Start a new camino?
Change of my plans to finish my last caminho and walk from Nazare to Fatima. After some investigation I found out there is no place to sleep between Nazare to Fatima and from Fatima to Casa da Lima. Too bad because that was my last part to my house. But I will not sleep outside on the floor in front of a church or put a tent somewhere, sneaky when it is getting dark… I am not that kind of a die-hard pilgrim. I need the luxury of not carrying a lot of weight on my shoulders. But where to go now?
Caminho Interior or Fishermen Algarve?
A suggestion is the Fishermens trail in the South of Portugal, a route via de rough cliffs along the seaside. This is a top trail with unimaginable views, one of the most beautiful trails in the world, I read… I will save this to walk together with someone some time, preferably in April because the Algarve is too hot in summer months.
The Chief pilgrim has another suggestion; There is a more beautiful camino road than the Portugues Central route, that I just did. It is the one from Viseu going north via Verin in Spain and merge with the camino route Via de la Plata from the South of Spain Seville. And later the other route from Spain Camin o del Torre from Salamanca merges also in this one. It should be a beautiful medieval route called Camino Portugues de Interior, let me find that out.
The signs could be gone due to works. And the camino will be deserted, but this is a good example of what Portugal is: deserted.
Camino Portugues Interior
After some research I see that the route is also extended to Coimbra. So, this is it, I start in the city and walk up to Viseu. And then further to the Spanish border.
The website Gronze has a detailed description of this route, starting from Coimbra. It is a difficult one says Gronze:
“The hardness of the route is not so much because it has large mountain passes, but because of very broken terrain, with constant ups and downs, and sometimes slopes like those sections that appear in the mountain passes. Exceeding 10, 15 and up to 20% inclination.
Finding accommodation is quite problematic. The few public shelters, arranged in old schools. They are sometimes closed or still in preparation. Obviously it is a forgotten jewel and travels through well-documented Roman and medieval roads. “The Cinderella of the Portuguese roads”.
It says it is a camino for `hard-working pilgrims, physically and also with orientation capacity, with the GPS at hand and if possible with an updated track`. Ouch, I don´t belong to these pilgrims I have no orientation capacity at all and no updated gadgets to help me. And what does a hard-working pilgrim mean? Let´s find out.
Bom caminho
I also read that the writer of the Gronze article only saw two pilgrims in ten days. When you walk the long trail Lisbon-Santiago, passing our house, we see around 10-15 pilgrims a day. It means when you walk you will meet one or two a day but off season you will not see anyone. In my last camino I only met one pilgrim. It was a solitary walk and that continues.
I am prepared and I will not meet other walkers. I say it to myself then: Just go, bom caminho!
Read my blog about this Caminho Portuguese Interior here.
