Pontevedra Spain – Newby to Expert Traveler

This is part four of a multi-part series on our experiences doing the Portuguese Central Route of the Camino de Santiago starting in Valenca, Portugal, and ending in Santiago de Compostela.

We woke up refreshed in Pontevedra at Dpaso Urban Hostels. We had a private room with only 4 bunks and a private bathroom, which made the experience seem luxurious by Camino hostel standards.

Day 4 was a considerably flatter day with about half of the elevation change of Day 3

Much of the beginning of the day was spent walking through Pontevedra. Pontevedra was the largest of the towns that we had stopped in, with nearly 83,000 residents. Going forward, we would be staying in towns much smaller than Pontevedra, and Carlos warned us that we should consider booking our accommodations ahead of time, because the hostels fill up fast. We were also slow hikers, so we were coming into town later than most pilgrims, which made finding a hostel a little more difficult.

Sign marking 64,500 meters to Santiago de Compostela

With Carlos’s advice in our mind, we put Emma in charge of finding us a hostel, and she used a Camino app to find one in Caldas de Reis. Knowing where we were going, there was the small matter of hiking the 15 miles to get there.

The first and most important thing to do every morning was to find coffee. Having been in Spain for a few days, I was getting used to starting each day with a café con leche and a small snack, which is a wonderful habit.

We started hiking through the middle of town, crossing the Lerez River at Ponte do Burgo while keeping an eye out for a cafe. Following the bridge, we continued the hike uphill through the middle of town. Finally, we stopped for a coffee and some really delicious breakfast sandwiches that fueled us for the hike.

Streets of Pontevedra in the early morning

After breakfast, we left Pontevedra, and we were once again treated to amazing views of the Galician countryside. It was a bright, clear morning, and the temperatures were cool but not cold. It was absolutely perfect weather for hiking.

We stopped by Igrexa de Santa Maria to stamp our pilgrims’ passports and use the restroom. It’s a little church that caters to the pilgrims passing through. Next to the church is a cemetery with rows of mausoleums. We noticed a lot of cemeteries set up this way in Spain, with mausoleums next to a small church.

The church itself had a large yard in the entrance, where fairly tame chickens seemed unbothered by our presence. Outside, a man with a guitar and an amp played a Bruce Springsteen song, which seemed a little strange for rural Spain. We got our pilgrim passports stamped and moved on our way.

The next hour was spent walking on a wooded path next to a creek. The hike was peaceful with the creek flowing on one side, shade throughout, and an ancient stone path to walk upon. Several brooks crossed the path, and every time, there was a cute little stone bridge to help cross the brook.

This was about as calm and quiet a hike as you can imagine, but that serenity was about to end. Shortly after leaving the peace of the wooded area, we started to hear music, singing, and a group of young men lined up with their packs. The Camino was about to become much more crowded.

A path with drainage running over it and a stone bridge on the side

We were taking the main route of the Portuguese Camino, but starting at Pontevedra, there is an important split. Many pilgrims leave the main route of the Portuguese Camino at Pontevedra to hike the Spiritual Variant. It is a longer route that heads towards the Atlantic Ocean and then rejoins the main route at Padrón. It’s normally hiked in 3 days, while the main route, Pontevedra to Padrón, only takes 2 days.

Many of the pilgrims we were getting used to seeing, including the English Gentleman, decided to take this route. In many ways, the Camino is like life, where people enter your life and leave, often without fanfare or even a goodbye, and all you are left with are memories.

But as some have left the trail, we were joined by others. One such group was The Boys. The Boys were a group of high school students from the Boston area. They were there on an optional school trip during their spring break, and we had missed them in previous days because they were hiking the Coastal Route of the Portuguese Camino while we were on the Central Route.

They were well-behaved and polite young men, but they were unmissable. There were about thirty of them, and even though they were courteous, the sheer number of them was a disturbance. We met them shortly after the wooded area, presumably when they were taking a break.

We passed them while they were stopped, but since they were faster hikers than us, they had to pass us. Because there were so many of them, it took over a kilometer for the whole group to pass us. They finally passed us completely along the trail in the middle of the day, by a sculpture garden called Carballeira con Esculturas de Madeira.

We hiked another hour and a half before we found some lunch. We stopped at A Cabaza Cafe Bar, a little restaurant along the camino with sandwiches, pizza, and beer. It was a welcome sight, as we were getting tired and hungry. It looked a little busy from the outside, so we had the kids claim a seat on the patio. Then we went inside and realized why it was so busy.

The Boys were there. This was March, in the low time for the Camino, when only about half of the services like albergues and restaurants are open. When a large group pops into a cafe during low season, it can create problems for the folks running the cafe. The woman working the bar did a wonderful job of handling the unexpected business, and we enjoyed a couple of pizzas and some beer out on the patio.

While we were enjoying our pizza, Emma was complaining about her Achilles tendon. This was getting progressively worse for her, and it was beginning to get concerning. She was not looking forward to the rest of the hike that day and was getting a little cranky about it. Jenn and I, being the wonderfully understanding parents that we are teased her a little about it and told her to suck it up. She was getting pretty annoyed by the teasing.

We finished our lunch and went back to the trail, leaving A Cabaza before The Boys had finished their meal. This meant that they were going to have to pass us on the trail again. Emma was noticeably limping and was becoming more agitated as the hike continued.

Vineyards were common late in the day, approaching Caldas de Reis.

As we walked through vineyards, The Boys caught up with us and started the long process of the whole group passing us, one by one. As soon as The Boys were past us, Emma and Alex left us in the dust. Jenn and I figured that our teasing Emma had upset her, and she wanted some time by herself. Alex followed behind her, probably because we had been hiking too slowly for him the whole time.

Estrella Galicia mural along Camino near Caldas de Reis

We had no desire to try to keep up with them, and they clearly wanted a little space from us, which really wasn’t surprising given the amount of time we had spent with them. We just texted them that we would meet them at the hostel.

We made one last stop on our way to Caldas de Reis, at Albergue Vintecatro for a quick beer and a bathroom break. Sitting outside was the English Couple enjoying a late lunch. We chatted with them a little bit about how we had apparently made Emma mad, and she left us. They had become familiar faces along the trail, and we enjoyed our short chats with them.

We finally made it to Caldas de Reis around 4 PM. Alex and Emma had beaten us by about half an hour and were waiting by Hotel O Cruciero for us to show up. We walked into the lobby, and there were The Boys, all of them, crammed into the lobby trying to check in. The staff was feverishly trying to get the passport information from each of them and get them checked into their rooms. Jenn and I exchanged glances that silently said, “Are you sure you want to spend the night in the same hotel as The Boys?”

One of the staff members noticed us, and realizing how long it was going to be to check in all of them, graciously helped us book a couple of rooms. The rooms were only 55 euros per night, but they were also pretty basic. However, I was just happy to have a private shower. I was worried that with that many high school-aged boys in the hotel that it would be noisy, but after the check-in, we barely noticed them.

We spent the evening in Caldas de Reis walking around town. I especially loved Igrexa de San Tomé Becket, a stone church surrounded by palm trees.

We had some dinner and then went to a pharmacy to find some pain cream to help with Emma’s Achilles tendon. As it turns out, she was walking faster than us, not because she was angry with us, but because walking fast was less painful. We were starting to question whether we should hike the next day. I really didn’t want her to injure herself.

Small Plaza with Cross in Caldas de Reis

During the last couple of hours of our hike, Jenn had developed a hot spot on her foot that she mistook for a pebble in her shoe. It was becoming clear that physically we were beginning to break down, and we could use a day off. Unfortunately, our schedule didn’t allow it. We couldn’t finish the Camino with an off day; there wasn’t enough time. We went to bed that night, unsure if we would be hiking in the morning and hoping that some sleep would alleviate some of our pain.

This is part three of a multi-part series on our experiences doing the Portuguese Central Route of the Camino de Santiago starting in Valenca, Portugal, and ending in Santiago de Compostela.

During one of our conversations with the English Gentleman we met on our first day, he commented about this being our first Camino. I joked that it was probably our last. He told me, “No, you’ll be back—it gets in your blood.” At the time, that seemed impossible. My shoulders hurt from trying to get used to my pack, and I wasn’t exactly used to staying in hostels.

But here we were waking up in an albergue for the third straight day. We had stayed the evening in Albergue A Conserveira, a fairly large hostel with probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 to 50 beds. Even though they were in one large room, they had separated them into pods of two or four. Each pod had a little curtain, which at least gave some privacy if you wanted to change your clothes. They also provided sheets and a blanket, which made the experience much more comfortable.

Water fountain at Parque Loureiro near Cesantes.

I didn’t notice a whole lot of noises overnight, which was surprising because of the size of the room and the number of pilgrims. The OSB board dividers between the pods did a pretty good job of blunting some of the noise. Inside the pod was a different story. Sleeping near my children revealed things I didn’t know about them. Apparently, Emma talks in her sleep, which was a surprise. What was really a surprise was that it was in Spanish.

Getting ready in the morning was a little more hectic than on previous days because the hostel was fairly full. There were quite a few pilgrims, all trying to get their packs ready and jockeying for space in the bathroom to get ready for the day. We headed out the door, saying our goodbyes to the people we met at the albergue.

Heading out down the streets of Redondela

The first kilometer of the hike was through Redondela, which is a lovely town. That was just the beginning of a gorgeous hike through Galicia from Redondela to Pontevedra.

One of the main reasons was that we were in the area around the Ria de Vigo, an estuary that is 22 miles long and 7 miles wide at its widest point. Much of the early part of the hike takes place in the hills overlooking the estuary.

Leaving Redondela, we climbed into the hills on the outskirts of town. The Camino led us to a natural area with tall pines on both sides of the narrow path. The trail was covered with pine needles. We were mostly hiking uphill, and as we continued, the pine forest began to thin out a little and gave us a preview of the amazing views to come.

Off in the distance, we could see Ponte de Rande, a striking cable-stayed bridge that crosses the narrowest point of the Ria de Vigo. The further we continued along the Camino, the higher we went, and the more spectacular the view. Now I understood what the English Gentleman told me – it gets in your blood. Every step was a blessing.

We started to descend into the town of Arcade, right where the Verdugo River meets the Ria de Vigo estuary. We stopped for a quick café con leche before crossing the Ponte Medieval de Pontesampaio, a stone arched bridge built in the 11th Century. It is an incredibly narrow bridge that allows automobile traffic to cross. Several cars inched past us on the narrow bridge while we were crossing.

Between the ancient bridge, the wonderful buildings, and the cobblestone streets, Arcade is a pretty town. It would have been a lovely place to spend an evening, but we needed to push on to Pontevedra.

Leaving Arcade, we went into another natural area that had some technical hiking, where we were actually hiking uphill in a rocky creek for a while. I’m sure that most of the time, that creek is dry, but it had rained a little, and there was water flowing down the path.

The path after Arcade became a rocky creek.

After a while, we came to a fork in the path where we had to choose between going on what looked like a slightly longer path along a creek and a shorter one along the road. We chose the complimentary route along the creek.

Path along the creek on the Complimentary Route.

I think we underestimated the extra time and distance needed to walk the complimentary route along the creek. I don’t know how much it added, but the path was extremely curvy. The complimentary route was a calm walk, but the extra hiking began to wear on us.

Tunnel near the end of the complimentary route

I began to notice a pattern emerging where we would start to get progressively crankier after ten miles of hiking. Emma would normally run out of gas about that time, and it also seemed like every day, Jenn would need a restroom late in the day, with nothing around. The Camino doesn’t have a ton of restroom facilities, and that can get a little stressful when you are out in the woods for a long time. Alex and I would get tired as well, but both of us get quieter when that happens.

Just as we were about to completely run out of steam, we arrived in the beautiful town of Pontevedra.

We got to Dpaso Urban Hostels, which had run out of bunks in the normal area of the hostel, but they did have space in a different building that had private rooms. We were able to book a private room with four bunks, which turned out to be perfect for us.

It was a very nice room for accommodating pilgrims with plugs on every bunk and sheets, and a comforter. The big luxury was our own private bathroom with a rain showerhead. I don’t mind sleeping in a hostel, but the shared bathrooms are something I really don’t like. Having our own bathroom for an evening was amazing.

We went back to the main area of the hostel to do some laundry and ran into the English gentleman, as well as Carlos, whom we talked with for about an hour while doing the laundry. At this point, there were people we were recognizing all the time, some that we never talked to other than to say buen camino. We had names for them like the German girls, the Ohio girls, the Italian couple, and the guy with his Mom. Even though we never had conversations with some of these people, our greetings became more friendly as the week went on because they were friendly faces.

One such couple was the English couple. They are a married couple who had done the entire French Way of the Camino, which normally takes around 40 days. They didn’t do it all at once. Instead, they did it a week at a time when they were on vacation. We first met them at Casa Veiga on day 2, and ran into them repeatedly the rest of the trip, since they were walking at our pace.

We ran into them again at Bar Pitillo, which had been suggested by the hostel attendant. They sat at the table across from us, and we chatted a little. Pontevedra is a fairly large town, and it seemed unlikely that we would run into familiar faces at dinner. But that’s just how the Camino seems to go; you always seem to be running into the same people.

Following dinner, we arrived back at the hostel where we climbed into our bunks to rest after a long and challenging day. I reflected on what a beautiful hike it had been and the wonderful people sharing our journey. It had become clear to me that the English Gentleman was correct. The Camino was in my blood now.

Tag: Pontevedra Spain

Day 4 – Pontevedra to Caldas de Reis

Day 3 Redondela to Pontevedra