Leaving Llanes

(When choosing the first picture for this post, this train sitting in the station at the start of the day turned out to be an interesting omen!! It looked like a luxury Orient Express type of train that I could imagine coming back and taking one day....)

Spent much of the previous evening weighing the pros and cons of taking some mass transit to ensure I got to Ribadesella by the time the post office Correos closes at 2:30. It also happens to be closed tomorrow for National Day of Spain. So I made the kind of difficult (but I think very practical) decision to walk for a few hours this morning along the coast and then hop the train to Ribadesella.

Boy did that turn out to be a mistake! :). After deciding to take an alternate route along the coast in the on and off rain, which was absolutely stunning, I arrived 20 minutes before the train was supposed to pull into Celorio at 11:06 a.m. it never arrived and I waited over an hour. And then realized my next option was a bus at around 1:32 a couple of towns down the road so I walked back up to the coast from more views along the way, then went back for the bus.

When I got to that bus stop, it was literally an intersection, with no markings anywhere, but there was a bar next door so I went in and none of the dozen people spoke any English, so using Google translate (after ordering a beer and getting some very nice free ham Croquettes that she was passing out!!), I was able to figure out that the bus did come through sometimes a little late.

To make sure I got to the right place about 100 m down the road, one of the locals as he was leaving the bar walked with me then pointed to the bus stop, which was just in front of a home and with no signs. When the bus finally came 15 minutes late, the bus driver immediately scolded me for being at the wrong place.. even though clearly I was not a local. Even with being on time I had very little time to make the post office, but we were running late. Somehow he made up some time and as we pulled into town I asked to get off just before the station because it was closer to the post office, he refused, I had a relapse into being a New Yorker, and ultimately after being dropped off at the station ran to the post office and made it with 9 minutes to spare!Read more