- Time of past OR future Camino
- Several and counting...
Day 0
London to Ponferrada
I haven't really got the time free for this pilgrimage but let that not stop me! It's ten years since I first walked from Lourdes to Santiago. I think this is my 12th or 13th time on the Camino path. Strangely it is almost 2 years since I've been in Spain, as last year I walked from Canterbury to Brindisi. And this year from Brindisi to Thessaloniki, through Albania and North Macedonia. I'm still hoping to continue to Jerusalem but won't have time until the latter half of next year. So this trip on the Invierno is to maintain 'match fitness' and because I've always wanted to do it.
I had booked my first possible departure day (Tuesday 22nd) without remembering that I have an appointment in North Wales on Friday1st. I'm flying straight from SdC to that meeting. So I have possibly 9 walking days. But that would not give me a full day in SdC and my plane on the Friday is 0640. So I plan just 8 walking days and two nights in SdC. Which means Camino de Invierno not ideal. BUT not impossible if I 'squeeze'. I've booked a hotel in Ponferrada and that is the full extent of my serious planning, which is about the same as usual. I plan as I go!
Planet or not, there is no realistic alternative to flying, and so I booked Stansted to SdC. Very cheap - I guess part of the problem for the planet is that flights are too cheap. But that is for another day. I currently live in SW London and Stansted not ultra convenient. I got local bus at 23:30 to Kingston. I haves Turkish lesson on Monday night in central London and didn’t want to miss two, so couldn’t move until after this. From Kingston I took the airport express to Heathrow then the coach to Stansted arriving about 02:30. Stansted was looking like a transit camp with many people stretched out on the floor in sleeping bags. Ominous announcements were saying this is not allowed and implying that sleeping only allowed in chairs, in an upright position, and announcing that people who infringed would be woken up!
From 0400 you can check in which was generous as my flight not until 0800. Then you can progress to the palace of conspicuous consumption which is what most terminals have become.
Flight was straightforward, and coach to Estacion de Autobuses in Santiago. Time for a snack then a long but comfortable coach trip to Ponferrada via A Coruña and Lugo. If you check map you will see that this is a counterintuitive route. It's always nice on the coach to pass backwards alongside that part of the Camino that heads from Tricastela to O Cebreiro.
So after 18 hours of travel, five buses and a plane, I reached Ponferrada. And that's why I has booked a hotel for the first night. Hostal Miguel is next to the covered market and opposite an unusually-named but pilgrim-associated lingerie shop (lencería) called 'Lourdes'! I think this was the extent of the 'city view' the website promised!
Ponferrada has a storybook Templar castle and a basilica. I’ve been here many times. It is a sleepy place.
There is Mass at 8pm in the Basilica and after some light refreshments that is where I went. And here I was rather surprised. The town is not exactly throbbing with pilgrims, but I saw dozens around the place. So I was surprised to find only ONE pilgrim at the Mass. I went for a blessing at the end of Mass to a very elderly and quite tiny priest. Everyone else, about 25, was a local. I'm not complaining - I feel what others do is their own business - but this seemed to me a noticeable change from ten years ago. And it made me feel a bit sad.
I had a nice supper and slept well, believing up to then that sunrise would be at 0738! I have a long day tomorrow as I have decided to go to Puente de Domingos Flores, rather than finishing at Las Médulas, to try and gain a little time and distance.
London to Ponferrada
I haven't really got the time free for this pilgrimage but let that not stop me! It's ten years since I first walked from Lourdes to Santiago. I think this is my 12th or 13th time on the Camino path. Strangely it is almost 2 years since I've been in Spain, as last year I walked from Canterbury to Brindisi. And this year from Brindisi to Thessaloniki, through Albania and North Macedonia. I'm still hoping to continue to Jerusalem but won't have time until the latter half of next year. So this trip on the Invierno is to maintain 'match fitness' and because I've always wanted to do it.
I had booked my first possible departure day (Tuesday 22nd) without remembering that I have an appointment in North Wales on Friday1st. I'm flying straight from SdC to that meeting. So I have possibly 9 walking days. But that would not give me a full day in SdC and my plane on the Friday is 0640. So I plan just 8 walking days and two nights in SdC. Which means Camino de Invierno not ideal. BUT not impossible if I 'squeeze'. I've booked a hotel in Ponferrada and that is the full extent of my serious planning, which is about the same as usual. I plan as I go!
Planet or not, there is no realistic alternative to flying, and so I booked Stansted to SdC. Very cheap - I guess part of the problem for the planet is that flights are too cheap. But that is for another day. I currently live in SW London and Stansted not ultra convenient. I got local bus at 23:30 to Kingston. I haves Turkish lesson on Monday night in central London and didn’t want to miss two, so couldn’t move until after this. From Kingston I took the airport express to Heathrow then the coach to Stansted arriving about 02:30. Stansted was looking like a transit camp with many people stretched out on the floor in sleeping bags. Ominous announcements were saying this is not allowed and implying that sleeping only allowed in chairs, in an upright position, and announcing that people who infringed would be woken up!
From 0400 you can check in which was generous as my flight not until 0800. Then you can progress to the palace of conspicuous consumption which is what most terminals have become.
Flight was straightforward, and coach to Estacion de Autobuses in Santiago. Time for a snack then a long but comfortable coach trip to Ponferrada via A Coruña and Lugo. If you check map you will see that this is a counterintuitive route. It's always nice on the coach to pass backwards alongside that part of the Camino that heads from Tricastela to O Cebreiro.
So after 18 hours of travel, five buses and a plane, I reached Ponferrada. And that's why I has booked a hotel for the first night. Hostal Miguel is next to the covered market and opposite an unusually-named but pilgrim-associated lingerie shop (lencería) called 'Lourdes'! I think this was the extent of the 'city view' the website promised!
Ponferrada has a storybook Templar castle and a basilica. I’ve been here many times. It is a sleepy place.
There is Mass at 8pm in the Basilica and after some light refreshments that is where I went. And here I was rather surprised. The town is not exactly throbbing with pilgrims, but I saw dozens around the place. So I was surprised to find only ONE pilgrim at the Mass. I went for a blessing at the end of Mass to a very elderly and quite tiny priest. Everyone else, about 25, was a local. I'm not complaining - I feel what others do is their own business - but this seemed to me a noticeable change from ten years ago. And it made me feel a bit sad.
I had a nice supper and slept well, believing up to then that sunrise would be at 0738! I have a long day tomorrow as I have decided to go to Puente de Domingos Flores, rather than finishing at Las Médulas, to try and gain a little time and distance.
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. None is in the sports hall - they probably have good pensions - and can stay in good pensions.
! 
