Day 29 - Vega de Valcarce to Fonfria

Day 29 - Vega de Valcarce to Fonfria

Sunny

You will not see any pictures of the hard climbs. We are just too busy trying to negotiate the slope, the rocks or the dirt and we want to keep whatever little momentum we have and carry it to the next step. It just takes too much work to start again after stopping.

There will be other climbs but today was a tough one. It's just one slope after another. In total, we gained 650 m in altitude but with the many down portions figured in, we climbed much more than that. Everyone is talking about O Cebreiro. It is a small town that we breezed by without knowing we have past it. It also was not the highest point today. Alto do Poio is higher but it is even smaller. 

We were planning to stop earlier because of the tough climb but we reached our original destination at 11:20 am, way too early to stop so we kept going. We ended up in Fonfria just after one pm. Although that was in the original plan, we thought that is too tough to do with the ups and downs. So we are very happy that we pulled it off.

Fonfria is tiny and there is only one albergue, but with 86 spots. The bed arrangement is unusual. They have two big rooms with the usual arrangement of bunk beds. But they also have one room that has triple beds; upper bunk that sleeps one and lower bunk that sleeps two. After this many days, it will be weird to have another person in the bed.  We expect that much fewer people will require a double-bed lower bunk so this room will be quieter.

There is also not much else in town so we joined the pilgrim's community dinner offered by the albergue tonight. Good wine, good soup, beef with rice and Santiago cake. More food than enough is always good. Hostess Angela ran the show. She cooked, served, collected dishes, took pictures for the pilgrims and collected money as well. 

That is not the mountain we climbed, but about the same height

Leaving O Cebreiro