



Portuguese Coastal, Part of the Primitivo, Week in Vigo
This morning in Lugo, we weren’t sure where our bus would be parked in the bus station so we made our best guess and I asked a woman in line if this was the bus to A Fonsagrada. She said yes and was very friendly so we talked while we were waiting, about 15 minutes. She was so nice and cheerful in the reserved Spanish way of being friendly.
I learned she lives in Madrid but grew up in a small village near A Fonsgrada. She was in Lugo visiting her older sister, who was with her. Her sister was a sweetheart as well. They were on their way to visit their childhood home.
They asked about our Camino and we told them of our plans to start in Grandas de Salime. They were telling us how beautiful the country is that we’ll be walking through. When we got on the bus, the woman pointed to a seat and told us to sit there to so we could see all the pretty scenery from the bus.
After we got to A Fonsagrada and had a mandatory cup of coffee, we got a taxi to take us to Grandas de Salime. The driver pointed for Charlie to get in the back seat and for me to get in the front seat. (This is not unusual.) And he was a talker. He apologized he didn’t speak Spanish very well since his primary language is Gallego (Galician). Of course, he spoke great Spanish as far as I could tell. As I’ve experience before, I can understand Galicians speaking Spanish easier than some because they are speaking their second language so perhaps use a simpler version, like me. He talked a lot and fast. I could understand maybe 60% of what he said. Enough to get the gist of what he was saying. (It was a bit exhausting trying to concentrate and understand him for that 30 minute taxi ride.)
He grew up in tiny village near A Fonsagrada. They lived a very simple life. Didn’t get electricity at the house he grew up in until the 1990s. He went to boarding school in A Fonsagrada.
We crossed the border between Galicia and Asturias on the taxi ride. (We are in Asturias!) He talked about how Asturias and Galicia are different autonomous regions in Spain. Different health systems, for example. Talked about how the Asturians speak Castellano (regular Spanish) although they have a lot of vocabulary unique to them. He mentioned that there are four languages spoken in Spain: Catalan, Basque, Galician, and Castellano. He also let me take his photo.
Some parts of this I understand but the two pairs of male/female icons are a mystery.
Up to now, we’ve been walking the Camino Portugués de la Costa. That Camino starts in Porto and ends in Santiago. We started in Porto but ended in Caldas de Reis, about two stages early. (Or 4 of our short stages.) This was our plan all along. Today we took a bus into Santiago and then another bus to Lugo.
Lugo is on the Camino Primitivo. (So named because it is the first camino.) Tomorrow we’ll take a bus and then a taxi to Grandas de Salime. We’ll walk from there to Melide. That should take us about 8 walking days. We are starting kind of in the middle of the Primitivo. The first half of the Primitivo is too difficult for us to contemplate. Long distances between towns. Huge elevation changes. But this later part is doable and we are excited to get to experience it.
Our expectations: The Camino Primitivo will feel very different than the Portugués. It will be more rural, through lots of small towns that might no longer have inhabitants if it weren’t for this Camino passing through. We’ll probably see lots of pilgrims but not as many as before. Certainly, there will be more ups and downs, and, of course, we won’t be walking along the ocean. We hope to find lots of fabada beans to eat.
The weather forecast is good! Not a lot of rain. Quite a bit warmer. You’ll probably hear us complaining about getting over-heated again. (Sorry.)
Melide will be the end of our walking. That’s where the Primitivo meets the “main” Camino Frances. We won’t continue on to Santiago from there. (We walked that distance on our first Camino in 2013. ) Instead we will catch a bus to Vigo and spend a week there before heading home to New Mexico. Charlie’s grandnephew Noah is in Spain right now doing a semester abroad. He is going to spend some time with us in Vigo. We are looking forward to that.
I included a similar photo in a previous year’s blog. We pay almost everything with cards on this trip and I’m glad to see the church keeping up with the times. But I am including this photo because of the photo I did not take and so cannot show. After I took this I looked to the right and saw a “No photos” sign. I was tempted to take a photo of it but I like to respect rules like that, their church, their rules, only fair. I wouldn’t have taken the first photo if I had seen the sign.
This seems to me like a really good idea for a little shop. I wonder if it is a chain?