The Stone Site

Saturday 27 of July. Today we walked every single kilometre in quite heavy rain! We have experienced rain before but not for such a long time and so persistent!

The first hours are quite fine in rain and you walk much faster in rain than in sun, But the challenge walking five, six hours in rain is that you in the end get wet, soaking wet! And your shoes become small swimming pools where your feet slowly are drowning! Not even a cat would like to be out!

It’s like life itself – it’s easy to get caught in the rain, you stand it for a while but sooner or later it will get you!

So what’s the solution. Well, perhaps you have to walk one or two Caminos before you find it out – at least I hope so!

A very peaceful Friday. Sometimes it’s just enough to do nothing – and today has been just such a day strolling around in the city and looking at all the fine things.

And Pontevedra is a very nice and big city, plenty of shops and plenty to see!

Of course a lots of fine churches!

But also some supermarkets with so much to choose between! It’s perhaps not the most cultural activity, but there are new things to see and learn. For example expresso coffee – in Sweden it is only available in special shops, here it’s available in the standard supermarket! It’s not a very big deal – but it brings up the question; why so? Who benefits from it? Would be cool to see this selection in Sweden!

It’s Thursday the 25, Saint James day, which means public holiday and almost everything is closed. Since Pontevedra is such a nice city we will therefore stay one more day to check out the city.

The weather has been quite strange both hot and rainy, typically Galicien weather. And the walking has been very beautiful, walking in fine small villages.

The pilgrim presence is also very high and there are a lot of pilgrim “creations” along they way. Don’t know the purpose of them but there are lots to find out studying them.

As mention, lots of fine things here and we do hope for an interesting day tomorrow!

Wednesday the 24 of July, we have been on the run or more correct on the slow walk for almost a month, and still not in Santiago … but we are getting closer!

We have mostly been walking uphill in a beautiful landscape! Galicia gives us such alp-feelings! And the morning mist is so refreshing however quite short.

What has been a bit confusing with today’s walk is the directions. Quite often it’s straightforward, but today it has been the opposite, arrows pointing in completely different directions. And we, who always follow directions, get confused. As in life in general, when the given path changes or become quite unclear; what to do then? Our solution walking the Camino is to start looking for the bigger picture, how does the change relate to that picture? Walking the Camino the next end destination is the bigger picture, in life it could be a bit more complex – however I’m sure there is always a bigger picture to be found!

Redondela as city has quite an interesting solution for trains! They have put the railroad above the ground! Suddenly you hear a terrible noise but you don’t see anything unless you look up in the sky! What a out-of-the-box solution!

Anything else to say? Well there are a lot of fine statues here …

Tuesday the 23 of June, another fine walk to Porriño! The last 100 km is the most popular part of the Camino and I can understand why – flat walking and many parts in the shadow.

Arriving at the city we spotted following poster;

Don’t want to be rude or “aggressive”, however if people in restaurants don’t understand words like “ice tea” or fries (“French fries”) my conclusion is that knowledge in English is very limited. So how the heck will people understand a word of what Bonnie will sing about? Or will she be dubbed? The first single I bought was a Bonnie single so I like her, but people here must absolutely adore her even though I doubt if they will understand a single word!

Porriño seems to be quite a fine city with a traditional siesta! So we had to wait as everyone else until the evening before we could have a look at shops etc.

And the shops are quite interesting, looks like the Porriño version of “Victoria Secret” also combine it with selling of religious candles and other items. Interesting combination, sin and forgiveness in one place – quite convenient I may say! What about dentist & candy store?