12 May

Our alarm is set for 7 45. When I went to get coffee there was blue sky and sunshine. By 8.30am the clouds had rolled in bringing drizzle.

This will be a great place to use as a base for a few days for the Nilsen-Leaver family Camino next year in July.  It has accessible rooms and a large swimming pool which Emily will love.

We walked with a German couple for a while.  She carried a backpack  and he had nothing to carry. He said she didn't trust sending her stuff ahead and prefered carrying it herself.  I told them that they looked like a typical rural African couple.  The man striding ahead and the women trudging behind  carrying the load!
We stopped  for a while and shortly after saw a young woman taking short stiff steps on the side of the path. "Are you alright?" We asked. "Yes.  No.  Not really," she said.  Cecilia from Los Angeles told us that she'd  had a knee op a year ago and was OK to walk the Camino. She started in St Jean with a friend but some time on the meseta the knee 'Blew ' and she couldn't bend it or walk on it properly.  She took a train from Leon to Sarria and was planning on walking 5 km per day so that she could earn the Compostela and meet up with her walking friend at Monte de Gozo.
We offered to walk with her. She said she was walking 5 km to Ferreiros.  She was upset when we told her that we were also going to Ferreiros which was 9 km away. She had missed calculated the mileages between villages.  We offered to stay with her and walked the rest of the way at a snail's pace.
Met a couple from Vredendaal at Morgade.  I rembered sitting there in 2011 waiting for Christine  and Judith to arrive.  Zuretha  and Theresa  walked back about 3 km down the road to meet them and carry their packs for them.

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It was another 3 km to Ferreiros and we walked slower and slower.  She had booked a room in the albergue and we in a private room.  This new albergue y Casa Cruceiro wasn't here in 2007 when Finn walked the Camino.  I had planned that when he met Marion, Analise  and me, we would only walk 14 km from Sarria  to Ferreiros on his first day.  We planned to stay in the albergue so we stopped at the cafe-bar, Finn and Analise for a beer and Marion and I for an ice cream.  Then we saw that there was a sign on the albergue door that said if you had only walked from Sarria you should continue to the next albergue as this on was for pilgrims who had started further back or at least 20 km.  There was a list of taxi numbers in case you were injured and couldn't walk any further.  Finn was devastated as he'd had 2 beers and an  ice cream by then.  We had no option but to walk another 12km to Portomarin,
We had dinner in the cafe bar and afterwards I helped Cecilia book rooms a few days ahead.  Her phone doesn't allow for phone calls only data.  I can't believe that people with smart phones don't buy airtime so that they can make calls in times of need,
I went to bed at 9:30km.