Day 17 & 18 Camino Portuguese 1 & 2 October 2025

 

Day 17 1 October 2025

 And today I walked from  V I A N A Do Castello to C A M I N H A which is on the border with Spain. separated by a river. Instead of crossing the river, I plan to walk on to Tui which is the first Spanish town that I will enter through on a bridge. So, I've booked my accommodation at Tui. It's about 30 km, but it's probably going to end up with being in excess of 30 kilometers. I plan to try and leave around 6.00 am or 6:30 a.m. and get an early start.  I'll be moving inland away from the coast and plan to get to Santiago by Sunday, the 5th of October. That gives me 4 days on the central route. Today was a quite a nice day. Weather wasn't too bad. I met a lovely couple, Julie and David from Wollongong in Australia. Walked with them for an hour or so. Aside from that I thought it was a reasonable walk. There was a few hills and I did about 400 m of elevation. Took loads of pictures. There were lots of cats around, some beautiful spots and some beautiful churches along the way. Uh, just reminds you that the pilgrims obviously um were fervently spiritual in their journey. um and obviously the churches were there to support them. Aside from that, um no injuries and accommodation's been pretty good today. I got in at about 2, but they host didn't check us in until 3:00. It was private accommodation. I got my own room. I had a fish meal. for lunch, which helped at least try and supplement the um lack of food that I've been having. And tonight, I just had a banana vanilla ice cream, which was pretty good. Although, interestingly enough, the Portuguese ice cream tends to be a little bit more sourish. Not sure why, but managed to finish that comfortably. But I still can't eat a lot of food and I'll just try and keep up um as much carbs as I can. Although I don't feel a weakening or bonking when I walk. I am drinking and having Coke and coffee which has helped particularly with sugar. So I think that's helped a bit but I'm not obviously replenishing the carbs that I'm losing. But I don't think that's a problem given that I'm not running. Anyway, tomorrow hopefully once I cross into Spain, I'll have a much better idea as to finishing the the walk in Santiago and I'll probably book my accommodation in Santiago. Then other than that, it's been enjoyable, peaceful. quite a few hours where there's no one around and that's been good.

 

 

 

 Day 18 2 October 2025

Today's day 18. It's Thursday morning. Spent a good night at Caminha. And today's walk is about 35ks to Tui on the SP on the Spain Portugal border. Started early just after 6 and got to see the sunrise. Started in the wrong direction. Walked 500 m before I realized that I was going the wrong way and had to turn back, but managed to get over the bridge on the way to TUI. Had a coffee break about an hour into the walk and making good progress. I was making it a point to wish everyone hello or good morning that I meet. Um And some sections of this particular walk is on the main highway. So the traffic's basically heading at you at 100 kilometers an hour. And that's obviously the only issue with this Camino. There are large sections of the walk on the main road  from Lisbon onwards, but otherwise it's been really Nice, pleasant. Weather's good again. No rain. Might get that in Spain, so I have to be prepared. Just thinking of all the good people I've met, thinking of all the goodness and metta in this world.  and just having equanimity with everything that goes on. I think that's basically the lesson I've learned from this walk. Not to be reactive. 

 

 

I finished day 18 at TUI. That was about 35 kilometers, or just short of that. It's a really hot day, and I had problems getting into accommodation because my data ran out. But aside from that, I didn't have any other issues. Had a really hot thick chocolate and then went to the supermarket and bought some stuff, had a sandwich, olives, stayed in the hotel. It's just too tiring to do any sightseeing.  Spain's an hour ahead of Portugal, so I lost an hour, which made it difficult, and that's why I couldn't get in. Eventually, a young German lady allowed me to use her phone to call the hotel. Well, and they gave me the codes which they said they sent on Booking.com. I then found out that my Esim  data had finished. So, I had to download new data which I had to go to a cafe to do. But at least I got a good night's sleep. Got up early and now I'm walking out of TUI. I haven't booked any accommodation. Hoping to do around 35 to 40 kilometers, get as far as I can and then try and find accommodation.  I know I'm about 112 kilometers out from Santiago, so hopefully I will be able to finish the walk on Sunday. Iam going to try to keep the last day to a minimum amount of walking. That means two big days today and Saturday tomorrow. But Other than that, it's um again not been a complicated journey. If anything, led to really simplify the life to just walking, eating and sleeping, finding accommodation, finding food. Not much else to worry about. The only thing that probably I should have kept away is social media. still reading the news but not allowing it to interfere with my journey and my thoughts ( though the reality we have no control over what pops into our head and are they really "our thoughts" a real lesson in non self  , "annata " philosophy) .