Slept straight through the night for six hours… Hallelujah! Such a treat to have proper sheets for the first time (rather than the regular disposable ones) and a proper towel.

Feel amazing today.

However the breakfast in the albergue was really not good…just hard baguettes with jam. For the first time this trip, I couldn’t even drink the coffee.

Luckily we had spotted a good breakfast place last night, Cafe Brevis, which opened at 6:30am. So we went straight there, and got a delicious cooked breakfast…toasties with local cheese and caramelised onions, and avocado with scrambled eggs on sourdough.

Temperature was 10° to start the day…very pleasant and we were so happy that it was no longer raining. There was a mist of gossamer over the sunrise, with lofty trees poking out of a very atmospheric cloud inversion. Breathtakingly beautiful.

We rounded a corner and bumped into Hod who was, true to form, taking photographs of the mist. Like ourselves he was also heading to O Pedrouzo tonight, so I feel sure we will see him at some point.

We planned to make it to O Pedrouzo by 1pm when the albergues open, so that we had the best chance of getting a pilgrim bed. (Unavailable for booking)

Our game of Pilgrim Bingo continues apace. Hamish overtook my score this morning, and he is now currently on 113 compared to my 93.

We were so involved in the game, that when we saw a cluster of young girls attending to the knee of their friend, all we could do was race to appoint ourselves a score of 3 (for “walking wounded”).

They were obviously trying to support her knee with a headscarf as a bandage and we guiltily realised that we should have been thinking about how we could help, rather than use them as a subject for our game, and returned to offer them one of our reusable cable ties to tie the headscarf tight. They were most grateful and we felt immediately absolved.

At that point Adam and Bron passed us, and they were amused by our cameo good-deeding. We continued on with them, chatting very happily for an hour or so…

They are very good craic (fun) and we exchanged stories effortlessly, as if we’ve known each other for years. It also turns out that Bron is mutual good friends with Lesley Shaw and Corrie Campbell in Scotland, through paddle-boarding.

What a truly small world this is!

Adam and Bron have joined in on the Pilgrim Bingo game and their score is currently at 17.

The camino path has been very pleasant today, mostly on earth and dirt tracks and the weather has been somehow perfect. For the first time in days, we have not had to wear our waterproofs, and it feels so good. It was very misty all morning, with the sun breaking through finally around 11:30am.

There are many, many pilgrims now…it’s a constant flow of people, and even some pilgrim dogs!

This is particularly exciting, as a pilgrim dog earns you 9 points (for a “canine”… ) and in the case of a “walking wounded” canine, it’s worth an extra 3 points, netting you 12 points!

We added a couple more game points to complete the Pilgrim Bingo rules…

6, for clicking sticks
7, for closer to heaven… (i.e. pious devotee)
10, means broKen… (i.e. beyond walking wounded)

Despite the massive influx of new pilgrims (due mainly to the merging of various different Camino routes here), it’s interesting to try and guess who belongs to which Camino and from which stage. It’s absolutely clear in many cases.

So to clarify, pilgrims joined at:

Lugo for last 100k of Primitivo
Melide from Francès
Arzúa from del Norte

Maybe due to the barrage of new faces, it gives you a real frisson of joy to recognise faces from your own Camino journey. We bumped into our Polish couple at a nice coffee stop, also our German friends Nele and Mark.

We also received moving messages and photos from our Italian squad and from our Dutchman Rob as they all made it to Santiago today.

The eucalyptus trees were smelling even more strongly of Vicks Vapo- Rub, probably due to the warmth of the sunshine bringing out their base notes. It was actually nice to hear Bron (from Australia, like the eucalyptus) waxing lyrical about how much the smell and presence of the eucalyptus trees meant to her, after all my ranting about them being non-native and so prolific here.

Towards O Pedrouzo, I recognised the very same stone semicircle bench where I had received a huge chalked message from Gordon’s best friends Graham and Susan over 11 years ago, when they had passed it 4 days before me.

I felt another moment of that gentle tugging on my heart. As ever, Hamish supported me gently, without fuss.

1km before O Pedrouzo, there was a moment where everyone halted and consulted their various guides, as the Camino route seemed to deviate from the town of O Pedrouzo. Everyone took the main road into O Pedrouzo as it is clearly more direct, but Hamish and I decided to take the longer forest road, which is actually signposted as the main Camino route.

This slight detour was to give us an unexpected treat.

As soon as we crossed the road and entered the forest, we realised that we were alone in the woods. We had the whole forest to ourselves. Everyone had vanished. We had the luxury of this wonderful open and earthy path all to ourselves (and the wildlife).

This was the first time of peace and quiet we’d had in the past couple of days.

A truly magic moment.

The Albergue da Porta de Santiago in O Pedrouzo is lovely, with a central garden within the dorms.

We found plastic basins and fashioned ice footbaths from ice scrapings from a freezer which clearly hadn’t been defrosted in a while. And we lay everything out in the sunshine to dry and air. Quick shower and nap, then off to Galaicos restaurant for a delicious early supper.

Chatted with Ronan (from north of Dublin) who is on his 11th Camino and Anthony who we met on our 3rd night in Campiello.

Hamish is writing a Camino poem as I write my blog. Tomorrow is our arrival into Santiago and I have mixed feelings about the ending of this particular journey. Perhaps I should be focussing more on the treasures and connections we have gained along the way…

Total distance 22.05k

Total ascent 437m

Total descent 532m