Camino Primitivo

A. Forsangrada to Baleira

September 12 2023

We were on the road at 8:00 am sharp this morning.  It was still just slightly dark but then it was very foggy. In fact the fog was so dense that visibility was probably less than 75 feet.  The fog has been burning off by about 10:00 am but this morning it hung around until closer to noon.  

As we proceeded along a tree lined trail we could see where all of the spiders had been busy spinning their webs as the heavy dew from the fog had coated the webs. The larger webs shone brightly in the sun which was coming through over top of the fog.  

The day's hike had two really large hills each being around 400 meters.  The hike up the first hill took us close to three hours as it was so steep.  The climb down was slippery from the rain and dew in the air.  We landed at a coffee shop at noon so we had our lunch before tackling the second hill.  It wasn't quite as tall but it was just as steep.  By the time we got to the top of the second hill I was close to out of water.  I was sure glad to find a second stop with about 7 kms to go.  I purchased a big 1.5 liter bottle of cold water and drank half of it down right away.  

The last 7 kms seemed to take forever to cover even though it was mostly down hill.  Bob's Camino book lists this day as one of the hardest of the route and I believe it.  My Garmin watch gave it 27.52 kms and 800 meters climb.   Glad to be in by 3:30 pm.

Terry