We walked from Palas De Rei to Melide. It was a walk that went up and down throughout. It rained all day.

Though Marybel had good shoes on her feet, they were not waterproof like her hikers. By the time, we reached Melide, she was soaked completely in her shoes. We originally decided to stay in the albergue O Cruceiro, but changed to the albergue Alpapador instead as the former did not have a kitchen. We wanted to continue cooking up rice and preparing a salad just so we can include some healthier meals on our camino.

Though we had a decent lunch, I could not resist having our supper at the famous restaurant in this city called Garnacha. Why is it famous? For the way they prepare this region’s delicacy, the octupus. I had an order with a side of delicious pimientos (green peppers). The octupus is definitely an acquired taste due to the slimy texture around the meat of the octupus. Once you can get past that, it is quite tasty swimming in extra virgin olive oil and sprinkled with salty cayenne pepper powder.

There is not much else to report on this day for the trek. Not too difficult but still tiring.

We were the only ones at the albergue so the caretaker gave us a key to the albergue, that way we are not locked out after our pulpuria (octupus tavern/restaurant) adventure. She did not want to stay up late waiting for us.

We have been quite lucky in that we have been provided private rooms settings due to not too many pilgrims coming into the albergues we have been choosing to stay at. Two possible reasons for this: some pilgrims have cut their pilgrimage short due to weather (these pilgrims are from closeby countries and can return another time to do the camino in stages) and most pilgrims are choosing the municipal albergues because of cost. Again, lucky us as we pay the normal costs for two beds and get the whole dormitory room to ourselves without paying more. Private rooms are costlier, double or triple the price. We have been enjoying almost the same type of accomodation without requesting for it. The camino have been treating us well.

Our next day trek will see us to Arzua. We will have only Pedrouzo left prior to the Compostela.

Peace and love,
Hilda 🙂