Author: Charles Crowley

We have seen faux painting like this in Spain and Italy. This is a good one.

Well, here we are in an AirBnB in Oviedo. How did that happen? After three weeks on the Camino having a great time we decided we wanted something different. One reason is that we didn’t have a specific end point. Another reason was that Charlie got tired of schlepping the 22 pound pack up and down the hills.

Anyway we’re quite happy with our decision. We will be here for five days. The Camino Primitivo starts here and, just to keep our hand in, we plan to walk one day down that to see how it is. After this we will spend seven days in an AirBnB in Llanes.

We had a delightful train trip from Naves to Oviedo, 58 miles. It was on a train they call the “FEVE”, part of RENFE, the Spanish rail company. It has some aspects of metro that serves rural areas and towns all along the north coast in Spain. We have taken the FEVE before and just love it.

The train goes mostly through forests and farmland, along rivers and streams, by high mountains and smaller hills, through tiny towns and larger towns, past people’s back yards — basically everything we love about Spain.

We love the gentle beat of the rails. It makes you feel relaxed. And all the greenery you pass adds to the mood. The trip was two hours and 40 minutes and we didn’t look at our phones at all, it was too entertaining to watch the world go by.

The conductor did not “sing his songs again” like in “City of New Orleans” but he was very nice and helped us with the train switch in the middle.

We passed lots of cows and horses in the fields and saw, again, lots of calves and colts.

We went along a wide (30-40 feet) river with lots of canoes and kayaks and one big launching place with over a hundred people in wet suits getting ready to take off. I couldn’t get any good shots from the train. You can see the canoes if you tap and photo and enlarge it. You can also see my hand reflected in the glass.

Steve Goodman “City of New Orleans”: one of the best train songs ever, Arlo Guthrie has a killer version.

Riding on the City of New Orleans
Illinois Central, Monday morning rail
15 cars and 15 restless riders
Three conductors, 25 sacks of mail

All along the southbound odyssey
The train pulls out of Kankakeei
Rolls along past houses, farms, and fields
Passing trains that have no name
An’ freight yards full of old black men
And the graveyards of the rusted automobiles

Good morning, America, how are ya?
Said don’t you know me? I’m your native son
I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done

Dealing card games with the old men in the club car
Penny a point, ain’t no one keeping score
Pass the paper bag that holds the bottle
Feel the wheels rumbling ‘neath the floor

And the sons of Pullman porters
And the sons of engineers
Ride their fathers’ magic carpets made of steel
Mothers with their babes asleep
Are rockin’ to the gentle beat
And the rhythm of the rails is all they feel

Good morning, America, how are ya?
Said don’t you know me? I’m your native son
I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done

Nighttime on the City of New Orleans
Changing cars in Memphis, Tennessee
Halfway home, we’ll be there by morning
Through the Mississippi darkness, rolling down to the sea

But all the towns and people seem to fade into a bad dream
And the steel rail still ain’t heard the news
The conductor sings his songs again
The passengers will please refrain
This train got the disappearing railroad blues

Good night, America, how are you?
Said don’t you know me? I’m your native son
I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done

We walked 9.2 miles in six hours with the usual ups and down. It was beautiful again. The hotel breakfast was very good with some killer pastries. A couple from Virginia was also staying at our hotel so we chatted with them at breakfast. We said we were from Albuquerque and guess what, they mentioned Breaking Bad.

We saw a lot of pilgrims today. And by “saw” I mean they passed us. Except for one group of young people. Normally the young ones breeze past us and they are out of sight in a minute but this group was very slow and kept stopping to look at their phones. I guess they were seeing how their social media was liking their Camino.

We saw the usual cows ignoring the great views they had and lots of calves following their mothers around.

A lot of beautiful ocean views, ho hum.

Miles: 8.4 miles, 13 to 400 feet, up 673 feet, down 545 feet, 6 hours on the trail including stops for breakfast and, later, cold drinks
Mexican restaurants: 1
Breakfasts eaten: 2 each
Difficult-on-the-knees climbing gates to get over: 3 or 4
Blue albergues: 1
Italian pilgrims met: 2

Another day of beautiful views, this time going right by the ocean looking down 100 feet cliffs to the surf crashing against the rocks.

Our hotel included breakfast this morning but (1) the coffee wasn’t too good, Wynette didn’t even finish hers and (2) it was a minimal pastry and juice-type breakfast. So, we stopped after about 3 miles and had eggs and toast.

When we were checking into our hotel tonight, the woman said she had immigrated from the Dominican Republic with her family when she was 16. She mentioned how “tranquil” Spain was compared to the Dominican Republic. Spain is a very safe country, a stable democracy and has a good economy. We have often thought that young people from Central and South America should consider moving to Spain since there would be no language problem. Spain, like all the first world countries has a low birth rate and needs more people.

I mentioned in an earlier post how varied each day is in terms of surfaces we walked on. Today I tried to get a photo of each change. It is more than surfaces, it the variety you see each day. Think of it as a day in the life of a pilgrim.

It is a lot of photos so I will divide them up to about eight per each post. All of the photos can be enlarged by tapping or clicking on them and from there you can go through larger photos of the whole gallery.

I will post these in backwards order so that you can scroll through them in the correct chronological order, top to bottom