Many also had tanks containing crabs and lobsters – all alive for the picking. There were hoards of tourists mingling about – many looking lost and consulting their maps for a hint of where they might be, for the town is basically a maze.

As far as the shops are concerned – a fair mixture to be found here. If I can just say “Gourds, Shells, Sticks, Celts, Witches, Galicia” – I need to look up the meanings of all of these in relation to Santiago – especially the Witches. We bought some gifts from one of the shops and took a heading on the sat nav back towards the van. It took us about 20 minutes to get back to where we had parked. Instead of two nights, we had ‘done’ Santiago de Compostela in about three hours. It was still fairly early, so we decided to head down the coast to an aire closer to Portugal. We set course for Pontevedra.

We arrived at Pontevedra at about seven o’clock. It was just a big open space off of a dual carriageway near the town, but it was fairly quiet, and free to stay. We parked up, and after we had eaten the belly of pork and potatoes that I cooked I went for a walk along the river and saw some cormorants. It was a quiet night, and next morning we emptied the tanks at the aire de service and headed for Portugal.