The walking begins.

Today's walk was a planned short walk of only 13km

Taking me to a public albergue where I met my friends Ed and Pat along with my new friend Annabelle who is the volunteer running the albergue for a few days each week.

Along the way I met many friendly people and made a few new friends from Taiwan and New Brunswick.  The walk was quite pleasant along beautiful stretches of beach, forgoing the defunct oil refinery just inland.

It was an amazing day to be on the camino and I quickly found myself going back into my pilgrim mode quite quickly and easily.  Lots of contimplation and pondering, very little answers.  What I did think about was the dynamic of the pilgrimage and the community that almost instantly forms around complete strangers.  Tonight's was an example, Ed, Pa, and I asked a swedish lady to join us for dinner. While dining 4 other peregrinos from our albergue we're at the nearby table and we had to many tapas so we shared them with the next table.  Later it was unfinished sangria.  It is the community of complete strangers not being strangers.

Tomorrow, feet issues aside, I am hoping for a full days walking.

The Warmup Day

Not really feeling like waking to an alarm I just left my rising this morning to when my body said so... 6:45 a.m. it said so and there was no going back to sleep. I had a solid night sleep from 11:00 last night to 6:45 this morning and when I woke, I was awake!

Having done a lot of preparation last night and only doing a warm-up run, I grabbed my mini pack and struck out around 7:30 stopping at my new favorite breakfast location and taking the time to dine inside with a fresh chocolate pastry and a large freshly squeezed orange juice (the Camino breakfast of champions!). I made it down to the river for 8:00 a.m. already a kilometer behind me and struck out down the river enjoying the scenery. While enjoying the scenery I observed, much to my amusement, a set of escalators up one of the steep Hill sides.

My initial thought was this must be a well if your neighborhood to demand an escalator, but an observation of the buildings nearby but not lean itself to an overly wealthy neighborhood.

A few kilometers into my morning track, I came across my first peregrino of the day, Edem from Israel. Edem had studied in Connecticut and was quite familiar with New England. We stroll down to the Lighthouse where our paths separated.

Interesting little side note, all along the river and at other places along the ocean, I observed exercise stations

there was another exercise station set up with weather resistant, gym grade aerobic equipment. So not only is the river in waterfront accessible to the public, it has been turned into an exercise playground. The best part was as I saw people actually using the equipment.

Further down the trail, I met up with my second peregrino of the day, Alec from Germany who was likewise very familiar with New England and Maine. We walked for a few kilometers until our paths separated.

15 km on the meter I reached the Mercado Metro station which I rode a train back into town where after a brief stop off at my room I was able to meet up again with my friend Charlton from Wales. On our way to the local decathlon store for some equipment that Charlton wanted to pick up we made it impromptu stop off at a cafe and enjoyed a fantastic lunch.

Yes, yes that Sunday tasted every bit as good as it looked! The bottom wasn't really an ice cream is more of a cream base. The chocolate ice cream at top was the perfect blend of chocolate, bitterness, and sweet.

Yes those salads were very good and yes they had ham and very thinly shaved local cheese.

After we completed our shopping trip at decathlon, we headed down to the river side to meet up with my friends Ed and Patty where we ultimately took the six bridge river cruise up and down the River.

from there we made our way slowly back up the bank to the cathedral, on to the rail station to get our tickets for tomorrow's rides, over to the pharmacy to get topical ibuprofen and spray cold, then off to find a bite to eat which ultimately was ham and cheese on toasted croissant which while simple was very good.

One of the discussions I had today revolved around the concept of tourist versus traveler. Alec and I had many definitions that were all accurate (tourists demand an experience for example where a traveler indulges in the local culture) but I think the most definitive and simple definition we came up with was that a traveler travels with their eyes wide open and an open mind.

That is all for today, tomorrow the walking begins in earnest.

A whirlwind!

I'll just start off with saying what a whirlwind few days this has been! I left work early on Wednesday and I'm so glad I did. I pretty much was taking care of last minute trip prep along with finishing up everything around the house and trying to get as much done as possible before leaving so if not to leave a mountain of stuff for Tina to take care of.

Tina and I had one hour sit down and relax together before she had to take me to the bus station (because it's just as easy to take a bus into Logan airport as it is to have somebody actually drive in drop you off and then pick you up there later). I count the journey as starting when I leave the house so my journey started Thursday afternoon 1:00 p.m. Eastern standard Time. The journey to the bus station and the bus ride to Logan airport we're very non-eventful. There was a 2-hour delay on our flight because apparently they didn't have a crew. Having a tight connection on the other side of the Atlantic guaranteed a missed flight... Our flight landed in Madrid as my connecting flight was landing in Porto without me. This added a couple of extra hours in the Madrid airport which wasn't squandered!

If you've read some of my previous blog entries, you'll immediately recognize the glorious treat that is KAS LIMON (don't think of it as lemonade or even Italian soda, think of it as mildly diluted lemon juice with just enough sugar to make it palatable - and all my years of searching I have never found anything that is quite as good as that). You bet I enjoyed the hell out of that drink! 

Remember how I stated above that the journey started the minute I left the house.  So flight delays and rescheduled flights are all just part of the journey. Doesn't really matter too terribly much whether a few hours gets in the way, I'm still going to make it to my ultimate destination which is Santiago de Compostela and I believe with my very heart and soul that when you're on a journey like this it is important to acknowledge the entire journey as part of the experience, embrace it, and find the hidden joys within... And that's going to lead me to another diversion, when we were getting off our flight it was 8:00 a.m. local time in Madrid. Many people were not well rested, struggling with connecting flights, and otherwise not having the best day of their life. I don't know how, I don't know why, but when I was going through the security checkpoint, the gentleman at border security stamped my passport which seems like a routine thing, but you actually have to ask border control in most places to actually stamp it. So when he stamped it I let out a little statement of Glee exclaiming that I was happy that he actually stamped my passport which caught the attention of several other travelers who noticed my happy attitude about things. I think a little bit of rubbed off on a few other people, instead of worrying that they were all tired, some of them started looking forward to getting stamps on their passport as well. I didn't see any sense in being upset over things I couldn't control. The guy checking me through board of security had nothing to do with any of my delays, and if I was a jerk to him he could have added more to my delays. Instead I was the first person he took through the line as he had just opened and I hope I started his shift off on the positive note.

Let's get back to this journey...  Let's get back to the physical aspect of this journey!

I finally arrived in Porto around 1:30 in the afternoon and got the keys to my mini apartment that I'm using for a few days.

Everything I need and then some. It is one building away from the portal City Hall, which itself heads a main boulevard that is fantastically beautiful.

Not venturing out further until I had showered, put on clean clothes, and washed my other set. What set me back till about 3:00, which I then wanted to touch base with Tina and give her a video tour of the place and see how she is holding up (she's doing perfectly fine btw and prepping for her own journey in a week).  Afterwards I took a stroll over to the local decathlon store and picked up a new set of trekking poles - you can get cheap trekking poles for 6 Euro a piece! I wouldn't hike the Camino with them but for casual use they looked perfectly adequate. A Camino grade set of poles was only 40 Euro for a complete set - I then struck off to the cathedral to meet up with my friend Charlton Slack. My friends Ed and Pat Riskowski have been taking a few zero days to not only indulge in the culture in porto, but to give the both of them some much needed rest from the abuses of the trail that they endured from Lisbon to Porto.

You know all these are signs would probably work much better if this was a theatrical movie and not a blog entry... I could keep everyone captivated with four, five, maybe even six sub stories that all meet together at the end.

Charlton and I, haven't seen each other since October 2015, greeted each other like two friends that hadn't seen each other in a week. 

Any aches and pains and misery that might have been lingering from the "troubled"journey just disappeared in an instant. We found the both of us would just feeding off each other and encouraging each other silently. We struck off to get food at 5:00 from the cathedral. We finally ate food at 8:00. In the middle of that time we realized we were only feet from one of the most famous Bridges in Puerto that is closed to vehicle traffic and open only to trams and foot traffic - a situation that is so ridiculous that osher in the United States would flip their lid...

 Oh yeah it's fun, The pedestrian walkways are on the other side of the bridge but when the trams aren't coming the entire bridge is pedestrian traffic. The trams come everybody moves aside to let the trams go sometimes only a foot away and as soon as the tram is gone everybody's back to it. Safe? Didn't seem to be a problem, the police on the bridge didn't seem to pay any attention to any of it. Well our plan was only to walk out to the midpoint of the bridge take some pictures up river, downriver, and around the bridge and head back.

 Well we got halfway across the bridge and realize that that's only half the journey we had to completely cross the bridge each way to make it count for us. That's about when we also saw the gondolas on the other side of the river.

 Once we were in the gondolas taking them down to water level, it was pointed out that we had tickets for free wine tasting. 20 minutes later and several wrong turns we finally found our free wine tasting.

On our return journey back up the gondolas Charlton and I met two wonderful young men from Russia living in Germany. They both work in software development, one for Audi and BMW developing autopilot software. Because of the Dynamics of their work, they were working out of Porto for a little while before heading back to Germany.

and if that wasn't enough diversion, we realize there was a perfect view spot to get a wonderful photo of the bridge.

THEN after almost 3 hours of "Oooo shiny" moments we found our way over to one of the eateries that has a claim to world top 10 hot dog.

well I'm not going to get into the debate on hot dogs and world top 10, I will say that it was very enjoyable. It's not so much a hot dog as a mildly seasoned sausage, with a strip of cheese, cooked in a tiny skinny bun, then cut into little individual bite size pieces. We ordered a plate of fries, and they came out my favorite way... Shoestring!

That was mostly an appetizer, as you can see from the picture, so we set out for another round of food with a quick stop back at the decathlon so Charlton could get a 3 Euro slack pack like I have (a 10 l stuff sack with a zipper closure and little straps). We wandered around for a while and stumbled across a place that apparently is called little toast in English. Wanting more snack food, we ordered the meat and cheese plate, it a very generously portioned to cool to replace with three types of local Portuguese cheese along with local cured hams, almost an entire bunch of grapes, raisins, some fruit jam, pumpkin jam, and apparently the namesake some tiny little toasts that are apparently made on site.

the waiter paired that up with a couple rounds of freshly made lemonade which was the absolute perfect accompaniment to the plate.... Charlton and I left embarrassed - we had to leave a couple pieces of cheese behind, we just couldn't finish it!!!

Today, was my alleged zero day. My friends Ed and Pat found a private driver to give us a personalized tour of the Douro River valley vineyards -the home of port wine. I will say that there was nothing bad about the tour, and at that point we seem to be always the VIPs over the other tour groups, going into the special tasting rooms where they had not just small samples but larger samples of the wine along with little snacks to cleanse in between samplings.

 Everybody was "good" after we left the first stop and we were given a chance to let what we just had process while we took a 1 hour Cruise up a particularly beautiful section of the river valley and back.

From there we started to climb the valley, stopping at another vineyard very quick stop and tasting, before climbing more and entering a little nondescript Hamlet completely off the beaten path. We had roast suckling pig leg baked in a port wine reduction, and some of the best roasted potatoes have had. For the health Halo there is some salad and rice to go around. Dessert was an absolutely fantastic homemade orange cake that Ed and I both managed to score a second round of, and even got Avatar operators boss, who was running a second private tour, to give us a serving of black vanilla bean ice cream.

With not much room left, we finished the ascent of the valley and were treated to a rose wine spritzer with lemon peel - it was refreshing, but the bitterness from the soda water did not make it one of our favorites.

That's when we had a little bit of excitement in our day however. I observed our driver was not looking too good when she came to tell us that when we were ready she would bring us back. I noticed she had lost her chipper mood and her voice seemed pained. I also observed when she walked away she actually grabbed a bar for support briefly and paused and uncomfortably long (She was NOT drunk - putting that out there right now!)!!!  I didn't immediately pay it too much heat because none of the rest of my group nor the staff over there seem to give it much attention. We wrapped up our stay, but when we headed out to the vehicle we noticed she was sitting down and on the phone and obviously distraught. Luckily her boss had been running a parallel tour with a different group all day and was there wrapping up his group at the same time. We quickly found out that she was 4 months pregnant and having extreme pains. Every single one of us immediately told him to make sure that she was taken care first and once he had her taken care of we would address getting back to Porto.

for a little mountain village seeming so far away from everything, the ambulance was there in minutes! The staff at the place was phenomenal and kept everything open for us long after all the other groups had Departed. Her boss was fantastic intended to her until she was taken to the hospital. At her request he offered to let us know how she makes out later when there's more news.

Somewhere up in that little Hamlet is the tour van we wrote up in, cuz we all packed into her boss's van and made a beeline back for Porto arriving back here an hour and a half after we planned on arriving. As of my writing we do not have an update on her status, but we are comfortable that they put her needs first and foremost.

Arriving back in Porto we got dropped off at River level because that is where most of the occupants were staying. That left me having to get up the river bank and then up the hills to my apartment. My first thought was to walk the streets up, but in that direction they were very crowded already with pedestrians feeling about. My second thought was to ride the funicular up, but the sign said it was a 40-minute wait from that spot and then there was another sign saying the weight was even longer because of some issue they were having. As I turned around to navigate up the roads I spotted a staircase. Climbing the staircase revealed the grand total of 21 sets of stairs along with several steep alleyways all twisting and turning between buildings up the riverbank... Remember I said this was a zero day? Well it may have been zero Camino kilometers but it was not a zero exercise day at all.

Just some pictures of tonight's snack. Yes! Yes, they taste as good as they look!!!

Tomorrow my plan is to do a light day just walk out of the city and up the ocean for a grand total of 10 km. I'll reach the end of the subway line and ride it back into town to enjoy more of what Porto has to offer.

Camino Portuguese 2022 - The Teaser.

Another Camino long delayed because of the pandemic. Originally destined to start in 2020, delayed 2 years because of the pandemic. This will mark 7 years since my first pilgrimage and a transformation of my mind, body, and soul.

The preparation has been years in the making, almost 3 years since the decision was made in the late summer of 2019. Daily walking began in March 2020 as the gyms and everything else closed, I started walking about 4 miles a day. I came into this year at peak walking readiness, only to be hit with a heel issue we'll just taking a lot of time, therapy, exploration of solutions, and patience to address. The sad news is that the heel issue is not going to go away on its own. The good news is that working with professionals I have been able to find acceptable adaptations that hopefully will allow me to do a full daily walk each day on this upcoming journey.

Later this week I will once again board the plane for Spain and then Porto Portugal -this time with significantly less trepidation and anxiety. I am ready for the upcoming journey and prepared for the challenges of mind, body, and soul. I will journey approximately 140 miles north and once again visit the tomb of the Apostle Saint James. Upon completion I hope to travel to Finisterre and Muxia, two places with historical and spiritual significance.

So, the larger question is not am I ready but are they ready for me?  (We will find out soon)

That's all folks.

Our Camino Portugues has come to an end and now our time on the Iberian Peninsula also must come to an end.  We have had a great and wonderful time out here, but home is home, and that is where we go at the end of every Journey before starting a new one.  We will catch our last sleep in Spain before leaving early in the morning for a mid-afternoon arrival back in the States.

For a relaxing touring day around Santiago it has been very busy.  For the first time since arriving Tina and I actually had the opportunity to "sleep-in"... I say it that way because we really didn't, last night's accommodation must have had paper-mache walls or some other equally poorly soundproof Construction.  Spain is not known for its early-rising yet the chambermaids were busy early cleaning all the rooms on the floor and in the process waking those of us up who are trying to get a few extra minutes of sleep.  A relaxing breakfast at the hotel was likewise rushed as the staff was looking to close promptly at their designated time.  Thankfully the reception desk was more than willing to hold our packs for several hours until we checked into our new accommodation.

Experienced peregrinos will be familiar with the pilgrim house in Santiago...  a haven for English speaking peregrinos.  Among the many services offered is full wash and dry for laundry and an extensive knowledge of the greater Santiago area.  Luckily for us we brought our dirties.

Tina and I then meandered over to the San Francis monastery which is a little-known gem but for those that take the time you are granted with a second Compostela.  Little trivia fact, there was a decree that no building could shine higher than Santiago de Compostela, so when they built the monastery they actually dug it down into the ground and still built it big.

We enjoyed a few moments of shopping before having to tend to more errands...  The Dirties we're no longer dirty they were clean, however we had new dirties that needed to be then cleaned.  Pilgrim house to the rescue again.

While walking down one of the side alleys Tina spotted a churros sign, with guidance from the pilgrim house we located a shop with delicious churros con chocolate, which was just the fix needed at that time.  It was a Spanish treat I had forgot about but was glad we indulged in.

and all the running around and changing hotels we still managed to get in a quick run to Monte de Gozo and the Peregrino Monument.  it is a very important location for peregrinos coming in to Santiago on the Francis route as it is your first chance to see the spires of Santiago.  Interesting side note, there were some locals picnicking at the Monte de Gozo monument with a little ankle nipper of a dog who learned that this peregrino wasn't going to put up with his bullshit.  I didn't have to say anything I just pointed back to the owners and growled and it went back much to the surprise of the owners.  as I started walking to the other Monument it had a brief moment of braveness until I spun around and growled at it again. I was ready to take a cue from my older brother and take a chunk out of the dog with my teeth.  Walking as much as you do when you're on Camino just put you in the mood to not deal with anything.

We even managed to finish off our last night in Santiago with an impromptu met up with a Camino friend from my 2015 Camino, Susan Peacock.  Susan was just herself finishing an extended Camino down the Portuguese and to Finisterre.  We spent our last night in Santiago indulging in Tapas yet again.

Sleep soon airport in the morning, the Iberian Peninsula can breathe a sigh of relief...  I joke a lot about that but in reality the Portuguese and Spanish people have been awesome to deal with and language barrier or not I always manage to communicate my needs.  I picked up just enough Spanish words to bullshit my way through almost any conversation so long as I can make animated gestures and sound effects.  To that point, one peregrina recently named me the whistling peregrino, as I'm more than demonstrated with animated gestures and sound effects several items I was describing.

ULTREIA!

Photos :
https://photos.app.goo.gl/BrwX3kEc8aytbNMo9

SANTIAGO!!!!

We will be honest with you, the day started off rough, that kind of last rough attack you get before you are victorious.  We were unable to score any breakfast before leaving town and the trail was up and down in the brisk morning breeze.  Upon arriving in Santiago City proper we finally located in open bar and were able to score a day saving breakfast. we also had the opportunity to meet up with a few other pilgrims we had previously met with and enjoyed their company for a brief while.

Breakfast in bellies and murdering temperaments calmed down, we commenced our final attack on Santiago.  Walking through the new city was kind of a slog especially during morning Rush.  On reaching one of the parks that is on the outskirts of the old city I was immediately in familiar territory.  Tina and I put our walking poles away and proceeded to walk the entire distance through Old City to Santiago Square hand in hand.

I can't tell you what the feeling is there are no words in the English language that I know of. I can tell you that even on my second pilgrimage I was still overcome by emotion, thankfully for the surrounding people it was not as explosive as my first arrival in Santiago.  Tina had her own emotions which I could certainly feel and understand but those are for her and her to share in her own time.  Suffice it to say the arrival in Santiago was powerful, more powerful than one would normally suspect could happen.

I will say that we were in the Square for quite a long time just soaking in the victory in the beauty of having overcome this Camino in arrived in the Square. we had many of our fellow peregrinos who had either overnighted or had come in earlier in the morning seek us out and give us congratulations for overcoming everything to arrive in Santiago.

Once we could fully compose ourselves we went over to the new Compostela office and waited approximately 45 minutes for our compostela's.  First Compostela, second Compostela, it doesn't matter, it's still a powerful and emotional experience. we even took in some extra time after receiving our Compostela Spain to relax in the garden out back and just soak in the entire experience that it happened.

Santiago had one more challenge for us.  before I get into that let me ask you this question, how well do you check over your hotel room?  Me, I tear the thing apart!  In doing so I found an extra, unwelcome, visitor in our room.  Bringing it to the hotel's attention they quickly closed off the room and put us in a significantly better room.  I will say that the significantly better room past the tear apart inspection. Did we flip out or otherwise lose our cool on the whole incident, no, not at all!  All the hostel, albergue, pensions, and other places we stayed, we found no other visitors.  Peregrinos diligence is always smart.

We proceeded to take a few hours of the day as downtime to gather and compose ourselves and reset ourselves for the 7:30 Pilgrim Mass.  The legendary botafuma, which swings very rarely recently, swung for us tonight!

As my fellow peregrinos can attest, arrival in Santiago is immensely powerful and highly emotional.  Today has been an extreme of emotions.  Yet when we sit back and reflect on the journey and it struggles, we acknowledge that we would happily do the journey again as the rewards are just so much greater then the challenge of overcoming the obstacles.

Tonight we celebrate with pollo paella (with a proper crust) and tinto sangria.  Tomorrow is a day to explore around Santiago and hopefully find those little cans of tiny pickles someplace.  Tonight, exhaustion and full bellies reign supreme.

Photos:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/BrwX3kEc8aytbNMo9

This is the road that never ends....

Yes it goes on and on my friend....  Ok, not really the truth as a matter of fact we have less than 7 km to go.  however when you're dealing with the injuries Tina dealing with the road just seems to go on and on and on Without End.

By the way tomorrow is the Santiago invasion and occupation. today was actually a little heartbreaking and sorts because many of the pilgrim friends we had met along the way and various Fashions casually or otherwise we're pushing today clear to Santiago and leaving town tomorrow. The trail today was a trail of Quasi-teary goodbyes as we bid an Ultreia farewell to our friends.  For my Camino friends they know how easy and quickly type bonding Camino friendships become, for those who have not walked Camino it's a very hard sensation to describe other than there is a near immediate bonding with so many people. Some people we seem to bump into everyday.  Some people we've only met recently.  Some people Proclaim that we have assisted them in some way.  Whatever the reasons for the friendship it seemed today we were passed by a constant stream of peregrinos all wishing us the best in our future as we likewise expressed our best wishes.

Tonight Tina and I are enjoying a quiet relaxing night in the largest suburb of Santiago before we invade tomorrow.  Looking back time seems to have stopped this brief week and a half that we've been out here.  When we set out we had an aspiration of Walking the Camino Portuguese from Porto along the coast for a while and then changing to an Inland route.  We tried our best to leave ourselves at the mercy of the Camino and let it guide our movements and not us forcing our movements in the Camino.

The first day out a minor ankle twist ultimately manifested into a full-sprain.  Thanks to the wonderful Portuguese and Spanish farmacias we were able to continue Along on a modified itinerary.  out of a possible 240 km we will have walked 177 of those when we arrive in Santiago tomorrow.  Along those km we have always put ourselves at the mercy of the Camino, gotten beat down on a daily basis, yet at the end of the day we were always shown kindness as we soaked in the local culture.

Was this a transformative experience like my Camino Frances trip in 2015?  No it was an entirely different experience.  The 2015 Camino was a solo Journey for myself over 800 km and 7 weeks away from home.  This is a joint Journey over a hundred and seventy-seven km in only 2 weeks away from home.  Does that mean that the journey itself was without results, absolutely not.  While Tina and I are very comfortable in our relationship this journey did help us both reaffirm our commitment to each other.

Tina's own personal take on the Camino she will have to express on her own.  for me it was almost like coming back to see a friend you haven't seen in awhile.  While a different Camino, it is still a Camino, and you can feel the warm comforting embrace of the Camino.  this Camino in the short two weeks probably tested my patience more than the entire Camino Frances did over the whole 7 weeks.  Being a younger Camino and still under very active development, I found sections of it more challenging then I would have suspected given the documentation in the guide books.  Either way my commitment to not let the Camino conquer me but to ultimately embrace the Camino and finish as friends with the Camino still stayed strong.

Tomorrow promises to be a very emotional day.

Photos:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/BrwX3kEc8aytbNMo9