Sexto día - miércoles el 21 del mayo
We were all up by 07:00, and Stanley and I were on the road by 07:30. We walked most of the first couple of hours on the edge of a lightly-traveled road, enjoying the scenery and the cool air. My feet were getting better every day; even though the skin on my heel was still pretty tender, I was able to plaster it up sufficiently to walk without pain after the first 15 minutes. There are few towns in this area, but lots of places where 2 or 3 farmhouses are clumped together. The Camino leads through many of these (always with the yellow arrows!), and at one a farmer's wife offered us crêpes for whatever we wanted to pay. We had one apiece, and found them quite tasty.
We made good time all morning, even through some ups and downs - traveling substantially faster than we had expected. We covered the 15 km (9 mi) to Triacastela by just after 11:00, stopping there at a café for breakfast/lunch - bocadillas and fruit juice, of course - and rest break of an hour or so.
While we were sitting there, we saw a steady stream of peregrinos, including José and Theo, pass by. Just when we were about to leave, Christine and Christina from Germany cruised in. We met them first in Hospital de Orbigo, and they have passed us, or vice versa, sometime every day so far, usually when one party or the other has stopped to eat.
After our rest, we set off at 12:15 for another 14 km (9 mi). The scenery in Galicia continues to be beautiful, but today the landscapes had more trees and more divisions into fields, giving more of a 'Lord of the Rings' flavor, reminding me very much of some of the scenery in Otago and western Canterbury in New Zealand. On more than one occasion we had to yield way to small herds of cows passing through. By the time we had covered another 7 km (4 mi) - about 2 hours - my feet were pretty sore on the bottoms, so we took a 25-minute break on a stone wall in the shade. Even though the sun was bright in a cloudless sky, it felt absolutely wonderful in the shade.
The guidebooks show this stage as essentially flat, but that is only true on average - we spent all afternoon gaining and losing the same 100 m over and over - although at least some of today's walk was under shaded canopy, which was quite pleasant with the slight breeze.
We got to the albergue in Calvór a bit before 16:00, just behind Theo. Several other people showed up in short order, mostly Austrians and (of course) Germans. Mark from Peterborough and Franziska from Germany were cooking something with olive oil and garlic and tomatoes, and it really smelled good. Theo had packed in his supper, which we sat and watched him eat - just to be companionable, of course - on the Stan Plan, we normally went without dinner. About 19:00, Theo found out that there was a place to get beer just a few hundred meters down the road, so Stanley and I walked down with him to a café run by a man who seemed insulted to have to deal with customers. Never mind, we sat and had a delightful conversation about all kinds of things for a couple of hours (I munched on green olives stuffed with anchovies, and we both had ice cream - I love this eating plan). Stanley was kind enough when we got back to the albergue to take care of getting our clothes washed (there was a machine here), while I wrote this up.
Today's walk: 29 km (18 mi). Six-day total: 185 km (115 mi).