Caminho Portuguese Coimbra to Ponte de Lima

I develop pinpricks in the Achilles heel and neck. Impetigo starts, a highly contagious skin infection, spreading on my hand. But most disturbing is the pain in my shin. Geo and I walk apart and have about 25 kilometer between us at the end of a day. Being a bit before Porto I feel I need a break. That means Geo has to bring himself to a halt too.

We meet in an elderly home run by Christian church that doubles as a hospital and kindergarten where also a dormitory for pilgrims is. But we can stay only one night. Geo books us a room in a private home a bit off the route for the next days and to get there is another walk through uninspiring towns. One neighborhood after the other like clay balls strung on a thread.

This coffee was made by a player of cards heavily emerged in the game. The milk was poured in cold and had become sour. I couldn’t possibly drink it. I left after bringing 1 euro to where the card playing group of men had withdrawn. I nevertheless enjoyed the non-drinking coffee break with composing this image.

While walking I wonder why people like to built their homes exactly underneath high voltage electricity lines. Each home has fake grass and always barking dogs. The most beautiful houses are small and abandoned and elderly people look not too optimistic any longer. Newer homes have a plaque telling me of their security system, just as plaques planted at natural surroundings tells me they train dogs. I don’t believe it a bit and ignore the signs.

Bemposta an incredible beautiful village had a closed off eucalyptus forest. Walking around it gave easy and unseen access to my camp spot.

When there is sun it doesn’t matter where I walk and so walking through industrial areas where the first peregrina that I meet does a lot of effort to pass me, makes me smile. She doesn’t smile and is outfitted with a backpack where a shell and an aluminum cup makes for a constant click clack.

The mountains beckoning in the distance have me rather walking there but as an obedient hamster I follow the arrows and I like it, just as I did when I was a child. Dry mornings where I can wear my favorite shoes I sing ‘tudapatubtum, these shoes are made for walking and walking is what they do’, alongside the daily promise to eat pastels when I reach the town.

I greet a lady along the road. She sits on a plastic chair and wears incredible high heels enwrapped in white fake leather. Indeed, such heels makes for sitting only. A little while later she is picked up by a blue car. In another part of the forest I notice a man fiddling with a white bra at crotch height. For a moment I think he is marking trees, as I have seen uncountable many rubber boots used for marking. This man however has intentions of his own making, since his trousers are undone. Soon, more at ease again in the cafeteria I sip coffees.

The bartender hits the portafilter with loud bangs to the wooden bar of the knock box, which makes me always cringe as the sound is so sudden and loud, but a coffee in Portugal comes with a small price. Ten days of rain forecast is often seeking shelter there. I now coincide coffees with visits to the toilet. Coffees in a dry cafe make me very optimistic (so far, I did not experience wet cafe’s).

Though I notice very strong mood swings. Feeling good, even though the surroundings are one of city going into suburbs, to feeling absolutely dreadful. Seeking shelter in a nondescript gas station café I hear the truckers mumble when I dash out into the heavy rain. Yet, what else could I do?

Not of the habit to throw food out, I am obliged to eat left over pizza. When not camping, with restaurants closed when I want to eat, I am left with very little choice and eat what I actually don’t want.

I meet with two horses along the main road filled with trucks and all sorts of businesses that find their place outside towns (tiles, tires, technicians). The noble creatures with a tiny patch of sand where once only nature surrounded them, now town have grown them in, like an octopus’ many arms. I touch them and the feel and warmth and breath of an animal always brings wonder. As do the not attractive prostitutes hurdled under umbrella’s, hoping for clientele while playing it cool on their cellphones.

When I walk there are no thoughts which I might form when I am between walls, in a house. Suddenly life becomes more quiet, simple and there is a lot less work. It boils down to getting my needs met and walking. I understand the words written by J. Krishnamurti meditation when the meditator is entirely absent.

In Caldas de São Jorge, a day walk after Porto, we meet. All my ailments need a rest (but not in the outraging expensive hot springs). A most normal yet odd village with rain every single day. The hand made pastel box by the grey haired man of 83 attracts my attention.

One day I notice that I keep meticulously on the look out for an abandoned building. At the end of the day my mood has become sour and I notice how I curse the Portuguese people for locking their ramshackle buildings and forgotten factories. Then it dawns on me that perhaps it will not rain tonight.

Bemposta was an absolute highlight for me. The sun shone, the moldy white washed walls and brick structure, the pace of (nearly dead) life and the stunning character of this important place brought me back to India. An ability Portugal has, perhaps because of their colonization past.

There is still no one on the caminho and it feels exactly as how I like it. To walk alone and meet locals to talk to is my idea of getting to learn a country. I am not the slightest bit interested how Jack or Jane from Illinois are doing or what the troubles of Jean-Jacques from Marseilles could be or even the reason why Bärbel from Germany is doing the caminho.

Entering Porto is one of surprise. I had forgotten about the bridge that hangs there and earlier on I had wanted to have some rest days in the city, to visit the bridge but it rains heavily and the atmosphere is one of flood. A torrent of tourists with in between the untrustworthy grim looking guy trying to rip someone off, steal his wallet or whatever he thinks he is able to. One such half baked thug follows me, although that might be because we are on the bridge. When I look at the tourists I feel I have to get away as soon as I possibly can. I do walk past everyone and seem to be rather quick. It still takes me hours to get to the albergue where Geo checked me in and made my bunk bed. Walked over 30 kilometers, wet and tired I arrive in darkness. In an albergue with plenty of pilgrims. I do not know how to interact with them and I never was in the mood for small talk.

When reading the scripts behind Ukrainian Elena, one can make up the overal state of a peregrino. To me it makes no sense to have your mood soured because of rushing from hostel to hostel. Yet, when I enter full of energetic energies it is Elena that barks at me ‘get your trailer out of the way, it makes the hallway wet.’ Duuuuhhhh…..

The night in the dormitory is awful. A man could not stop talking and snorted all night long. A young German angelical girl needed counseling from a veteran peregrina, whether she had asked for it or not, the stocky Swedish woman who cleaned the hostel as a volunteer for only one meal a day, gave it to her. There seems to be a certain energy among peregrino, whereof I know nothing.

Collecting stamps turns out something I like. Some stamps are very beautiful, while others are cute. Can you see the one at Geo’s left index finger?

Porto is where you can choose three routes: coastal (that overlooks the coast), littoral (at the beach front) and central (inland). I long to see the ocean and hope to set up camp at quiet beaches. After a double order breakfast in an old fashioned, roomy neat looking cafeteria, we set off in different directions.

The walk seems clear, freeing the mind from form. I came for stunning beauty and instead I got a quiet mind. It comes to a halt when I suddenly meet a lot of pilgrims, none of them greeting. Although all of them seem German to me and since we both do a similar activity, I find it normal to greet. Just as I do with about every single person I pass. Now the mind is occupied with all sort of thoughts about how to react. When I reach the ocean front I feel a special feeling that oceans usually bring about but is now overwhelmed by conformity that none of the other humans confirm to. Each and every pilgrim, and there are a lot walking the ocean front, are walking in their own bubble and feel superior, or may be not, or in no need to say ‘hello’. The standard ‘bom caminho’, when said by a Portuguese Instagram friend, I came to love the beautiful round syllables of her and thought it so romantic to say that to each other on the trail. Now all that I feel is a broken state of mind, a disturbance on how to act. My mind forming all kind of judgment about the people passing or leaving behind me or coming towards me. Some seem so queer and so angry while others seem in a battle with themselves. Some at ease, enjoying. One woman greets me in my favored way. Tattoos are exploding my vision and cold faces with amphibian expression make me realize I am too spontaneous. Probably I would be labeled as impromptu.

Walking on a wooden boardwalk right at the beach makes it impossible to pee (a challenge I have to succeed, witnessing a homeless man adjusting his clothes unseen from all what’s going on above him). I ask two young marine officers whether it is allowed to camp at the beach and they say it isn’t but they do it anyway, just be out of view of police. I walk on the Littoral Way and it is aimed at tourists, summer apartments lining one side, the ocean the other with on a thin strip between those two, pilgrims that are stoic and stern.

At first I experience the irresistible power of the ocean and her fierce waves, the wild nature, the untouched beach and the distance into which I can see. The sea gulls tumble overhead and soon I see myself walking with the same people. Mostly Germans, in new fresh clothes and a virgin white scallop shell. I notice an ironed crease in a stretchy outdoor trousers. Some under dressed. But no sign of glee. I eat the grapefruit a man gave me the day before and decide to go back to the Central.

I have succeeded to come up with healthy, non constipating meals. This is easy in central Portugal as villages are a non stop given. The trailer is easy to stock up and I won’t feel the extra kilograms.

I open the Google map on satellite mode and walk inland to the first woody patch available. I want to be back among the locals. I want to greet local Portuguese people that have nothing to do with tourists coming to sunbath in season or walk the Littoral trail. I do not want to be on a wooden boardwalk, like a hamster having no options. I want to talk to women running a cafe, eating their homemade cake and not understanding each other but yet being able to communicate. I don’t mind being the oddball off the caminho as long as I can be myself with a mind less disturbed on how to greet or not to greet. To just walk.

It amazes me that by walking one can actually cover large distances. While looking at the map it might go slow but in hindsight 30 km a day makes quick progress. Nike Trail Run shoes with Goretex are good to walk long rainy distances. I switch between the Belenka trail Walker as feet need change.

The pain in my shin is flaring up and Geo advises me to massage and stretch a lot. I dread the thought to stop walking and be very careful with these signs of inflammation I know so well. I stop earlier and evenings are now focused on finding a new route that lead me to Vila do Conde Porto Fashion Outlet. I could take a bus but that option is the absolute last resort. With new shoes the shin is turning tide.

Local cafeterias seemingly closed but in full swing while pouring rain outside and which would fullfill my desires absolutely made my mood swing back to contentment and pure happiness.

The desire to consume eggs becomes strong, maybe especially after an evening where I’d ended the walk in heavy rain topped with some hail, setting up a wet tent after where I place the wet clothes in the vestibule, then I’d cooked. I left behind a trail of German pilgrims with rain covers over their backpacks, who chatted non stop with each other and me in close overhearing distance. Some look at me as if I would eat them when they’d reply my ‘bom dia‘. All of them gathering in the same town dotted with signs of ‘pilgrims menu’ and ‘albergue’. I opt for the wet eucalyptus forest further out and next morning I do my best to avoid the crowd crouching up on me by turning into a village to eat eggs.

Our fully disconnected and far off place of living gives the cafe’s and greetings to locals and supermarkets extra flair. I do not long for chai in a cold wet camp but straight away march to the most cozy cafeteria. In Courel I ask for a sandwich with eggs. ‘I don’t have eggs,’ says the lady who made access with my trailer to her place easier by taking out the tables and chairs in the hallway. ‘But I can get you eggs’, she continues. Her cafeteria is in full swing so I offer to get eggs myself but off she is already and in no time has prepared me a plate of scrambled eggs with some herbs incorporated. Portuguese mind is so in contrast with East Europeans.

With the question ‘do you have children?’ and both our answers being cats and a dog, we set off into a pleasant talk. One I needed and one that fuels me for the rest of the day into much longer. Together with sitting in a cafeteria where dad and moms, elderly ladies and men gather. Some to drink a shot of strong coffee while standing, others liquor to start the day. It is a culture I like and where I am taken part in.

Enforced by social pleasantness and a dry day I yell ‘bom caminho’ to a stocky pilgrim passing who is melted in one lump with his backpack and cellphone guiding him, and still walking the wrong way. A faint reply of ‘oh, hello’ is carried off by the wind into my direction. I feel a clown for being so optimistic: where locals greet me, even passing on scooter, I must make a distinction and leave pilgrims where they are (in sorrow, in silence, in quiet contemplation, on their phones). Geo tells me greeting with ‘bom caminho’ is hopelessly worn out.

Standing under an awning in Barcelos, sheltering from rain an elderly lady comes up and talks to me. She tells me she has cancer in six spots. Although she is bright, optimistic and truly shining, she has no hope to live long. Her heart is weak, she says. She appears well off, wearing high heels, lipstick and copies of Chanel apparel. She smells good. ‘When I was without cancer I was fretting about my teeth and my hair, now I don’t care. I live! I see the light and go to the light. I will be fine,’ she tells me in either Portuguese, Spanish or a mixture. Asking me whether I go to Santiago de Compostella, I answer that was the initial plan but in the meantime I have made the border with Spain my end point, in no desire to enter rainy Galicia. When we say goodbye I tell her how amazed I am with her optimism. ‘My name is Palmira, do you know what it means? It means ‘light’’. With a hug and two kisses she takes off, the good smell of her soap and perfume pleasing me.

Continuing in heavy rain fall through a city I promise to myself to take the first abandoned building to camp in: ‘this time really, no excuses’. I find one right away: an open front of a home unfinished in between those that are finished and inhabited. I barge with the trailer over a heap of stones and lumps of hardened cement to the first floor. One dried out human excrement is laying odorless alone. I know it will be unlikely someone else comes up. Later a Mini Cooper parks in the open front garage where I found my entry.

The freshness of each new day is crisp and full with promise. Though in reality a cold wind blows in and hail unable to reach my tent from the open front of the house I am camping in. With an empty feeling I again start the day in heavy rainfall. Passing a couple of young female pilgrims out waiting the onslaught of rain in a bus stop shelter, while fighting their poncho’s, I seek a cafeteria. Like the young, unhardened, subdued girlies, the cafeteria attendant tells soon: ‘Our people lost courage. We are cowards. Only watching our belly buttons’. After my first coffee and pastel I am in for socializing and getting to know the person who works in a cold cafe lacking all coziness situated in a large apartment building that appears to be of Russian design. ‘We were fighters, we won many battles. I am not saying war is good but nowadays most people in Portugal, my Portugal, are cowards. They leave the country to work and make good money, live easy luxury lives and this’, he waves his arms around to indicate the city we are in, ‘is not Portugal. To see my real Portugal, you need to go more inland. There is the simple life, hard working people and very beautiful. Not here.’ We go into the hopeless topic of politics, a subject that I hate and usually avoid, always leaves me wondering why older people talk so negative about the world. We blame politics. We find people in Africa poor. We think Russia is bad. Ukraine good. Israel bad. Palestine good. Tibet forgotten. Taliban forgotten. I cut the conversation and we wish each other a good day, with smiles and waves.

Later on the trail I see beauty in two younger German women. Both offering to help me carry the trailer over a difficult stretch. I am amazed by their offer but also realize they might see me as an old woman with a difficult task. I thank them for their kind offer, half in amazement, half with confidence in my gaze. But since I choose this way of carrying my stuff, I have to deal with it. I learn that their friendly offer is called ‘trail behavior’, unknown to the somewhat blunt loner.

Opposite liking is disliking. Pick-nicking in the rain is one of hard dislike. Alone under a bridge looking at no doubt warmer places nearby and in a toilet of a church, together with a bunch of other shelter seeking German pilgrims entering and leaving to strictly use the WC.

Being inspired by wall tiles on my walk, this came forth from it ‘Pillow Case Wall Tiles‘

We were in Portugal from February 8th to March 17th 2024. I walked more or less 217 kilometers from Coimbra to Ponte de Lima. Part 1 Caminho Portuguese Lisbon to Fátima and part 2 Caminho Portuguese Fátima to Coimbra