July 5, Vila Franco De Xira 572 km

Started the Camino yesterday. It was hot. I didn’t do enough to deal with the heat. I got dehydrated, overheated, and was walking along a river with no shade. Unfortunately it wasn’t possible to climb down the bank to the river (or more accurately to climb back out). Made it back to civilization and found a cafe, drank 2 orange pops and a half liter of water. Slept well, after drinking 3 quarts of liquid in 4 hours. This morning only my achilles tendons were sore.

Today was a walk along the water. It was still hot, but I put up my umbrella, drank a ton of liquids and camped out in one restaurant under the A/C. I got to Vila Franco and they are having a big festival. They put up fence barriers, sand in the road, and had a parade with riders (they were carrying wooden poles about 8 feet long) and some bulls. After the parade seemed to be over I was walking on the parade route with lots of other people to get a drink. A man started talking to me in Portugese, and gesturing. He herded me behind the fence barrier less then a minute before men on horseback raced by followed by the bulls.

Right now music is playing right outside my window, hopefully for not too much longer. It’s going to be an early start tomorrow, 5 am to start walking by 6 to avoid the heat. Not many pilgrims, but some bikers yelled Buen Camino this morning.

Here’s a few pictures of scenery and art. I tried but no success. WiFi isn’t strong enough to upload images. I will try again tomorrow.