Day 44: Castro Dozón to Silleda

The rain came and it went. It came and it went. It came again and went again. Sometimes with wind, sometimes heavy. It was a day marked by rain. It was also a long day of 28km, the longest of this stage. 

We began the day well with Mass at the lodging. After a coffee we then headed back, by taxi, to the village of Castro de Dozón to pick up the Camino once again. So we went directly to the bar in Castro for breakfast. The ladies running the place weren't really set up for breakfasts - toast, croissant, etc - so we each had a large bocadillo of Cea bread with serrano ham and cheese, with coffee. While we were eating, a group came in the bar. It was hard to work out how they had come together as a group. Later, I discovered they were a group of randomly brought together tourists organised by the regional government tourist board. I ended out speaking at length to one of them who was from Uruguay later on. Interesting conversation!

After yesterday's failure to find any lunch, we were keen to keep to one of my maxims: go to the first bar you find. So, within 4km, we had stopped at a very friendly little place for another coffee. From there we journeyed from village to village, along rural pathways towards our lunch stop. Only one steep path in this section made it rather easier than yesterday!

We made it to Botos by Spanish lunchtime. On arrival in the village we saw there was a place offering lunches. It was one of the old-fashioned bar/restaurants with tremendous value for money lunch and lots of workers eating together. I had lentils and pork knuckle. Others had been beans with chorizo and hake. All were satisfied with the food and with the price.

The rain and wind really got up as we left the restaurant and walked up the hill, through the village and onto woodland paths. These paths continued for a time till we got to the N 525 main road again and a nice place to stay: María Carmen's restaurant. It had a bar area with a real fire: so we sat there to try to dry out, took on some liquids and some of the homemade Spanish tortilla which was kindly offered. A quick change of socks was good too as they had got wet and I wanted to avoid any blisters.

The last 8km to our target was tough. We saw from the map that the official Camino went well off the direct route, marked by the main road, and took in a deep river valley. It was unpleasant walking by the main road getting sprayed by lorries and cars going past. So we found an alternative minor road which took us through a lovely rural stretch and then around the less beautiful industrial estate of Silleda. As we entered back onto the main road for the final ascent into Silleda town where we were staying tonight. We arrived very tired with the darkness already fallen. A very light supper and a bottle of beer was enough for us, tired as we were.

So we have seen the distance to our target drop from 69km to 41km. Very close to Santiago now! Only two days till we arrive.