In Galicia

We have left Castilla y León behind and entered the region of Galicia. We left our B&B at about 7:30 after a very bad breakfast, and by 9:00 we came out of an old oak tree tunnel that had taken us all the way up the mountain to the Canda pass, and we saw the sign that told us we had ascended to 1281 meters and that we had entered Galicia. At about 3 pm today, after a long day with a few more ups and downs, and one incident where Dana, Herman (a German man we occasionally walk with), and I got split up looking for a bar, we finally arrived in the town of A Gudiña.

These last few days have been just incredible, we have been walking along rivers, down old lanes with ancient stone walls covered with moss, and tree trunks that are goblin-like in appearance. There have been plenty of opportunities for soaking our feet in ice cold running water, either in streams or in the little canals of water that run throughout the towns we've been walking through. The amount of water running through this region is pretty incredible.

We did have a moon-like stretch today through a part of Galicia where no water seemed to reach. Kind of desert terrain with huge boulders all over the place. But for the most part, we are in green, wet Galicia.

Our last three nights' accommodation have been in private albergue (fantastic, spotless, with clean sheets washed daily), then in a private Casa Rural, the Casa Pachaca (very nice, in an old remodeled stone house, with a great pork chop dinner -- yes I ate pork chops!), and then today we are in the municipal albergue where they give you paper sheets and pillow cover for the bedding (I assume this is an anti-bed bug measure). We have seen a definite increase in the numbers, in fact, today I think there are almost 20 people in the albergue.

Yesterday, in our nice little hamlet of stone houses, barroque chapels, and lots of fountains, we had intended to go to the albergue. When we arrived, and I went upstairs, I saw that we would be pretty squished, well, ok, we can deal with that, and there were lots of people, well ok, but then I heard that the toilet wasn't working -- as Dana said, that's a deal killer. So we headed out to hunt down the pretty little Casa Rural and had a very nice, almost luxurious room in comparison to what awaited us in the albergue. How 20 people can stand to spend the night in a place with no running water and no toilet is beyond me -- and to top it off, the person in charge came and collected 5 € from everyone!

In two weeks we will be arriving in Santiago, I can't believe it. We have some mountainous days ahead of us, and probably rain, but we are well