Camino Portuguese

I’ve adopted “Narrow Road” by Josh Baldwin as my theme song for this walk. Take a listen!
Friday night- Made it to Esposende. It is a really nice resort town. The Main Street is all waterfront and park. Staying in a hotel that I at first thought was really nice. Now I think it is really nice- in an Overlook Hotel kind of way. It has lots of character as old hotels do- but there is definitely a creepy element here.
I took kind of a circuitous route to get here. There are actually 2 different coastal Caminos. The one I thought I was on was the traditional one, but sometime today I noticed that I was no longer on that one. There was a pilgrim from Norway- Vidar. He and I had been taking turns passing each other and had stopped at the same place for lunch. Anyhoo- he saw me looking confused and told me I was on the Senda Litoral, but I should just stay on that cuz it’s the better one anyhow. Turns out Vidar had already done the Portuguese Camino both there and back. Did the traditional coastal and came back the Litoral- so he knows from whence he speaks. (He has also done the French route. Kind of an over achiever if you ask me). So I stayed on the Litoral but then started to wonder if that was gonna end up being longer so decided to cut over to catch the traditional. But that looked really far so I just consulted Google maps and went where they told me. And it ended up being a really pretty walk even though I was on it all by my lonesome.
Met a couple of angels today, both named Maria. Neither spoke a word of English but we ended up being able to pantomime our way through. The first 2 pictures are of one of the Marias and Vidar.

It’s Saturday and I’m about 1/2 way through the day’s walk. I started on the coast but the boardwalk had given way to sand, (no me gusta), plus it’s a hot day and no shade on the litoral. So I switched over to the coastal. So glad I switched. It’s been a beautiful walk, through some towns, some woods…. Right now I’m sitting under a tree in the courtyard of a beautiful church. Seems to be a popular pilgrim resting place. But the route has become quite hilly.
Ya know- people are generally very kind. I stopped at a little cafe to have a cold sparkling water. The owner brought out a jar of biscuits, honey, jam and a little bowl of peanuts in the shell-(and I had just been thinking yesterday about how much I miss peanuts. It’s true what they say- the Camino does provide!). He filled up my water bottle and stamped my pilgrim passport without my even asking. I have met a couple of girls from Miami, a very nice woman (Silva) from the Czech Republic - she was traveling with a friend but the friend had gone ahead. Then another woman from the Czech Republic, Katerina, who was doing her 1st Camino and was on her own. Her son was an exchange student in Kansas last year.
I am feeling that things I have been thinking about, reading, and listening to are beginning to synchronize.

On the playlist today- Simon and Garfunkel. Best lyric- “I get all the news I need from the weather report”. (Only Livin’ Boy in New York).
The church bells just rang and there appears to be some kind of mass. Time to get movin again!

The pictures of people I meet I am including for me to remember. But there are some more scenic pictures too!

So I was gonna end this when I left the church but then a mile down the path was this little canopy area and a guy, Albero, who had a whole little supply hut with fresh fruit, chips, beer, sparkling water- even a little espresso maker. He only asks for donations. So awesome!Read more