O, O, O Cebreiro

Made it to O Cebreiro yesterday, and onwards to Triacastela today. Rained both days. Welcome to Galicia, indeed - Galicia, Spain´s most northwestern province, is the rainiest province in Spain, with, according to my guidebook, rain at least once every three days.

The trip up O Cebreiro was mostly okay (only about 10km), until the last part which was cold and rainy and very windy - about what you would expect going up a mountain in Galicia. The hostel was the first experience with Galicia´s pilgrim hostel network. Unlike most other provinces in Spain where the pilgrim hostels are operated by local governments, here in Galicia they are centrally managed by the province, since Galicia is very proud of the Camino (and probably all the tourist dollars it brings in, since Santiago de Compostela and Finisterre, the end points of the pilgrimage routes, are both in Galicia). The accomodations were decent enough, and warm, but no Internet, which appears to be the norm for government-run pilgrim hostels in Galicia.

So today, several of us (the Italian, as well as a Canadian girl, Australian guy and German man that we´ve sort of travelled with today, and two of the Italian guys from earlier, though the Canadian and American girls aren´t staying here) checked into a private pilgrim hostel, which costs a bit more, but is smaller and has Internet, along with other amenities such as cheaper laundry, so it works out about the same. Since I don´t know how many public vs. private pilgrim hostels I´ll be staying in over the next week, updates could be sparse.

Today´s hike was about 20km, and it was cold and rainy most of the way. The rain finally let up in the half hour before we got here. I even saw the sun peek through the clouds in the distance, though not anywhere nearby. Maybe tomorrow there will be sun?

Tomorrow, on to Sarria. About 130km left to go to Santiago. Hasta luego!