Last day...Salceda to Santiago

The albergue was fantastic, but there were some heavy-duty snorers in the bunk room. Michelle and Brian slept through it all, but Emily and Lucy had to find refuge on the lounge room sofas mid-way through the night.

We got up at 6am and had cold pizza and diet cokes for breakfast. The weather forecast was for rain all day, and it was correct in its prediction. There was no damping down of our spirits and enthusiasm, though. We could not believe we were on our last day of the camino, excitement levels were high. We had a great walk together in the mud, puddles and rain. The scenery was beautiful; lush meadows, magical forests with tree branches reaching over our heads, waterfalls, gushing waterways and pretty homes.

There was a quick 2nd breakfast stop for tostardas con mermalada and coffee. When we re-joined the Camino after 2nd breakfast we could not believe the shear volume of walkers on the way. It was incredible, and we had not seen this before.

To get your Compostella you need to complete 100kms of walking so many people begin their camino in Sarria and today we meet them! (Not us we did the 800kms), including a school group from Ireland, a total of 50 students plus teachers, who started 3 days ago from Portomarin and were extremely excited to be finishing today.

We had one last Camino lunch and chanced upon a very clean and well run bar. Tostardas, tortillas, coffee, magdellanas, and diet cokes was our last super. We will miss the feeling of being hungry as a result of walking long and hard. At almost no time on the Camino are you walking flat. We feel we have gotten much stronger physically over the past month. We considered ourselves to be fit before we started, and although we didn't struggle with blisters, injuries, or with the long days, it was a big physical challenge and not suitable for all.


On entering the Santiago Compostella Plaza we were super happy to be there, and there was a lot of others there too. We took a quick photo to record the moment and decided to come back early the next day to go to pilgrims mass, maybe take a more orderly photo or two and welcome in some of our friends we had meet along the way who are due to arrive in.

We found it easy to collect our certificates (Compostellas) and were shortly after reunited with our pre Camino suitcases, which meant clean dry shoes and clothes.

We are in a little modern apartment for two nights and are currently adjusting to not walking and not being in a different Albergue every night. It is quite something to process. We must admit the thought of three touristy days in Portugal are very appealing, and we are looking forward to them.

We will post more photos tomorrow as sunshine is forecasted.Read more