Day 17, April 21: San Ciprián

Post by Wynette: We are having a nice rest day in San Ciprián. Slept as late as we wanted. Had breakfast.

Charlie cutting up fruit for muesli. Check out our cute gas stove.

Did a load of washing then hung it out to dry.

Red bud tree matches the clothes pins!

Walked into town (1 km) and had an excellent menu.

We were pleased to get fresh peas and ham as a choice in the first course. We are finding it a challenge to get enough vegetables.

Walked through the town along the beach. It was cool and breezy at that point.

Very few people doing beachy things, but a few.

Walked to the beach on the other side of the tiny peninsula.

This side was wilder and rockier.

We had fun looking in the tide pools.

Sea urchins.

Finally got to the light house.

Make that light houses.

Then walked back through the old village.

Others took advantage of the sunny day to do laundry as well, even though it was Easter. It was getting warm. We were seeking out shade to walk in.

Morning Sun

We had another beautiful walk along the coast this morning and I was experimenting with how my camera would work with the sun breaking out from behind the clouds. Then Google photos did me one better with its stylized version.

Not real but then I know my iPhone camera warms up the colors so the original maybe was not real either.

Day 16, April 20: Burela to San Ciprián

Fallen camellia petals among the calla lillies. (Thanks Mom and Robin for helping me to name them. We see lots of these growing here. Lots of camellias, too.)

Post by Wynette: We walked 9.8 miles today. We are staying in an airbnb on the edge of San Ciprián. That 9.8 includes walking 1.5 miles into town and back for lunch and grocery shopping. We reserved this airbnb back before we left Albuquerque when we were panicking about finding places to stay for Easter weekend. San Ciprián seemed like a good place to spend Easter so we decided to make the reservation for two days.

We have lots of space. Large kitchen, large living room, 3 bedrooms! Fun to have a house to spread out in and a kitchen to cook in. It’s sunny and charming. Only drawback (besides it being a third floor walk up flat and not in the center) is that there seems to be no heat. I’m currently wrapped up in a blanket on the couch.

Tomorrow we’ll relax and explore the little town. We’ve made reservations for an Easter lunch at one of the restaurants.

Pretty and meticulous garden we passed today
Friendly gentle dog who came out to greet us
San Ciprián

Day 15, April 19: Foz to Burela

Wynette thinking, what are those pointy things?

Post by Wynette: I woke up today feeling a bit under the weather. Nothing bad. Just on the edge of maybe getting a cold or fighting something off. So, we decided to do an easy day. We walked about 3.5 miles alongside the ocean out of Foz and then caught the Feve train to do the final 8 miles to Burela where we had a hotel reservation. So glad we didn’t miss that 3.5 miles, even though it was cold and breezy.

We got to the train station sooner than expected and were lucky there was a bar nearby. So we had a great breakfast. Once again amazed they only charged us 8.50 for 4 fried eggs, 4 toasts, butter and jam, and 3 large coffees. (Coffee was so good Charlie had two.)

At the train station, as we were waiting for the train, a family joined us waiting. It was a retired couple about our age, their daughter and son-in-law, and their young daughter. We’ve been noticing pointy things on top of all the hórreos and a little earlier I told Charlie I was going to ask someone about that soon. So this seemed like a good opportunity to ask. Turned out the daughter spoke excellent English. She explained that the points were to break up snow on the roofs, but her father pointed out that they don’t get snow here on the Atlantic Coast. So they all agreed they have no idea what the pointy things are for.

The family explained that they were not from around here, but from Burgos. We said we’d been to Burgos twice when doing the Camino. They said they had a place in a small town near Burgos on the Camino and had noticed in the last ten years there have been more and more American pilgrims. Hardly any before that. We told her about the movie The Way that came out in 2010 that had introduced so many Americans to the Camino.

I asked her what was the small town and she said Itero de la Vega. We told her we loved that little town and stayed there on both Caminos. We described where we stayed and what we remembered about the town. They were amazed how much we remembered because, she said, you go through so many towns on the Camino. Then they said they also owned a house in Comillas, in Cantabria, on the Camino del Norte. We had stayed in that town last year, and remembered how much we liked it. Again, they were amazed we remembered.

The family was in Foz for Semana Santa. They were just riding the train a few miles and back just to let their little girl experience the train. She was a cutie. Her name was Abril, which means April.

One thing I noted was when they talked about the Camino Frances, what we sometimes refer to as “the main Camino”, they called it the “Camino principal”.

Abril with her dad on the train. Her mom smiling at us through the seats on the left.

Beach Showers

The whole north coast has one sandy beach (playa) after another. They all have these shower stations every 100 yards. The one on the right is for washing the sand off your feet. I’m not sure what the chair thing is for. On each side you can see the higher shower heads. Here is another beach we passed today, the bathrooms above and the stairs to the beach.