Stage 35 – Castañeda – O Pedrouzo
Total Distance – 25.1 km (15.5 miles)
Adjusted for Climb – 25.9 km (15.5 miles, accrued ascent 160 m = 0.8 km)
High Point: Alto de Santa Irene at 405 m (1,328 feet)
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This picture that was taken by Sue that morning shows me packing what she called my “TARDIS”. Dr. Who fans will readily understand her fascination with how much I stuffed in my Mountainsmith Day Pack.
The picture above is one of three pictures (Three! An all-time low!!) that were taken on this stage. Was it the excitement of Santiago being so tantalizingly close? Did I just want to get on with it and just get there? Possibly. It certainly would have been understandable considering that I had been walking for over a month and really was I that different from any other peregrino? I think not.
Sue and I started this stage together but little did we know that we would not complete it together. At first we were walking together just fine but 12 kilometers into the when we stopped at Casa Calzada for a coffee Sue told me that she had injured her leg and could not continue. I was worried because we were almost halfway done with this stage and I hoped that she could recuperate enough for tomorrow and Santiago. Over coffee we devised a plan that would have her take a taxi to O Pedrouzo and find us a place to stay while I continued on foot.
This day was truly a blur for me. Nothing memorable happened on my way to O Pedrouzo and this may have been either due to my excitement, anxiety and/or determination to get just a little closer to Santiago. Whatever it was I got to my destination to find Sue waiting for me at a restaurant on the main street of town where we had a coffee before heading to the casa rural that she had found for us. Our strategy while in Galicia was not to try to find albergues to stay in because we felt that they would be full by the time we arrived. Instead, we relied on casa rurales or pensiones for our accommodation thinking that they would likely be available to us and luckily for us they were.
The courtyard of the casa rural where we stayed the final night before arriving in Santiago.
michaelspilgrimage 