Day 23. Valle do Seo to Portomarin. 60 miles.

Day 23. Valle do Seo to Portomarin. 60miles

After writing yesterday's bulletin, we discovered that the car battery was flat. It's the original battery from 8 year ago. Had it simply come to the end of its life? Recently you we've switched our breakdown cover to Nationwide (it comes with one of their bank accounts), so here was an opportunity to see how it worked. Brendan phoned in the evening to report the problem. It was agreed to phone again in the morning. The engineer arrived within an hour, gave the battery a boost advised be to drive for at least 2 hours today. Great service all round.

So our usual pattern of meeting up during the day didn't happen. B drove straight to the next campsite, at Portomarin, a small town on the shore of what looks like a lake. It's really a dammed up river. The town was rebuilt stone by stone when the valley was flooded. You approach the town over a smart looking bridge, and straight ahead is an enormous flight of steps rising up through a turreted portico into the town. The campsite is off to the right about a mile. Grassy, partly shaded, good facilities, cafe/bar. We're staying here two nights, which will make sense when you read tomorrow's posting.

Back to cycling. It was another cool morning, so the climb up to Pedrafita do Cebreiro proved to be a steady, but not exhausting plod. The gradient averages 4% but there are a few slightly steeper stretches. Fuel was that excellent combination of potatoes (left over mince and tatties from last night's meal, and oatcakes). As time passed, I collected a cloud of house flies - they seemed to like the smell of my sun block (that's being charitable). I didn't shake them off till on the final climb to O Cebreiro. It wasn't that I was cycling faster, quite the opposite, but there was a stiff breeze up that high. O Cebreiro is at 1300 metres. The hamlet includes a cluster of circular, thatched, stone dwellings that used to be summer residences for local farmers when the took their animals up to them summer pastures.

These ones have been restored. The road stayed high up for several miles, undulating a bit, and crossing two more summits, alto de San Roque at 1270m (there is a statue of him by the roadside) and Alto de Poia (1332m).

Just before Alto de Poia I spotted this mountain village graveyard, looking more like a collection of little cabins than graves.

From here the road made a gradual descent for 16 km, with wide sweeping curves and a smooth surface. I got to the foot of this hill (Triacastela) in 25 minutes. The road continues dropping to Sarria, a much bigger town than I was expecting, and not easy to navigate through. The usual white arrows painted on the road as markers to cycle pilgrims seemed to take a break in the town. I saw another cyclist who said he'd come from Santiago and pointed the way for me. His journey started in Lisbon, and he's aiming for France, one of the few pilgrims going the opposite direction. After Sarria, the road climbed for several miles, but, O Joy, the final 8 km were downhill.
Here is the view from inside the tent.

And this is what you see from the terrace of the campsite bar/restaurant. A very fine kitchen garden in th foreground.

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Day 22. Rabanal del Camino to Valle do Seo. 44 miles

After a simple but delicious breakfast at the inn, I was faced with a stiff climb up to the highest point on the whole journey, at over 1400 metres, higher than Ben Nevis. Fortunately it was a very cool morning, which helped. The vegetation became greener as the top of the hill approached. Oak is the main tree, with some pine higher up. Two kinds of heather (calluna and erica) and two kinds of broom (yellow flowered large broom and white flowered smaller broom) form most of the shrub layer. There are occasional wild roses, plenty of bracken and, several smaller flowering plants whose names I don't know. Should have brought a flower book.

Anyone know what this little yellow flower is?

Reaching the Cruz de Ferra proved to be a very emotional experience for me. As soon as I saw it looming over the horizon on the last stretch of the climb, tears came to my eyes.It's an iron cross atop a tall wooden pole supported by an enormous, cairn of stones. There are photos of people, and items such as ribbons, flags, and pieces of cloth pinned to the pole. There is a tradition that here pilgrims place a stone from their home country. For some this may symbolise the laying down of burdens, psychological or spiritual, as a part of the pilgrimage. To me, this place seemed to have a far greater sense of spirituality to it than all the churches I have visited so far. I was thinking of the words we use in our church to begin our worship: "Divinity is present everywhere. The whole world is filled with God. But in certain places and at certain times, we feel a specialty of presence..." This was certainly one of those places and times. I felt exhilarated to have reached this high place, but am conscious that another mountain range had to be crossed tomorrow, with an even longer climb. The stone I laid was taken from the river Liddel at my home town, Newcastleton, in the south of Scotland. Brendan too laid a stone from Scotland on the cairn. We spent a while quietly before messaging our families. B gave me a scallop shell to attach to my bike as a souvenir of the journey.

Downhills can be exhilarating. But this one was scary. Long and steep, with a rough surface and many bends. I hoped the brakes would work. Half way down is a tiny village called El Acebo. I had read that cyclists have died here due to slipping on the paved surface of the road. In fact, the concrete paving has rough stones set into it, so it's a bit uncomfortable to ride through. There was a smooth concrete shallow drain down the centre of the road, with water running in it. But I managed.

Our planned meet up in the next big town, Ponferrada, proved a challenge. The place turned out to be vast, a city of maybe 100,000 or more. But thanks to mobile phone technology we found each other. B unfortunately had a minor tussle with a door in a supermarket. He had been attended to kindly by one of the shop ladies and emerged with a plaster on his nose.

Second stop was in the charming town of Villafranca del Bierzo, in the foothills of the next mountain range. Exit from the town took me through a road tunnel by which the N-IV road traffic could avoid the town centre. That road has now been bypassed by a motorway which runs up the valley on a series of viaducts. Many hillsides have been scarred by construction of this road, and although there is some evidence of landscaping/tree planting, it will be many years before the vast scars turn green, if they ever will. The other hillsides of this valley are covered in lush woodland (oak, with pine higher up).

A gently rising, quite road led me to the camping site at Valle do Seo. A quiet meadow surrounded by trees and with the best soil of any camping site so far.

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