Walking the Camino de Santiago

Sept 2-

“Birds flying high
You know how I feel
Sun in the sky
You know how I feel
Breeze driftin' on by
You know how I feel
It's a new dawn
It's a new day
It's a new life
For me
And I'm feeling good” - Michael Buble 

Hit the trail this morning walking down to the waters edge in Porto and the view was spectacular! This is a whole new environment now that the Camino Coastal route is in play. Walking along the edge of the Atlantic Ocean will be my view for the next couple of weeks.

From the moment I hit the trail today, I started seeing other pilgrims also heading out on the path. This is something I’ve not seen up to this point. As we would each pass each other on the trail, the traditional Bom Camino greeting came into play. I met a couple from LA, a woman from NY, and numerous others from Germany, UK and Australia. It wasn’t too long before I was walking with two guys from Germany who both were “freshies” starting their first Camino’s from Porto. Luca and Christian would be my trail buddies all day today. We walked together, chatted and stopped for coffees/snacks together the entire trail. For their first day, it was impressive they walked the full 33km that I was walking.

The photos don’t really represent the beauty of the views today. While we did have a partially overcast day, that even included a little bit of rain (which required we break out our ponchos to protect our backpacks) the views of the ocean, along with the salty smell of the air, was a welcome change. The temperature was cool but not too cold.

Today was a long, but fairly flat walk on the Camino. The distance for today was a long one for a single day. Having the company of a couple of trail buddies made the time go by much quicker. The distraction of the ocean and beaches along the journey didn’t hurt either.

The destination today is the town of Vila do Conde. Vila do Conde is one of the oldest settlements in northern Portugal. Geological artifacts dating to the Paleolithic have been discovered in this area. In other nearby parishes there have also been discoveries of implements dating back to the Bronze Age and Neolithic periods.

As the three of us got into town, we split up, as I was staying at a different accommodation than Luca and Christopher. Later in the evening we met at a nearby restaurant for dinner and then headed down to the water to watch the sun set. Overall it was a great day.

My thoughts: It’s so nice walking along the coast and a drastic change to the last couple weeks in the central region. Having some buddies to walk with made me super happy. Even if they are “freshies” 😁 We plan to walk again together tomorrow bright and early. I’m feeling very grateful and blessed to have the opportunity to be here. I’m definitely “feelin good”.