The pilgrims complete El Camino

We walked into Santiago de Compostela on Thursday afternoon. Only the little scallop shells on the sidewalks, and the occasional sign post, were there to keep us on track while navigating the modern roads into the city. Finally, into the old part, down a hill, through a passage and into the large open square facing…

Plodding along

Monday was a lazy day – just 17 km, a lot of it downhill as we approached and entered Ponferrada. Weather was mixed with scattered showers, cloud and sun. The large municipal albergue was a little way off the route we took into the city so we used that as an excuse to stay the…

On the road

The streets and skies of Astorga were wet yesterday morning so we had to don full rain gear. Then we proceeded to put in about 5 km walking from one end of town to the other and back, trying to find a place to get our credentiales – pilgrim passports that we get stamped daily…

In Astorga, ready to go

This morning awaking in Madrid, we decided to get on with the journey right away. Took a few hours to wend our way to the right bus station and get tickets for the 4-hour trip to Astorga. Then, of course we wandered up and down streets before picking a hotel (I feel it is cheating…