Well, it’s a drastic change. We had hoped to spend the rest of our time in Spain walking the Camino Francés and see how close we could get to Santiago at our slow pace. We were sitting at a sidewalk cafe yesterday afternoon in Portomarín drinking tea and decided it was time to reserve the next night’s lodging, hoping to find something about 6 miles down the trail. I have no idea why we were so optimistic since, as we’ve mentioned in previous blog posts, we are running into lots of closed hotels, albergues, etc. Well everything with private rooms was closed within 15 miles. There were a lot of places to call and everyone answered, but they either said they will open either April 1 or Semana Santa, the week before Easter. (They are answering because they are taking reservations for after they do open.) At that point we were getting discouraged and, I hate to admit, tired of dealing with it. We went back to our room and I started looking at holiday apartments and airbnbs in Muxía. We ended up reserving one for 5 nights, starting tomorrow. This morning, we took a taxi within 5 miles of Palas de Rei and then walked into Palas de Rei so we had one last walk on the Camino Francés, had a good tapas lunch and then caught a bus to Santiago where we are now. Tomorrow morning we’ll catch a bus to Muxía.
Muxía is a destination for lots of people who walk the Camino and want to keep going after they get to Santiago. (A surprising number of people do.) We walked there on our camino from Portugal in 2016. We really liked Muxía and felt that our time there was too short. It’s a small town of about 4700 people on a little península that juts into the Atlantic, about 45 miles from Santiago. If you saw “The Way” with Emelio Estevez and Martin Sheen (about the Camino, highly recommended), it’s where Martín Sheen takes his son’s ashes at the end of the movie.
So, we’ll still be on the Camino, just a different one. Well, really two different caminos: (1) Camino de Finistère y Muxía and (2) Camino dos Faros. So there will be lots of good hiking around there. Beautiful beaches. Good seafood. Sounds like a vacation, doesn’t it?!
This sounds like a great way to go! You still stay in a small charming town and you can walk or hike everyday – but you don’t have to carry everything with you.
These days, I think THAT would be the camino for me! Enjoy your holiday.
Bummer. Though spending five nights in Muxía doesn’t sound like a hardship; rather nice actually. Noticed it was raining in Palas de Rei. That can’t really be fun.
Yes, it had been beautiful sunny weather for the walk into Palas de Rei but as we were having lunch it started pouring rain. The hardest rain we’ve seen the whole trip. Luckily by the time it was time for us to wait for the bus it had mostly stopped. We’ve found the rain to be very off and on this trip. Luckily no days of constant hard rain. That has happened to us a couple of times, but not this year.
Muxia has been great. Actually we have been lucky with the rain, a little here and there but not bad. We find the weather apps tend to over forecast rain. Since most people don’t like rain, overpromise and underdeliver is a good strategy for rain forecasts.