The End

“Oy! Adriano!”

I hadn’t made it 50 yards before I heard someone call my name. I was in the middle of a crowd of pilgrims in the plaza, and didn’t see anyone I recognized. I figured it was just a mistake and was going to continue on my way, but then I saw someone working their way through the crowd towards me out of the corner of my eye. I turned to get a better look.

“FERNANDO! You son of a bitch!”

Camino magic. A guy from the original group I had been hiking with at the start just happened to be in the same place at the same as me as I was leaving. Amazing.

“When did you get in?”

“Today. we’re just finishing now.”

“We?! Are all y’all still together?! That’s awesome!”

“No…Eamon got out ahead, but Nick--”

I looked beside Fernando. It was Nick!

“Nick, you Aussie fuck! How you doing man?!”

“Weeel….I ees good, man…”

That wasn’t an Aussie accent by any means. I looked closer at the guy. He had the same build as Nick, sunglasses and beard like Nick, but definitely had a different pack and gear. This guy was NOT Nick.

“Oh…shit. Nevermind. I though you were someone else…”

Fernando laughed

“Yes, yes, that is what I was trying to tell you! Nick took some time off. Padrino wanted to go slower…”

Made sense. That first group was running a killer pace for the first three days. Which was likely a contributing factor to my injury zero day in Pamplona.

“Gotcha…well are you going to Finisterre?”

“Yes. We will go tomorrow”

“Ah! Cool! Bus or walking?”

“Well…I want to walk, but my friends may not want to…”

“I gotcha. Well hey man, I’d love to stick around, but I’m actually on my way to Finisterre right now, You’re welcome to tag along if you want, but I’m guessing you probably wanna stick around Santiago if you just got in….”

“Yes.”

“Well. Plenty of places to stay and good food and whatnot. Congrats, man, and it was awesome to see you! Look me up if you’re ever in the states!”

Fernando nodded and we shook hands.

“Buena suerte.”

“Yeah, you too. Best of luck.”

I turned away from the crowd and continued my walk across the plaza. I then picked up the trail right by the Cathedral, and it began to take me out of the city:

In order to avoid confusion with the Camino de Santiago the Camino de Finisterre uses Yellow “F” markings alongside the yellow arrows for appropriate demarcation.

A welcome addition to navigation…the way some of these other pilgrims are, they might find themselves walking in circles from going the wrong way at intersection points….

The trail itself was beautiful, shady and much less crowded than the Camino de Santiago. A perfect illustration of just how much heart the 100kers have: they’ll do it to get the Compostela, but most of them won’t go a km farther than they have to. Let alone 90 of them.

All in all, the days leading up to the finale were pleasant yet routine hiking. The good weather and less than difficult terrain (aside from one moderate climb) made it a pleasant hike. As did the scenery:

Yet before we knew it, the final day was upon us.

We set out from a town called Olveiroa.

A few kilometers in, we encountered the main split:

The Camino de Finisterre is actually a bit of a misleading name, as it actually splits off into two separate trails: One will take you to Finisterre, and one will take you to a place called Muxia. Both are terminus points for the trail that end at the sea, and it is possible to complete a loop that hits both of them, but Finisterre is more of the “mainstream” end point of the two of them. Needless to say, we all decided to keep on the Finisterre route.

Then, after a few minor hills, we began to go up a fairly steep incline. Near the top was a fairly interesting trail marker:

It didn’t look like any of the others we had seen, and the words “To The End” were painted on rather conspicuously…

To the end. Well. No shit.

After walking past it and to the top of the hill, I immediately began to understand why the marker was there:

That blue in the distance is the sea. Quite a view.

We picked up the pace, coming down off the hills as quick as we could to try to get to the beach. It was a hot day, what we all wanted to do more than anything was hit the sand and relax by the water. Yet the day seemed to drag on and on as the trail kept zig-zagging near small beaches, leading us incredibly close, but then turning us away right as we got near:

 

This continued for several kilometers, until we hit single digit distances...

...and the final hill between us and the beaches at the outskirts of Finisterre.

Coming down off the final hill, there is a point where the road curves:

And then dumps pilgrims right onto the beach:

The trail abruptly turns from paved asphalt to sandy boardwalk, right beside what can best be described as a stone patio. Ronja and I stopped at the patio.

“We made it…”

“Yes…”

I started taking off my boots. I didn’t want to get sand in them, and at this point, it was clear that I didn’t really need them anymore.

“I’m gonna take my stuff down to the beach…”

Ronja collected her gear and headed onto the sand. I wasn’t sure if she was trying to politely give me space to change into swim trunks or something, but I had already planned ahead and was wearing shorts under my hiking pants. Either way, I took the opportunity to change, and quickly did the best I could securing my boots to my pack…

Interesting problem to have….I was an expert at packing the gear I had, but there was NO extra room for my boots in my pack…I ended up tying them to the outside of my pack with para cord. Like a noob hiker.

But then, having changed into my shorts and flip-flops, I made my way down to the beach, stopping halfway to drop my gear next to Ronjas. I took off my flip flops, grabbed my camera, then headed towards the water.

The sand was hard to walk on at first. My feet were in pain, but not from any identifiable cause. Guess they just didn’t like the feel of the sand after walking on hard ground for a little over a month.

I walked maybe a dozen yards further, and the feeling subsided as I walked from dry to wet sand. I stopped to take a picture…

…And then immediately felt the cool water come crashing down onto my feet. I looked down at them and watched the water subside. My feet were wet. From the sea. On the Spanish coast. That I had walked to. From France.

I looked out from where I was standing across the inlet:

That road to the top of the trees is the last of the Camino. Tonight, we’ll all be out there to watch the sunset. We will not need our fully loaded packs, and we won’t have any more hiking to do. There is no more trail. We are done. I am no longer a Pilgrim on a quest to reach the sea. I am a tourist in a beach town.

“Oh! Hey!”

Ronja shouted down at me from her perch atop one of the larger rocks

“It’s Anna’s birthday today! We should do something!”

“Hey, yeah, we totally should.”

“Here, let’s make her a BIG sign in the sand! She’ll see it when she comes down the Camino onto the beach!”

Ronja picked up her walking stick and began writing large letters in the sand. As she moved down the beach, I kept an eye on things and made sure the writing was even and big enough for her to see. Actually came out looking half decent:

Alright. Time to check in to the hostel.

We made our way off of the beach, but not before Ronja made a side trip to a washing station to rinse off:

I suppose that made as much sense as anything else. Even though we didn't really need them, there is zero sense in filling your boots up with sand needlessly. And, once she was done, we headed into the heart of town. Finisterre, although definitely a tourist spot, was still very much a “comfortable” beach town. Not overrun by beachgoers, tourists, souvenir shops, or excessively large hotels, it had a moderately quiet, picturesque, and relaxing atmosphere:

A short walk through town, and we arrived at our hostel, Albergue Do Mar:

Talk about Grade A accommodations at the end of a long trip! It was extremely clean, had comfortable beds (with paired power outlets), blazing fast WiFi, a large communal kitchen/refrigerator, friendly staff, and an OCEAN VIEW BUNKROOM:

All for around 20 Euros a night. Can’t beat it. Best hostel I’ve ever stayed in, hands down.

After getting situated and unpacking our gear, Ronja and I waited on the patio outside of the bunkroom for the others to get in.

Once the rest of or crew arrived, we set off exploring the town, as well as spending some time on the beach:

Later in the day, Matt and I broke off from the group to hopefully find a place selling beachy touristy type stuff (towels, beach balls, boogie boards, goggles) to get stuff to entertain the team while we were killing time for the sun to set. Luckily, we found a place without too much searching.

The place was essentially a beach-themed dollar store. It took us no time at all to find what we came for. Between the both of us, we grabbed a boogie board, some sunglasses, a plastic bucket and shovel set, and a badminton set. We were on our way to the register when I got hit with a crucial part of the agenda I had forgotten up until that point. I turned to Matt.

"Hey, you got something to burn?"

It was Camino (as well as pagan pre-Camino) tradition to burn something on Cape Finisterre itself after the sunset. Purposes and origins of this tradition are unknown, but it is a widely observed part of of the Camino nonetheless.

"No, but if you do I'm sure I could find something!"

"Oh I definitely do. But we need something to start it with. Let's try to find some lighter fluid or something."

We split up and paced the aisles of the shop, looking for anything we could use to start our fire. After about 20 minutes of searching, we both came up empty.

"I don't think we're going to find it, man..."

"Nah, dude. We gotta get SOMETHING to start a fire with. It's tradition. We just gotta."

We searched the aisles again disparagingly, hoping to find something of use.

“Idunno Matt. I mean, I really have no idea where we’re gonna find some kind of lighter fluid and long matches or a bbq lighter ‘round these---“

“—You mean like this?”

I turned towards the end of the aisle. Matt held up a bottle of lighter fluid and a BBQ lighter.

“Ho-lee-shit!”

I ran over to where he was standing

“Well hot damn. Who woulda figured.”

I ran to the counter and hurriedly bought them both.

Alright, let’s get back to the hostel and rally up with the others. It’s almost sunset!

About two hours later, our little band began trekking up the last of the trail toward Finisterre. First along a winding road:

Then through a parking lot:

…And onto a small footpath to the famous Finisterre lighthouse:

Before hitting the final marker of the Camino de Santiago:

And descending out onto the rocky cape to find a spot to sit comfortably and watch the sun set.

From left to right, Ronja, Matt, Anna and Amelie.

"Zee Germans" (Ronja, Anna, and Aemelie) had planned ahead and packed a deliciously simple meal of cold cuts, fresh fruit, bread, wine, chips, and Santiago cake (light yellow cake with powdered sugar and almond extract; a snack we had all acquired a taste for after being on the trail for a while).

 

Meanwhile, I prepped our burn pile:

Insoles from my failed set of Merrils. It’s still sad to think about, even as I write this. Such good boots. Wasted.

We spent the time waiting for sunset with many jokes and talking through shared experiences from the Camino. At one point I turned to Matt and asked him where the greatest country on earth was. His response:

Technically, that IS the direction of both Canada and America. So I guess he’s right either way…

The sunset itself lasted only a few minutes, but it was well worth the wait:

Once the sun sank below the horizon and darkness fell, our crew packed out the remnants of our little picnic, and I dumped the remainder of the water we were carrying on our small fire:

My Prolonged Excursion on the Camino de Santiago had officially come to a close.