Day 41 – Melide to Arzua

Day 41 – May 13 Melide (Km 53) to Arzua (Km 39) = 14 km – Cumulative 705 km

“Arzua, Province of A Coruña, Galicia 08 05 13 20:04

Hi Just a quick check in since your Mother has already sent you the news of the day. Today we are 38 km from Santiago, 2 days march so we are on schedule for a Thursday completion. More details then.

dad”

“I am in Arsua today and just happened upon a free internet. I have hiked to the edge of town to meet the hikers as our pensionne is a little difficult to find. Nothing much exciting. Last night Sue Dick and I had pulpo for dinner. Dad wasn´t going to touch it with a 10 foot pole! Pulpo is octopus. This was cooked in red wine then snipped into bite sized pieces, pile onto a wooden plate and drizzled with oil and paprika ( the paprika was hotter than we have in Canada and had quite a bite to it). The pulpo was a nice firm textured white meat but the sucker part was a little rubbery! The meal was very rich with all of the oil. Today they are hiking 15 km. Bus cost me 1.20€. Tonight our rooms are in a little family run business... an older couple who seemed happy to meet me and to know that I was from Canada. I’m getting quite good at asking directions and following the gestures but not the words. Today the man said terminus and I got the message to go to the end of the road. Sue has just arrived so I’ll sign off.

Love Mom”

From Sue Schubert

“A 13 K day
Rainy but not cold

Jean has become more valuable than we ever imagined. Besides doing her usual front (wo)man activities, she now finds the very best pastry shop in town! We arrive early in Arzúa and have the entire afternoon to scout out the sights (church complete with nuns); a general store and the pastelería. Our pensión is run by a (very) old couple. On the third floor of an old building, our accommodations have a common street-facing balcony, glassed in, which, in spite of the overhead clothes line, allows us a cozy setting for cocktail hour. So instead of looking at Dick´s washed underwear tonight, it just drips on our heads.

Arzúa´s general store is a highlight of the day, a local gem filled with everything from knick knacks to hardware, food to souvenirs, stuff that must have been on the shelves for decades, maybe centuries! Consuelo, the owner with her husband, and I have quite a chat. She is very unhappy with Spain’s president Zapatero. He isn’t helping the people to a better economy, only putting money into the pockets of the already-rich. There are a few rich at the top and mostly poor. Sound familiar? (We see an inordinate number of old stone homes and farms for sale on our path.) They pay too much in taxes; have too many immigrants and not enough native births. And, they aren’t rich like the U.S. I couldn’t convince her that our country is going the way of theirs. And even though she doesn’t long for Franco to be in power anymore (yes, I know he has been dead since 1975), things were on more of an even keel under him, according to her. Of course, they were! If you crossed him, the Guardia Civil would make sure your dead body went into one of the many common graves in the Spanish countryside. We had our photo taken together and I promised to send her a copy.

Tonight we find a small restaurant that opens early (American style) and have a fabulous homemade tourist menu, 12 euros each: fish soup, jamón and white asparagus, and potroast. Yum. The ubiquitous flat-screen TV. is on in the restaurant, as it is in all bars. Loud, annoying.

A few more observations about the pilgrimage. Pilgrims wear most anything on their feet: boots, Teva sandals, sports shoes, Crocs, etc. The trail can be sand, mud, moop (mud mixed with cow poop), sand, slate, granite (with or without mortar), brick, asphalt. What am I missing? Who knows.”