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Onward to the northwest coast of Spain, Galicia. After spending 2 days in Gijon, we quickly found ourselves reading road signs in Galician and hearing this different Spanish. As we drove west, we saw lots of rolling hills , rivers and more greenery as we traveled to Betanzos. We arrived in the small town of Betanzos, a hilly village wedged between two rivers leading to the Atlantic Ocean, to stay in an airbnb right in the historic district. Staying in a historic district means 1- very narrow streets 2- difficulty finding the apartment 3- off-site parking 4- hiking luggage up cobblestone streets. Staying in the historic center also means narrow streets for exploring and finding unique restaurants, meeting locals and being a quick walk away from the town's annual August festival! Our host was a local who had moved to the "suburbs," and graciously left us cereal, muffins, croissants, milk, and water that covered us for our 3 day stay which was unique and appreciated. We went into A Corona (in Galician) or La Corona (in Spanish), which is a big city where we hit upon an amazing local pulpuria (octopus bar) and we enjoyed the traditional pulpo a la gallega, boiled octopus snipped with scissors into bit size pieces served with olive oil and paprika, eaten with toothpicks. I really enjoyed the local pimientos de Padron, small green peppers sautéed in olive oil and loaded with rock salt. We walked out to the oldest lighthouse in the world, Torre de Hercules.
We were 1 hour away from Santiago, so headed south to Santiago to finally see the infamous Cathedral of Santiago. We saw pilgrims with the classic pilgrim walk or limp from walking for days on end with different size camino scallop shells on their backpacks representing how far they had traveled. Pilgrims sat all around the Plaza do Obradoiro in front of the cathedral where there is a large scallop shell right in the middle of the square proving to be a good photo op for pilgrims and wimpy tourists like us. The cathedral façade is being worked on and overall the cathedral is much less glitzy than the Burgos Cathedral. There was a long line to enter the church where you can hug the statue of St. James, so we passed on this and instead went to the main church where we could see the hands of the "huggers" on the sides of the statue. We did go to the cathedral museum which is in part of the cathedral which was very extensive and showed details of the construction of the church. The church was initially a simple chapel but had additions made over 12 centuries as it became a site for pilgrims. The quick story of Santiago is that a monk followed a field of stars to the village and discovered what was declared the remains of St. James, one of Jesus's favored apostles who evangelized in Galicia. The church was build and named Santiago (St. James) de Compostela (campo de estrellas, field of stars). The place was popularized in the 12th century when Roman Catholic kings were trying to take over Spain from the Moors and used the story of St. James to promote the location's spiritual significance. This history of the Roman Catholics fighting off the Moors, ie, the Inquisition, recurs again and again on our trip around Spain.
But onward to Portugal with quick views of Ponteveda and Vigo, Spain before crossing the border.
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