Camino de Muxía, Etapa 2 – Negreira to Santa Mariña, 21.1 kilometers

I woke up at 5:30 am in a coughing fit and clambered out of my top bunk, trying not to wake everyone in the albergue. Dragging my blanket with me, I went to the common area in the front of the building to work out my cough and gather my wits. The 1 euro vending machine coffee was the magical elixir. By the time my cough cleared, wits were gathered, and coffee finished, most of my fellow pilgrims had arisen and departed. Back to my normal position, one of the last to leave.

I stopped for first breakfast before leaving town (the vending machine coffee doesn’t count) and then set out. There is some good architecture on the edge of town, but more intriguing is the sculpture at the end of the plaza (in the center of the pic above). It makes a simple, yet strong social and economic statement.

If you time your exit from Negreira just right, you can see a great sunrise at the Iglesia de San Pedro de Gonte, just up the hill and out of town. From here it’s a nice walk (with a fair number of ups and downs) through the forest to the Albergue Cafetería Alto da Pena, perfectly placed for second breakfast, if you can make that atrocious climb up the stairs to the bar. It’s worth the effort.

In the glut of Camino information, there could probably be more detailed info about staying in an albergue (shared bunk space). I’ll do my part by sharing two pictures from my stay at the Albergue Casa Pepa in Santa Mariña. The first picture is of me flat on my back alternating between reading the graffiti on the bunk above and craning my neck to admire the excellent rock work in this building. The second picture is what I saw when I rolled over on my right side. Note, not all albergues are as plush as Albergue Casa Pepa. But even in the less-plush-than-Casa-Pepa, I generally enjoy albergue life, it is a key part of the pilgrim experience.

This was a great place in off-stage Santa Mariña, fully self-contained with machine wash & dry, a bar, café, pilgrim meal, and a general store. Their hospitality was the icing on the cake.

I fell in love with lentejas last year while walking the Camino Português, eating them every time I had the chance. In my experience that best ones were served as tapas from the bar. In the mid-afternoon at Casa Pepa (after the nap), I straggled down to the bar for a Rioja, and this was the bowl of lentils that came with my wine. The owner-hospitalera-mesera wanted to fill this bowl to the brim but I stopped her before she emptied the last ladle. I’m not a glutton.

Later on in this walk, I will discover another legume-based dish that will take the place of my beloved lentils…