Day 44 – Trabadelo to Las Herrerías

Walked today: 7.2 miles

Walked Camino 2019: 318.2 miles

The skies looked threatening and our weather app said rain in 10 minutes, so we prudently put on our rain gear before leaving the hostal and walking through Trabadelo.

The paved road through the village continued for a half mile or so

and then rejoined the crash barrier walkway again.

We stopped for breakfast at a huge truck stop and hotel complex, took off our rain gear as blue skies appeared, then walked through Portela de Valcarce (pop. 37).

We stopped for a brief visit and photo of a small church.

We also took a photo of some lookalike statues that we”ll try to duplicate and mount on our driveway back home.

We walked through the villages of Ambesmestas (pop. 46) and the fairly large town of Vega de Valcarce (pop. 703). A shop in Vega had Camino handcrafts of every kind you could imagine for sale, but we kept walking realizing anything we bought, we would have to wear or carry.

The further we walked,

the more lush the landscape became with streams, green meadows and the approaching mountains of Galícia.

We finally reached Las Herrerias (pop.44), our destination for the night.

This small village is literally at the end of the road, which becomes a path through the forest, then a steep “wash” up the side of the mountain, then a path again, climbing up the side of the mountain until it reaches the top, some 4 miles later at La Faba and finally, O Cebreíro. We know this, because we did it in 2017.

As soon as we arrived the clouds moved down the mountain and a light drizzle, cool wind and dreary sky forced us indoors for most of the day.

We had a menu of the day in the dining room at 1:00, all to ourselves, save for a late arriving pilgrim cyclist. We then retired to our room and tried to keep warm and dry for the rest of the day.