Santiago de Compostela

Day 9 of the trip saw us crossing over the top of Portugal and into Galicia heading for its capital Santiago de Compostela. Allegedly the remains of St James the Apostol were brought to in 813 AD for burial, and pilgrims have been flocking here ever since.


the back of the cathedral


If you go upstairs you can "embrace" the Apostle??


Lots of carvings and pictures of this fella

35 degrees in Europe can be hard work, the green hills in this area start to give up a lot of the moisture they are holding onto and the humidity goes through the roof!! While we were starting to look for a place for lunch I suddenly caught the smell of BBQ and down below us to the right on a minor road we found this place. All you can eat for 20 euros. The place was packed with locals and tourists alike. Whoever though of stocking the fires so that the smoke drifted across the main highway was a genius !




When we finished this they just asked if we wanted more!!

I had been warned by my sister that access to the area around the cathedral was limited bordering on impossible and it was more by luck and ignoring some no entry signs that we found the entrance to our hotel right opposite the back entrance to the cathedral. We unloaded the bike and registered and for the first time on the trip we had to put the bike into a public car park for safe keeping. Never mind. Our hotel was an old monastery and while the rooms were sparse they were comfortable and cool.


The entrance to the hotel


Inside was nice

The next day was spent wandering around the old city and trying to find not only the religious parts (of which there are many, cathedral etc) but the other interesting places like the meat and fish market we stumbled upon.


fish market in full swing


Lots of interesting places to discover

The early evening nightlife in Santiago is fantastic. Once everyone has woken up from their siesta the street cafes and tapas bars come to life and it’s a great way to people watch while having a drink and some nice nibbles. In fact this was becoming our evening meal as we ate our main meal at lunch time as eating at 10.00 in the evening is not my thing.


Cafe culture in the evening - Great


Good beer, but beware at 8.2%!!!


Octopus tapas, mmmmm!!


Different buskers each night at this place

Zamora "in da hood"

We left Toledo and headed out across the wheat plains of Spain (rain this time of the year was mainly thunder storms at night!) stopping at Zamora which was just a mid point for a nights stopover but is a nice enough Medieval town in its own right. With 24 churches in the old part of town it has the most Romanesque style churches in all of Europe.


Great old streets again



One of the 24 chrches


At the end of the old city is the cathedral number 24

The other thing Zamora is famous for is Holly Week when the Easter brotherhood’s, parade through the streets (I’m sure some of the Zamoran’s have cousins in the deep south of the USA??)


Statue in the main square


The brothers in the hood!!

After a good walk and a beer or two around we raided the supermarket to get some food seeing as the restaurants don’t open until 10.00 and we were both getting very hungry.