Day 9 - Pontevedra to A Armenteira - 22.8km

Today started out less than ideal (I would say shit but my parents read this blog). We only have a 16km walk today so we can have a slow start and explore pontevedra and i could get a quick shave and haircut before a relaxed walk.

But first breakfast. We found Lola and Lia in pontevedra. Have a quick look on google. Eggs benedict, juice and coffee should be an amazing start. It was STONE COLD! Who wants cold toast with cold ham/salmon, cold sauce and cold poached eggs. So cold that the white is runnier than the yolk.

They got sent back. The next ones served up were almost luke warm. Almost. Less than ideal.

I was hungry so just ate it. Sod it. Mum couldnt face cold, runny egg whites so returned it and decided to look elsewhere. They still tried to charge us for both but I think mums face persuaded them otherwise.

So we went to a local pattiserie and mum looked and said croissants look ok but no, lets go back to the bakehouse we saw earlier.

I spotted a barber shop so stopped to wait for a haircut whilst mum went to get a sandwich. She returned 10 minutes later to ask where the croissants were as her sandwich was brioche and sweet. Off she went.

They had sold out of croissants. She finally found another place and got a ham and cheese croissant. It was "crap". Well at least we have a terrible sweet sandwich and 3/4s of a crap croissant for lunch!

My haircut took 45 minutes as it seemed most people went there for a chat rather than a haircut.

The start of the day was less than ideal.

We did get to see a couple of lovely churches and at 10.30 we were ready to set out on our easy day.

However.

Mum questioned the route which I had got from a website called Stingy Nomads - they have great details and routes and options for the camino. It wasnt the official follow the yellow arrows route. We should follow the proper route.

The proper route was 5km longer. Our short 16km day is now going 21km. Not ideal at 10.30!! It did however turn out to be a good idea as it had some lovely bits of path and a nice little church!

The first 5km out of pontevedra is extremely busy with the pilgrims from the central and coastal routes all meeting here and setting out. After this a sign pointed out the spiritual variant.

To top of the less than ideal start mum has a blister on her little toe. So the first hours included a few stops for various compeed, blister popping and plaster applying moments.

There were some lovely sections walking very narrow paths, and through some woods with nice chats with other pilgrims.

At 12.35 we arrived at the Monastery de Poio. It closes at 1! The lady taking tickets was very clear it closes at 1!! Less than ideal!!

We legged it round eyes flicking over the mosaics and art work, mostly admiring a stone statue that looked suprisingly like mum has all morning.

We took a moment to reapply compeeds finally getting it right and making the walking much easier! We also "enjoyed" the leftover breakfasts.

We stopped for a beer at Combarro to prepare for the hill. There were three big hills yesterday. Todays 1 hill has the same elevation as all of yesterdays combined.

Galician bars often give pinchos with beer. Its awesome. Order a small beer, and get a free small snack. This time we had little bowls of spag bol. Banging. I also had a little "special tapas of the day" which was a mini burger. It was fantastic!!

We commenced the hill. 5km of constant uphill. We were so looking forward to it expecting a lovely narrow path in the woods. However in keeping with the Camino Portuguese it was tarmac for 80% of the way.

And the heavens opened. We put the ponchos on and trudged our way up the asphalt.

We bumped into Agata again - a lithuain girl living in Manchester. We met her a few days ago then saw her again in our accomdation last night. She is very chatty so we had a good chin wag as we all made our way up hill, the rain eased at the top so we were given some nice views over the estuary, with its multitude of mussel farms. Finally the path turned to dirt and we had a few nice kms before it narrowed and we made our way down over the last half hour to reach Armenteira.

Its a small place with one hostel - in which we have a lovely twin room and bathroom with an amazingly hot shower - 2 bars and a monastery. Leg stretching done we had a quick beer before visiting the monastery, making our way through to the cloister for the pilgrims blessing by the resident nuns. It was a lovely moment with pilgrims from many nations recieving a blessing for the rest of our journeys.

The only bar in town looked like dinner was going to be on par with breakfast but the portions were mega and the price great! We had 2 big main meals, 2 glasses of wine and 2 beers for the princly sum of 30euro. Bargain!

I hear my bed calling. Lets hope a good sleep leads to a better start tomorrow!!

Night night!