Camino de Santiago Portuguese - Day 8

Daily Overview

• Summary of the Day: 

  Today we slipped out into the cool morning air of the empty streets in Viana do Castelo at seven-thirty and headed for the last place we had seen a yellow arrow a few blocks away. The yellow arrows mark all the Camino routes throughout Portugal and Spain. Here’s the problem: in some cities, different routes of the Camino converge, and Viana is one of them. The Portuguese coastal route converges with the Camino Coastal (litoral), which follows the coast more closely. The formal coastal route goes inland much more along the way. We had been planning to continue on the more formal coastal route up into the mountains, but we were having a hard time knowing which yellow arrows to follow. Even the GPS on my phone was giving confusing information. In the midst of that, we encountered a German woman we had met earlier, and she showed us the arrows to the formal coastal route. Around the same time, we ran into another German gentleman who said he was doing the Coastal Litoral route because it had less elevation

  (basically fewer hills) I had been missing the walking beside the shore from earlier in the week, so we decided to change our plan and go that way. The challenge with that is that the path is not as well-marked, and there is less “support” infrastructure. We were thrilled when we encountered a cafe near the beach with exactly the foods we needed for lunch, bread and cheese, and bananas around one o’clock. We were so happy to be able to sit and have lunch there as other pilgrims came and went. There was only one section over the entire fifteen miles we walked today that was genuinely difficult to walk and navigate, and that section was less than a mile. We were getting pretty tired when we got into Moledo, and we were very relieved to find our guest house was only a few blocks from the path.

  
  

  When I was a little boy growing up, and my parents put me to bed, they would always say, “Good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite”. As a child, to me, it was a joke. Around one o’clock in the morning last night, that funny bedtime routine came back around. I woke up around one a.m., and I was thinking I don’t remember getting bitten by a mosquito on my leg. I’ve been wearing long pants all week. Lying there, still not getting the memo. How did a mosquito get into this room? And finally, I haven’t seen a mosquito since I have been here. OH NO! I’ve been bitten by a bed bug.

  Four times in fact! Sandy was asleep and oblivious to the situation, and I was trying to figure out why they went after me and not her, and at the same time, trying to figure out what to do. Then I realised she was sleeping in leggings and I was sleeping in shorts. I rummaged through my pack and found my long underwear bottoms that I brought as a base layer, and put those on with some socks. After that, no more problems during the night, but now I have four pieces of my precious clothing isolated in a plastic bag until I can put them in a very hot dryer or drench them in scalding water and hang them out to dry.

  Bed bugs can be a problem on the Camino because everyone is “bed hopping” all the time. from one place to another every day, and it’s not just hundreds of people, it’s thousands. In any case, as much as I hate having a mosquito loose in my room at night, this is just a little bit worse.

  
  

• What we planned to do: Today, our plan was to leave Viana do Castelo early in the morning and head to Moledo, fifteen miles to the north. We originally had planned to continue on the regular Camino Costal route that tracks inland, but we altered our plan and took the coastal (litoral) route that tracks right along the ocean. That way, today was beautiful beyond measure.

The Day's Focus

• Topic: Guidance is the key

  Yellow arrows are not enough; the GPS on my phone is not sufficient, even knowing the way by heart or following someone else is not a substitute for being guided by God . It’s the only way to find my way with certainty, and that guidance can come in as many different ways as you or anyone can imagine. It can come from a casual conversation with a stranger or an offhand comment from your spouse. It can be glaringly bright or as quiet as a whisper.. The greatest challenge with this guidance is not recognising it when I see it, but it is in knowing full well that I can’t find the way without it and functioning every day from that reality.

• Word for the Day: Dependence

• Scripture: Isaiah 30:21 Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.

• Spiritual Practice:  Pick one area in your life where you have been struggling to find the way and make a list of three ways that God might be guiding you.

Moments and Images

• Beautiful Spot of the Day: 

  

  Sunset over the Atlantic as seen from the beach in Moledo

• Spiritual Meditative Moment: Watching the sunset over the ocean together with Sandy

• What Church We Saw:

  

  

  Here are pictures of a couple of churches we saw on the way out of Viana do Castelo this morning. Since we were mostly on the coast today, we didn’t visit any churches.

• People we experienced:  Navigating our way out of the city this morning was challenging, but we encountered an older German fellow who helped us decide which way to go

• Unexpected Surprises: A beautiful forest glen with a clear stream canopied by shade trees it was most certainly an enchanted place.

  

  forest glen

• Animal/Nature or local life: 

  

  Some pilgrimages take longer than others

Camino Portugues Video of the day

Reflections and Learnings

• Reflections from Today: It’s fine for me to walk with others, but I must find my own way and follow it. I cannot presume to tell anyone else what the right way is for them because it is up to them to discover that, and I cannot allow someone else to dictate to me the way I must go because that is for God alone.

• "Well, that was hard" Struggling to get through one poorly maintained section of the trail. Sandy lost a rubber foot off one of her trekking poles. It’s a big deal because a lot of the coastal Camino is decking planks, and you can’t use poles without tips to walk because they are pointed on the end and get stuck between the boards.

• "What helped me today": Two people who helped us navigate out of Viana and a British couple outside Ancora who didn’t even know what the Camino was but helped us find the right way into town.

• "Something I learned": There is something worse in the insect world than a mosquito

• "Insight for the day": The earlier you get going, the sooner you’ll get where you need to be. Ok, sounds trite, but it’s true on the Camino, and it’s also a metaphor for life

• "Mystical occurrences": We encountered a German woman on our way out of Viana this morning, and she was planning to take the traditional inland coastal route while we decided to take the more (litoral) path along the ocean. Eight hours later, we met her again heading into Moledo, occurrences like that are what happen on the Camino.

Daily Conclusion

• A look at our Compostela (pilgrim passport) for today

  

  These stamps were collected over six days of walking. We stopped at the tourism office in Âncora today to get a stamp, and I asked the lady behind the counter how many stamps she gives out each day, and she said 100 to 125. A Compostela with two stamps for each day of travel is required to get your certificate when you arrive in Santiago. It is intended to show your actual progress.

• Gratitudes (1–3 things I'm thankful for):

  That we were able to find the route we were supposed to take today

  Finding a wonderful little cafe along the coast in the middle of nowhere for lunch

  Walking through a beautiful shaded glen after walking in the sun most of the day