Early breakfast then set off to station loaded with bikes/bags etc to catch the train to Barcelona. Arrived an hour before our train and we’re very glad we had. It’s survival of the fittest out there. With limited space allocated for luggage and almost every person with suitcase to say there’s a rush at the gate would be an understatement but we were up to the task! Taking a tram approach we lined up early and approached our carriage ina pre-emotive swarm. Our 30kg bags made it firmly to the bottom rack- and we were well and truly relaxed in our seats before the big luggage debarclle began trying to accomodate the other 30 or so suitcas s.

The scene early was pretty bland on the way over- green farmland mainly and pretty flat for most of it. Arrived in Barcelona just before 3 and in our hotel soon after. A short break the off to explore.

I can see we are going to enjoy Barcelona already- while a big city the thing that instantly struck us was the presence of street trees- even on the busiest roadways- something we haven’t seen a lot of since home. Being Sunday lots of families were out and about but most stores were closed.

Didn’t go too far afield. Finished with dinner at what turned out to be quite a fancy restaurant – BBQ pork mini tacos for me (delicious) and of course the mandatory Sangria – which we are all addicted to and seeking out the best recipes for when we get home.

Off to bed- have a 3 hour walking tour in the morning which hopefully will give us some ideas of places we want to go back and explore in more depth.

Set off on the early train to spend the day exploring Toledo. As we’ve come to expect the morning was foggy so views from the train were limited. The journey took only half an hour- with the screen showing we were travelling at up to 230km/he in some areas. There’s no doubt the European train system leaves ours for dead for speed, reliability and comfort.

Arrived in Toledo just before 10am to find the guide for our walking tour already waiting for us.

First stop was the ‘panoramic lookout’ – shrouded in fog but a teaser to come back once the fog had cleared.

We then spent a couple of hours walking the main monuments- reflective of the three main religions that lived side by side until the ‘cleansing’ by good old Ysabella and Ferdinand back in the late 1400s. From then on in it was all Catholicism.

Toledo is renowned for its pottery and its swords. In fact the train line between Toledo and Madrid is the only public transport route on which one can legally carry a sword – made me scrutinise my fellow travellers on the way back!

heading to Barcelona tomorrow for our last couple of days – can’t believe our adventure is nearly over…..

Arrived in Madrid lunchtime Thursday after arguably the most stressful hour any of us had ever spent in a car. Madrid while not an enormous metropolis takes traffic/road chaos to a whole new level, while simultaneously defeating any GPSs ability to keep up. After being led by Siri round the same 6 lane roundabout 5 times in search of the Avis car return yard, we followed a raft of taxis into the central railway station -Therein followed a lot of negotiation (begging really) on my part to convince a taxi driver to drive me to the Avis car hire – a mere 300m but apparently in a google maps black hole- and allow David to follow him in our rental. Not sure if my offer of 10 Euro clinched it or the fact I was desperately clinging to his door handle but either way he agreed and we were there. Found out later Rick and Bei had the exact same experience but a Good Samaritan local did it for them for free.

Most of Madrid so far has been walking and eating. The hotel is poorly located for the attractions but extremely well located for food/eateries. We have been eating our way around the local restaurants like true Spaniards- 2 to 3 course lunch round 1, siesta, then dinner round 8, sleep then repeat.

Madrid has everything on a much bigger scale than the other cities we’ve been to – it’s a city of monuments, and wide promenades spread out over. a large area. Regardless we’ve done our darndest to see the major sights over the last day and a bit.

Spent the day following a self guided tour of the ‘old town’ today. Salamanca is a UNESCO world heritage town. Like most of the UNESCO towns we’ve visited it had layer upon layer of buildings from different historical periods – Roman, Moorish, Gothic etc. , and old and new cathederal (with a somewhat dodgy definition of ‘new’ – 15th century). All buildings and streets were well preserved – it seems like Spain has more $$$ to put into preservation than Portugal. The city is also much less hilly than other cities we’ve explored which made it harder to justify the ‘eat everything we see’ approach we’ve used to date.

Salamanca also hosts one of Spain’s biggest and oldest universities- so buzzes with students.

We’ve now adapted well to the Spanish eating patterns. Had an enormous lunch in a local restaurant – after much use of google translate we chose meals which ended up remotely resembling what we thought we were ordering. Finding the Spanish food tasty but quite salty – not sure if it’s just this region or a whole of Spain thing- will need to eat more to see!

Tomorrow we are heading to Madrid – last day with the car.

Retrieved our car from the public car park where we’d had to park it overnight round 9 , and putting our full faith in Google maps pointed our noses towards Salamanca (our stopover en route to Madrid). GM told us it was a 426 km journey (true) which should take 4.25 hours ( total porkies).

Once again we set out in light fog with the promise of a sunny day. As has become the trend, getting out of the city was a bit hair raising, but once we were on the highway the early part of the trip was fairly unextraordinary – on wide interlinking highways with all towns bypassed.

We had organised to meet Rick and Bei in Ourense, what looked on the map to be a relatively small country town about an hour out of Santiago. Turns out it was a city of about 250k people (don’t know how we missed that small detail). First challenge was to find a park – and navigate the parking instructions in Spanish- challenge two was to find each other! Challenge three was to navigate the route out again to continue our journey.

David and Rick took the opportunity to get some manscaping done – they popped into what looked like a barbers- turned out it was a ladies hair and nail salon – they had a vacancy and so – job done. There was lots of lively chatter among the girls working there – no idea what they were saying, but were pretty sure it was about us!

By 1.30pm we were back on the road, fed, coiffed and good to go.

Heading into central Spain meant mountains, and much of the afternoon was driving above the snow line. It was a beautiful mix of snow and sunshine. The roads were pretty rough and ready – lots of potholes, likely from the high volume of trucks using them. It took it.s toll on the running board of our rental – which vibrated loose. But we are nothing if not resourceful – with a bit of jiggling and Rick’s masking tape we were able to stick it back on – let’s hope it holds!

Arrived in Salamanca round 6.15 (so much for 4.25 hours!). Too tired to explore, opted for an early night instead and exploration tomorrow. Pretty sure we’ll need our winter woollies.

Today we set off by car (thank goodness) to Cape Finnisterre – which is on the far west coast of the Galicia region and the very end point of the Camino for those who want to go beyond Santiago de Compostella to where the body of St James first landed in Spain.

Wouldn’t you know it the one day we are NOT on the bike the sun shone all day! It made for beautiful views of the countryside and coast.

We explored the fishing village of Finnisterre and lunched right on the waterfront. Paella for two was enough to feed a small village but we were up to the task (nearly)

Got back to Santiago in time for siesta followed by yet another amazing late night (for us) seafood dinner. No idea how our bodies are going to adjust back to normal eating hours when we get home.

a quiet day today. Walked through the cathedral – which was surprisingly way less ornate than others we’ve been through . Being a Sunday the organist was playing .

wandered the streets – with newly purchased umbrellas, window shopping as all except souvenir stores were closed. Then headed back to the hotel for the big bike pack up. Split the bikes up, bought them to our room, showered them to get the dirt off – only marginally easier than showering the dogs- dried them (on our towel no the hotels) and re-did the giant jenga. Amazingly cases weigh a bit less than coming over even with the few items we have purchased – but we were able to dispose of a few things no loner needed.

Finally cleaned the room/bathroom to leave no trace of dirt/bike muck. What they don’t know……..

Set off at 9.06 (to be precise) to complete the last leg of our ‘Way’ – it felt pretty momentous to know that today would be our last on this trail. We only had 25km to cover but we now know from experience that distances are a poor indicator of challenge over here. But we made it!

Just to prove consistency it rained from the get go and temperatures between 6 and 11 degrees made it particularly punishing. The ride was an interesting one weaving its way through the narrow backstreets of villages allowing us to sticky beak into peoples back ‘yards’ – mini vineyards, choking pens – every house seemed to have a dog eager to bark at us, and narrow lanes seething with cats – the definitely wouldn’t have a rat problem here. Some roads, particularly as we drew near to Santiago but also lots of forest paths.

We stopped for our last pilgrim lunch today and boy did we need it. Most cafes put on hearty pilgrim meals including vegetable soup and bread (hits the spot for warming up), meat/fish and potatoes/chips and a drink (coffee for us). Was hard to drag ourselves out of the warmth and back into the rain.

As we got closer to Santiago there were more and more walkers on the route as the various ‘Ways’ merged. It was an amazing (and quite emotional) feeling coming in through the narrow streets to the cathedral – with young pilgrims cheering from the bars as the probably celebrated their own achievement.

And then we were there. – four drenched and bedraggled cyclists and 2 muddy bikes hanging on to their chains by a thread. Of course they don’t actually let you into the cathedral – not without a booking anyway- so that will have to wait for another day. We lined up to get our final stamp , present our credential and receive our certificate at the Santiago pilgrims office – feeling very proud of ourselves.

And just when we thought we’d finished we had another 600m ride to our hotel – while it is only 150m from the cathedral, it’s on the ‘other’ side of the cathedral from the pilgrim office!

By 4pm I was showered and tucked up in bed soaking up the warmth – exploring and food can wait until later , as can dissembling the bike – eeek! We are staying a stones throw from the cathedral and can see it from our window – but importantly can also hear it! Those bells ain’t quiet!

The most challenging day so far today. Only 35km but over 700 vertical metres of climbing.

Tra path from Vigo to Pontevedra was away from the coastline all day with just glimpses of the sea from above. Some lung busting hills that required a bit of walking- however pushing the bike uphill is nearly as hard as riding it. It rained for all bar the last 8km.- so on this pilgrimage our sins are certainly being washed away!

Hotel is cheap and cheerful with a fabulous owner who is an ex-professional cyclist- very lovely character who happily shared a beer with us.

But irs a successful day if you get to your destination and arrive we did. By 5.45 we were sitting in a bar waiting with hungry anticipation for the restaurants to open for dinner at 8.

Woke to crisp but dry weather this morning, trundling down to breaky round 7.30. Spanish hotel breakfasts aren’t quite as extensive as the Portuguese ones – which might be a blessing for the waistline – so we scoffed everything they offered us and hoped that we’d find cafes along the route.

Set off round 8.30 all feeling a tad weary and a bit uncertain about the big hills shown on the gradient today. As it turns out our worries were unfounded – the path was much flatter than we expected (or perhaps we are getting a bit fitter), and the weather smiled at us, with some clouds but also bursts of sunshine which had us stripping down layers.

It was quite a beautiful ride to Vigo- the path was up high above the coast serving the dual purpose of protecting us from the ferocious coastal winds and offering up fabulous views.

We stopped mid morning at the halfway mark in an absolutely packed cafe (again mostly with men) in one of the villages. They plied us with turros (donuts) cake and coffee which gave us the oomf we needed for the second part of our journey.

Arrived on the outskirts of Vigo round noon and it took almost 45 minutes (and a few grey hairs) to navigate the busy city streets to our hotel.

After a quick shower we headed out in search of lunch and an afternoon of exploring. Found about the last restaurant open before siesta and had their daily specials – steamed mussells.

After lunch strolled through the city – ending up down by the docks. I have to say these Spanish certainly take siesta seriously – hardly another soul out on the streets.

Strolled back to the hotel just as the city was waking up. Now in room having our own siesta.