Phew! It’s been a long day. We were lazy, Dorothy woke me at 7:30 and by the time I’d got my wits together and we’d finished a short diabetic coma inducing breakfast it was 8:30.

I mentioned last night’s dinner but didn’t remark on the French family who were eating at the table next to us.

They consisted of a young girl of six, a boy aged eight, another girl aged eleven, a second boy aged 12, mum and dad. They started walking three months ago in Le Puy en Velay, 1,300+ km away! Mum was inordinately proud of their achievement but the children were fractious, tear stained (last night) and seemingly not quite as proud as mum.

Back to our day.

Today was most remarkable not for the journey but for the butterflies which were simply everywhere, continually criss crossing in front of us and fluttering around seemingly randomly until they discover another of their species at which point they spiral around each other furiously before conjoining momentarily and then continuing on their way. We may indeed be in the midst of insect Armageddon but in this part of the planet at least butterflies appear to be in rude health.

It was again a day of glorious flowers starting with these.

Shortly after we came across this fine gentleman.

Suitably inspired we bounded along.

Another feature of today’s walk, at least for the first 10k+ or so was the proximity to the viaducts ubiquitous to this region. They were rarely absent from view, but not usually quite so close.

The following image doesn’t convey the essence of this plant, the touch of which is like velvet. It reminds me of the bat that flew into our house once which I caught, held gently and experienced the most astonishing sensation of softness. Bats, moles and hoary mullein – simply gorgeous to touch

Today’s journey was an almost step by step repeat of the hardest day of any Camino that we’ve walked – April 12th 2018. (https://pererindod.com/2018/04/12/fonfaria/). So I thought that I’d repeat some of the images starting with this chap.

In contrast to 2018 the weather has been glorious, 26 degrees at its peak with nary a cloud in the sky. As always there are the ubiquitous Spanish brassicas.

I didn’t notice these two fine people last time.

After a recent session, Anna, our gentle ophthalmologist assured me that as we age we all develop cataracts with the result that colours become muted. Little old ladies after cataract operations suddenly realise that the much loved subdued pink jumper they’d been wearing was anything but, hence the term ‘shocking pink’. I disagree. Flowers are more richly coloured to my eyes than ever as with this common chicory flower.

And the ever present poppy

The ascent to O Cebreiro is fairly tiring rising 480m over 5km, a gradient of close to 10% Dorothy found it particularly hard on her back and hips and engaged in an impressive range of callisthenics at regular intervals in an effort to keep both under control.

I have the back and hips of a Welsh pit pony so need of such public displays.

There were plenty of cheerful looking free range chickens en route most of which waddled across to greet us, presumably hoping for the odd crust and waddling away again shortly afterwards disappointed.

At the foot of the climb to O Cebreiro it’s possible to hire horses to carry both rider and pack to the top. It costs €50 per person but it’s clearly an attractive proposition for a certain type of person. Uncharitably I assumed such people would be fat and unfit but the four who passed us today were slim and healthy looking so why they needed to be carried I’ve no idea. The horses looked well fed and healthy and were led up the path by a chap who walked fairly sedately and carefully. The pace was comfortably less than a healthy geriatric with a large pack was able to manage but there’s no accounting for either taste or motivation it seems.

Dorothy tired as we approached the top

We stopped a couple of km from the top for a drink and a chat with a handsome Alsatian who insisted on sniffing my ankle, presumably detecting my brief flirtation with a beautiful retriever who had popped across to say ‘hi’ earlier.

Some more flowers …

We stopped for some food at O Cebreiro before deciding whether to continue to Fonfria or call it day and look for lodging there. Dorothy felt comfortable enough to continue so we retraced our steps of 2018 once more only this time without the heavy snowfall that made it so hard to walk. The relatively short route through the trees that took so long last time that it left us absolutely exhausted took us no more than 20 minutes.

There’s a fairly brutal last section climbing up to Alto do Poio that needed a last effort before the final 3.5km gently downhill to Fonfria.

We arrived, roughly 32km from our starting point at 19:00, some ten and a half hours after starting out. Ultramarathons are apparently essentially eating and drinking events with some running thrown in for entertainment. So it is with long distance walking. Our walking pace on flat ground is typically 5 km/hr, on steep sections such as St Jean to Orisson, a distance of 7.6km, we typically take 2 hours, so an average of 3.8 km/hr. Today was lots of stops and starts, three breakfasts, two lunches washed down with perhaps a couple of litres of water each. Two haribos, a dozen cherry tomatoes, a vegan chocolate nutty bar and a chocolate cornetto each complemented the main meals. We finished off with dinner here, decent food with friendly, cheerful company, all in all a good day. Dorothy has been lathered in voltarol gel, audibly creaks when she moves but will no doubt be fit and raring to go first thing tomorrow when the aim is to walk to Sarria, the common starting point for upwards of 150,000 pilgrims a year. Hopefully they won’t all be there this weekend.

I’ll leave today’s post with an image of what the owner described as the first children’s PlayStation.

Buen camino