Day 1 Porto to Villa do Conde

I guess I’m still an amateur at this long-distance walking thingy. I decided last night that I would set off from Porto with clean clothes so I did a hand wash of my polo shirt at the hotel. The charming receptionist had told me at check in that the towel rail came on for a couple of hours each morning so I carefully draped my soaking shirt over said towel rail. In the morning it was obvious that the towel rail had not come on. So, weather was too damp to dry the shirt by tying it to the outside of my rucksack…so I put the soaking clammy shirt on which did dry it surprisingly quickly although it was pretty rank at first.

I started by taking the metro out to the starting point at Matsinhos. Funny to think that that was going to be the last bit of powered transport for the next fortnight. From now on, the only thing that will take me from A to B will be my feet.

The route isn’t particularly well way-marked but you’d have to be a moron to get lost -just walk North and keep the waves to your left. Bit tricky to get wrong.

Atlantic waves

It was a bit squally today and I found myself taking my poncho on and off. At one bus-stop, as the rain had stopped and the sun had appeared, I took advantage of a covered bench to take off my poncho, repack some stuff to rebalance the pack etc. spent five minutes doing this much to the amusement of a woman standing there waiting for a bus. She was even more amused when I, now ready for a sunny walk, stepped out of the shelter and promptly came back as a heavy shower arrived. Spent another 5 minutes getting ready for a wet walk. I like to think that I cheered her day up.

Managed to stroll the 16 or so miles along mostly boardwalks. Quite a delightful experience, walking along springy, wooden paths. There was one section in a wild-life area where I managed to get a bit lost (see comment about moron above) but generally a good walk. I met a nice couple from Tubingen, near Stuttgart, who were surprised to meet someone who had been in their neck of the woods within the last few weeks. This route is clearly hoping to capitalise on the Camino industry as the entrance onto the boardwalk made clear:

Welcome to the way

Villa do Conde is a nice little town with a long aqueduct dominating the skyline. It says something about how good Roman engineering was that I just assumed that this elegant intact structure was Roman whereas it’s only 300 or so years old. The guest house (the yellow one in the picture) was charming and I had a room overlooking the river. I decided after the walk I needed tea and cake which started a bit of a trend with another Englishman and two Australians following suit and an Irishman accusing us of living as stereotypes and demanding to know what we had done with the cucumber sandwiches.

Evra Doce

Dinner with Joe from Warrington and Liam from Donegal followed. Strikes me that there is much less blister and bad feet talk so far. I expect that Dave from Australia had it right when he said that everyone he’d met on the Camino Portugues had previously done the Camino Frances – so we’ve all learned a bit about foot-care. I wonder if I will be quite so smug by the time I arrive in Santiago.

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