A good night’s sleep was not had by me at the pensión. Although it was a private room, I had to share a double bed with Ella and it was not at all relaxing, not helped by the fact that it was very cold.

So we got up to a cold and damp room this morning and put on our cold and damp clothes and set off in the rain. To add to the pain, it soon became obvious that we had missed a direction and needed to retrace our steps. However we didn’t have to go far before finding the correct route, and before very long it stopped raining. And that was it. It didn’t start again. Not at all. Not even for a moment. It was a dry day, and we even saw some blue sky eventually.

The walk was very pleasant, cutting across the countryside via tracks and quiet roads. We are still having to climb steep hills although we are heading towards sea level by the end of our journey today. We pass through several villages and stop after 12 km for some breakfast. During the second half of our walk we came across three separate women walking the trail in reverse, which was extremely difficult for them because there were no markers in that direction, and it was virtually impossible for them to judge which way to take.

The way makers have changed each time we have crossed into a new region. In Navarra they were almost impossible to miss, there were so many of them. In La Rioja there were posts every kilometre. In Castilla y León they were more hit-or-miss, but still plenty of them. In Galicia, initially there were markers every half kilometre, but since leaving Santiago there have just been markers only where it is necessary to make a decision, and if you happen to be walking on the wrong side of the road (as we were this morning), then it is very easy to miss them.

All in all though, we have been looked after well by the camino and its guiding arrows.

The walk today was so very much more pleasant without any rain to dampen our clothes and spirits. Then at 12:30 pm, whilst descending a forest path I suddenly glimpsed my first sight of the sea through the eucalyptus and pine trees. It was a lovely bright blue, and as we emerged from the forest we could see the full expanse of the ocean. Quite magical, and so lovely that it remained dry.

We still had approximately 5 km to walk to Muxia, but with the sight and sound of the ocean it was a much less arduous task.

We are now ensconced in a bright and shiny new albergue, with more than sufficient facilities. We have washed and tumble dried all our sad damp clothes and are setup for the last day of our journey tomorrow, when we head off to Finisterre.

At the moment (6:30 pm) there is quite a lot of cloud, but the sky is also lit by sunshine and I am hoping that we will be lucky enough to catch a glorious sunset this evening. I will hold off posting this blog until after sundown so that I can hopefully include a photo of the sunset.

Sorry, no sunset. I walked quite a way to find the spot where it would happen. There were several coach loads of visitors, but I managed to take a few pics without the hordes. It would be nice to go back at sunset but it will be too late and too cold, so these will have to do.