Here’s the map. More to follow: Up to Finisterre at EveryTrail

Last night I ventured up to the terrace bar for a drink and to write up some notes. When the young guy working as a waiter put something to nibble (tuna and some twirly pasta) on my table I decided to risk dinner. I was hungry. I went for the mirage of the aroma of cooking meat and the warm buzz of company. I learnt – never again. The food ‘marinated pork and potato’ turned out to be daunting in volume and poor in quality – the potatoes were actually chips. I was challenged to finish even half of it.
Afterwards, with the sun just setting I walked down to the beach. Now, unlike earlier in the day when it was hot, bright and crowded, now it was beautiful, deserted, the tide just up and on the turn, a lovely light just before the sky lost any colour, the quiet lapping of the water around the rocks. This moment, like the walk up to the stations of the cross seemed to say to me that there are moments of involvement to be found but they are unlikely to be in searching for involvement in what others seem to find attractive. I first sensed this about 40 years ago and still don’t seem to confidently believe it.
This morning I am still suffering from last night’s dinner. I rode up to Finisterre, the most westerly part of the peninsular in search of 1. A supermarket to buy some fresh produce after a week of not seeming to find any and 2. What I imagined as the lonely lighthouse on a crag with ample parking and few people. I can tick off number 1 – I could even park right outside the door but not the second. Despite two attempts, all roads seemed to end in the congested and cobbled little town sea front awash with people walking out in front of the bike and other people trying to park anywhere. There were also many pilgrims to be seen who had obviously gathered to much spiritual momentum on their walk to Santiago that they were unable to stop walking and hopefully managed to stop just in time before the ended up in the sea.
On the way back I got my always mysterious helmet cam to work for the first time on the trip. As a triumphant finale I manage to turn up into the steep and narrow street leading to the campsite under smooth control – unlike my first arrival.
Once back here at lunchtime, I see the place is filling up again, with three new tents in the field down here, two guys with the radio on (strains of double-stopped violin, ‘music clasique’ says one of them without turning it off, then a family of three – the third being a small annoying girl. Then interestingly a couple riding a Honda Pan (Pan European – if you are not in the know) with GB plates. They turn out to be Scottish, pleasant, him fit, an ex-competition cyclist and she, ironic, funny and dealing with their apparently huge amount of washing. There were two conversations going on – the men talking about motorbikes, cycles and fitness and interjected conversations between me and her about the washing machine having broken down – I tell her she will have to buy a complete set of clothes now.
Later, after a few halting pages of Being and Time and swatting flies, I went down to the beach with my swimmers cunningly ready beneath my zip offs (in zipped-off mode; you see, I have saved bringing two separate pairs of trousers; the legs have colour-coded zips). I discovered its actually beautifully breezy down there and lay in the sun and sneaked into the sea which is cold. It’s the Atlantic not the Mediterranean. I also notice that while many people walk up and down in swimming costumes very few actually get into the water.
Postscript on my failure to find the lighthouse. The wonders of GPS and Google earth showed me just now exactly where I went wrong on the road. I need to decide whether to retrace my steps tomorrow or to take another winding coastal jaunt in a southerly direction down the coast to the Cape of Arousal. The attractions are obvious. Excuse me while I find my zipped-off legs.