A walk along Spain's northern coast
As mentioned in other posts today, we took the ferry (barca) into Santander. There was a boat driver who we never saw and a young woman who did everything else: guided the boat driver as he “parked” the boat next to the landing area, helped people disembark and embark, took tickets, even swept the boat during the ride over. She was so pretty and cheerful.
We have noted before that the north coast of Spain is a big surf area and we saw lots of signs of that on today’s walk: surfers on the beaches, surf school buildings, surf classes.I know cute bathroom photos are overdone but I had not seen these before.
Miles walked: 7.0
Miles on pavement: 1
Miles along headlands with amazing views: 3
Miles along a seemingly endless beach: 3, it was low tide, very pleasant walking
Pilgrims who passed us: ~40
Pilgrims we passed: 0
Locals out for a sunny Sunday walk: >200
Bicycles who passed us: ~10
Times we said what an amazing walk it was: 4 or 5
Boat rides across the ria to Santander: 1
This was a great walking day. Sunny but breezy so it was not hot. We were walking along headlands with 60-70 foot drops down to rocky ocean shore or pristine beaches. We saw a few surfers on the beaches.
Then the trail dropped down to the start of a beach that was 5-6 miles long. We had walked along some of it in 2018 but then it was high tide. This time it was low tide and we walked for three miles along it. Lots of people on the beach enjoying the sunny weather but still there were long stretches with no people. It was breezy and several people were flying kites.
At the end we were across the ria from Santander. We stopped for a cup of coffee and then caught the ferry along with several other pilgrims and a number of locals.
