Camino Pilgrim

I can feel that certain muscles in the legs have limited mobility and are somewhat tired. It mainly comes out when walking uphill. I had a bit more frequent and longer breaks today, which made the whole day longer overall.

From Santullan to Castro-Urdiales the walk went super fast. I barely noticed the kilometers pass and the scenery was lovely. Castro-Urdiales itself is a very fancy looking city, but prices for everything are much more sensible than in San Sebastian.

Walking further from there was not as nice. It followed a big national highway and did not go that far from it. Still, there was a gorgeous stretch where the road went between the ocean and the highway. You walked across green pastures with animals and birds around, while having cliffs and the ocean nearby.

Past that scenic part of the Norte, there was again more of the highway. Most pilgrims seem to be encouraged to take a shortcut and walk the whole day next to highways. I did not feel like getting faster and further was the way I wanted to go at the moment and followed the main route, which again did a circle in the hills before heading back towards the ocean.

The walk in the hills today was a bit less nice. Mainly because, also away from the highways, you were still close to a big car road, but only for two kilometers. After that, it was just a peaceful time in the countryside.

It took a bit of time today to even have a picnic next to a village grocery store. The weather was just lovely and in my mind there was no rush, because pretty much no pilgrims would even walk through Liendo and be using the highway shortcuts instead.

I was wrong. The small village albergue had only one bedspot left over when I arrived in the evening. I was lucky, otherwise I might have needed to push onwards to Laredo and then would have partially walked next to the highway to shorten the road.

Because I was lucky, I can take my time again tomorrow and take the long scenic route next to the ocean. I think another two days, around 30 kilometers daily (max), is needed to recover the feet enough to even consider adding some extra later on. I need to listen to my body.