Last full day in Portugal

As I'm sitting here getting dinner at a local restaurant. I am both excited to enter Spain tomorrow and saddened to be leaving Portugal behind. The people of Portugal are so incredibly friendly and helpful that it's frankly embarrassing to so many nationalities that visit. The value that they put on Camino infrastructure in this country it's amazing. Literally dozens of kilometers of Oceanside boardwalk promenade and pathways for the purpose of recreation and fitness. Very very little of this country has privately owned oceanfront.

The food is always so incredibly fresh and then lock in the Camino you walk by many of the growers in producers of the foods here. As you've heard me say from other Canadian adventures, the bread and pastries, all artisinal, I baked fresh every night and delivered early in the morning to the pastry shops. You're a country that loves their bread and pastries, they are generally very thin, fit, and healthy! The most important aspect of it all I believe is that thing to have a singular pastry and a small cafe.

Today, today I was feeling more in an "adventurous" mood... Well okay, Heel was still a little upset from yesterday's walk so I was looking for anyway to make the walk easier so I decided to walk undocumented coastal section. 20 kilometers of freshly built roadway, halfway coming forward one, etc, all for the purpose of recreation and fitness. Upon leaving my last town, I was getting a little anxious because I was not seeing a ready supply of Camino directional arrows. As a matter of fact I only saw three of the entire distance leaving the city and they looked like they were impromptu ones put up by somebody else. The entire distance between the two major cities didn't work one single directional arrow. Fortunately the trail system they built so complete that no additional markings were needed, one just needed to walk the path. And in the places where it wasn't abundantly clear, one just needed to walk with the ocean on their left.

One of the really great things is it took me very very little time to fall back into my Camino walking groove in no time at all I was already walking with my entire world lead needs on my back living in the moment in the space I was in at the time. It is so extremely freeing to just get up and walk and stop and find watching when you're ready to start without setting an artificial goal for yourself of having to make specific goal... It is worth noting, and there are a few times because of logistical reasons, we do have to plan your day stock a little better like today. All that being said, it is very liberating to be on the trail and not to have any worries but you're immediate needs at the moment.