Well for a day that looked from the forecast as though it might have been drier, it sure was another wet one. Nedjo was awake in the night but he finally fell asleep and we both slept later than usual. It’s not getting light (with the time change on entering Spain) until 8:30ish. Since we had to be out of the hostel at 9:30 we decided to just pack up and get coffee and breakfast later, since the next town was less than 3 kilometres. But that cafe was closed and so it went with every seeming possibility looking long abandoned. Giving up on finding a cafe, we found a beautiful spot by the beach, right next to some salt pans, for hazelnuts and melba toast—a scant but welcome repast.
We had dry walking for the first hour or so and then once it started, the rain never really stopped. The day’s route was often a little bit elevated, looking down to the beaches, roads and villages below, and that meant we had more ascents and descents than some days. There was also some road walking, but again with the broad, and painted yellow, shared bike and pedestrian way.
The rain and lack of food was making us a little grumpy with each other. Finally a larger town came into view and amazingly it was our town, Baiona, since we were making this a short 14 kilometre day. We were so excited and found our rather swish hotel (Pazo de Mendoza €65, including breakfast) - kind of castle-like actually - very easily. The very sweet person at reception was more focused on what she thought was our excellent Spanish than on our dripping, bedraggled selves. I love that about the hotels on a camino route, they seem to take us as we come.
Showered, we headed out for a restaurant with a menú del día we’d seen posted on our way in. We thought we’d scored and were into our drinks waiting to order when it was clear something was amiss. It turned out the cook was sick, so we needed to search out another place. There were lots of restaurants but nothing with a menú which was what we were after. But eventually we found Taverna de Abuela and they squeezed us in even though it was already 3 (their usual cut off time). We had excellent potato tortilla, fried merluza (hake) fillets with potatoes and salad and flan for dessert. Excellent! Of course we walked home slowly and then napped.
Later we explored the fort, climbing up to the walls, chatted with a couple of fellow peregrinos we knew, picked up groceries and had ice cream. Nedjo made a second foray out for paper towels, which we used to stuff our boots to help them dry. We rigged up a line in the palatial bathroom and hung our socks by the open window. The luxury of a kettle and herbal tea made for a welcome bedtime drink after the day’s drenching. There is a lot of rain in the forecast but after today we’re not sure we can count on that.