Another top ten day of walking! For reasons we can’t understand people seem to be desperate to get going as early as possible and so again today the stampede (with associated banging of doors, bags, backpacks and poles) started ten minutes before breakfast started at 7:00am. No matter that today was possibly the best scenery of the entire camino, which you can’t see if you start in the dark!
However, that’s the last complaint. We got going as the sun was rising and set off around the north west of the peak near O’Cebreiro. We expected a fairly flat trail however the early going was very up and down (welcome back to Galicia!) until a final short climb up to Hospital de la Condesa, where we stopped for a bit, just after the cows had been driven through the main street for a day in the paddock.
From there we climbed gently at first and then very steeply to today’s peak, and the last of the Cantabrian mountains, Alto de Poio, at 1330m just slightly above O’Cebreiro. We had a longer stop there and neither of us could face a coffee after the climb so we had water (might be a first for me) amongst a bunch of roosters.
The views to our right this whole stage had been unbelievable, and after the alto they switched to the left. We descended slowly at first through the villages of Fonfría and Biduedo, then more steeply down through Fillobal and then the much smaller villages of Villoval, Pasantes and Ramil before reaching Triacastela around 3:30pm.
The villages are real rural villages, meaning the cows stay in the village overnight, sometimes under the farmers house, and go out to pasture during the day – using the same paths we do! The stink was too much for us to stop for lunch in Fonfría but we did stop at Biduedo, fortunately at the start of the village before the barns.
Although it’s been hot at times, we’ve now made it through the last three mountain ranges in good weather and been rewarded with great vistas. There’s some rain coming after Sarria so we are glad to be off the mountains without a repeat of the conditions over the Pyrenees.
One of the highlights of today’s walk was the return to what are clearly old trails – many times our heads were below the level of the adjacent ground, meaning the path had been worn down over some time. We were also very pleased with the condition of the trails, even in the steep sections. Too soon to say that Galician trails are better looked after but today’s certainly were!
22kms today to a round 620km in total, with the video here.
steelewalking 
Awsome. What a few days you’ve had.
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