Today I walked 20 km along the Caminho de Santiago de Portugal.
I'd like to tell you that I had planned it, or that seeing a shell on the street made me the desire to walk...but in fact not, absolutely not so.
I'll tell you this little story...but you have to promise me to don't laugh at me. Well, me also I cannot just whatever. If I think on about that I laugh a lot.
Yesterday morning I took a Blablacar to go from Leon to port. I was in Oviedo, in Asturias (Spanish great Celtic region).
Then I took a bus in the morning at 8.30, and 2 hours later I arrived in Leon. I had slept very little because the night before I was to a typical Asturian music concert (Celtic).
I had booked an apartment with Airbnb, in Porto. The owner tells me that it is not in Portugal, then I have to meet another fellow Pole who comes after 21, and that therefore if I arrived I soon agreed to go downtown to visit and get calmly to the apartment (which is 1 and a half km from the city centre).
The guy who's picking me up with his car, Pedro, was born in France but is of Portuguese origin, the son of Portuguese immigrants in France.
It's his first time using Blablacar, he'd never used before. Coming from France, the Basque country, has crossed the border and arrived in Leon following a little bit what are the areas of the Camino de Santiago.
In the first approach we knew both that we're in sync, and that will be an interesting journey.
He ask me if I was in hurry, and if not he propose me to visit the old city of Leon, and that if I hadn't no objections we can go get some coffee in the historical centre of this beautiful city.
I obviously accept immediately, since I had no hurry to get to port and wait for the polish man of the apartment until 9pm (it was 3pm)
Pedro is a wonderful person, and a great connoisseur of Portuguese culture. During the trip gives me a lot of information and a bunch of pointers to survive in Portugal, and makes me realize how easily I fall in love of this country, its history and its culture, and especially the food.
We arrived in Port at around 8pm, and decided to have dinner together since niether we were in a hurry.
When you drove me to the apartment, no one answered the intercom. We tried the owner's phone number, nothing.
Pedro has not lost heart and asked me to come with him to Santa Maria da Feira (its destination at the home of his cousin), taking a night in a hotel and sort all the next day with Airbnb in Porto couldn't find anything cheap to spend the night. And so I did.
A small detail: Santa Maria da Feira is 30 km from Porto, and I hadn't a clue. The hotel was way out of my budget, and out from Mary of Feira.
I could rattle me and pass me the night miserable, pissed off with the world and the Universe. Instead I decided, like for quite some time now, to pretend nothing and remain happy, since there were other solutions.
Night at the hotel at 4 stars, terrific breakfast, I spent one night like god (I am used to couchsurfing on sofas, or sleep in Pilgrims hostels with room for 15 people who snore and smell,it is not the best).
I wrote an email to Airbnb telling it all before bedtime, and away in the arms of Morpheus.
This morning after breakfast, I asked the front desk how was I going to get to Porto city.
Answer: it's Sunday, no bus, taxi option 40 euro or ... from there passes the Caminho Portuguese to Santiago!
After a half-second of temptations to blasphemy, I felt as the luckiest man in the world! The Caminho!! I am a pilgrim! And I thought 100 times to resume the journey since I finished, every time I saw pilgrims to Oviedo (Oviedo the Camino Primitivo for Santiago) I was homesick, and today I had the chance to walk again with my stick and my will to live!! Great!
That's why today I put "the Wanderer" and I took a walk with an immense joy.
In Portugal there are not very many of pilgrims as in Spain, and Portuguese people believes the pilgrims like heroes.
After 5 min walk, stepping in front of a bar and a man calling me and offering me fresh water! Was delighted to see me! He offer me that I could get whatever I wanted from the bar, and forbidden to pay!
As you can imagine, around every corner at every village had access to food and fresh water. I didn't expect really.
Some pictures of my Caminho now:
Tonight when I got to the hostel I had booked, I found the customer service email Airbnb I confirmed repayment of the night at the hotel and free cancellation of booking.
Moral: I spent one night free in a 4 star hotel with breakfast, I took a piece of the Caminho de Santiago Portuguese, I met a lot of people and I am super stoked!!