Hector posted detailed daily accounts, including mention of his difficulty in finding food. You could review those threads, but I don't see the point in it now
I wholeheartedly agree. However, I did go back to Hector's detailed account of his walking from SJPP to Santiago. In Carrión de los Condes, he ate in a restaurant and he even bought two sodas there to take with him on the next day. As it was a Sunday, he did not find a grocery shop that was open to buy snacks. No amount of Google Mapping or WiseApping or Leafing through
Brierley now will change any of this.
He does not need any defending but I feel like defending him and the two or three posters who recently wrote about not finding food or not finding quality food (although the tone in one of these posts was not appropriate imo). People on the forum share their experience and that is valid. That's what happened. Maybe others can learn something useful from their experience but no amount of post factum online advice will change the past.
And in contrast to a popular opinion: No, not everyone goes back to do a second Camino and a third one after that. Plenty of Camino pilgrims treasure their experience tremendously but it is a one-off experience for them and there is nothing wrong with it. These former Camino pilgrims are just not visible on this forum.
It is not that Camino pilgrims don't try to adapt to an unfamiliar environment. They do. But there are constraints. I myself know about the Menu del Dia in Spain that is served in restaurant at lunch time only - in contrast to other countries where the concept of a Daily Menu exists, too, but it is served not only at lunch time but also in the evening. In all my 153 days of walking to Santiago and back I never had a three course meal as my lunch - it is just not what I need or what I am comfortable with before I have finished the day's walk. I also rarely arrived at my destination before 3 pm let alone before 1 pm - so I could not profit in Spain from regular lunch time opening times because restaurants were closed by the time I arrived at my accommodation for the night.
I remember one time in Burgos - of all places - where we fancied having a proper meal around 5 pm or 6 pm. We walked around in the Cathedral area / tourist area and could not find anything, not even in a tapas bar! It is not a complaint. Just an observation. And btw I don't need advice about eating in Burgos but I can give some
: La Quinta del Monje! Super! Tapas! And tapas can make a decent evening meal - plenty of Spaniards seemed to think so, too, while we were there.
Pilgrims staying in the typical (not privately run) Camino albergues have more constraints to deal with: Not only do they have to be back before curfew which may mean finishing an evening meal by 8.30 pm at the latest, they also leave at ungodly hours like 5.30 am in the morning as Hector did in Carrios de los Condes so nothing will be open. Also, people and their stomachs may not be keen on having their major meal of the day late in the evening. I/We stayed in private accommodation whenever it was available, i.e. quasi everywhere, and rarely left before 8 am.
The post got quite long. It is just to tell Hector: You did fine!!! And although I do know that one could eat more protein and fewer quickly and easily digestible carbohydrates than one tends to do - I don't do it either and I don't regard my walking to Santiago and back as a failure because of this ...
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