Day 25 – Oviedo to Santiago de Compostela

July 13, 2019 – We really loved and enjoyed our time in Oviedo.  It was nice to spend a couple of days, get some things done and have a larger and more comfortable room.

We got up, packed and checked out of our fun place.  We had to lug our bags back to the parking garage, put them in the car and we wanted to grab some coffee in the mall, hit the restroom and move on west to Santiago de Compostela (SdC). 

When we were ready to leave, we brought our parking ticket to the payment machine to pay for our three days of parking and got in the car to leave.  Wayne put the ticket in the machine, paid and got his receipt.  When we were trying to exit the garage, he was trying to insert the receipt into the slot at the exit, but the machine would not take our receipt.  After many expletives, he backed the car out to go and try another exit.  The same thing happened and we thought that maybe he was supposed to get his original ticket back from the machine when he paid… It is very difficult when all of the directions are in Spanish…we really try, but sometimes we can’t figure it out.  Wayne drove back to our original location, still spouting expletives and I ran back to the ticket machine, where he paid, to see if the original ticket might be there.  It wasn’t.  Wayne joined me and we went outside to see if there is a parking attendant anywhere that we could speak with.  There wasn’t.  I ran to the entrance gate to see if the machine would give me another ticket with me being on foot.  It wouldn’t. HMMMM.

I went back in to the payment machine and was checking it out when a voice came out of the little tiny speaker on the machine and was babbling at me in Spanish.  I told her that I did not speak Spanish well and asked her if she spoke English.  She said no, then I heard a click.  Well shoot.  That was a parking attendant and I’m thinking that she just “hung up on me” and blew me off.  Now what?  About a minute later she came out to the machine smirking and I was able to show her my receipt.  Apparently. she saw me running around like a maniac in the garage and outside to the entrance trying to get a ticket… haha… cameras are everywhere.  Hopefully she didn’t also hear Wayne’s multiple strings of profanity. She told me to go to the exit and she would let me out.  Which she did.  When we arrived at the exit the arm came up and we were FREE!!  Thank God…

We got on the road and were again amazed at how lush and green the landscape is in this part of Spain.  We had not been this far west yet and started to notice a lot of hikers making their final push along the Camino de Santiago…more on that later.  We also noticed that in every town there were very elaborate Gothic cemeteries.  They had giant headstones that were beautiful by day but I bet a little eerie at night.

Along the way, it started to cloud over and sprinkle off and on.  We stopped at a café to get some lunch and were going to sit outside but as we were walking across the parking lot, we saw four lightening bolts followed by immediate, loud thunder claps so we headed inside to sit in the bar.  As soon as we sat down the sky opened up and I swear the lightning was striking right outside…IT WAS SO LOUD!  The power went off a couple of times and we wondered if we were going to be able to eat after all.  The bar staff did not care about the weather and went about their business so we ordered some food and a beer.  We had some meat empanadas (Wayne said it had anchovy in it but I don’t think it did…I couldn’t taste any cat food in mine), some pulpo (which is octopus) some patatas bravas (potatoes with yummy sauce) and they also served us a big basket of bread that we dipped in the octopus sauce.  Again, we were stuffed.

After lunch we had a short drive to old part of Santiago de Compostela and checked in at our AirBNB, which was a bit weird at first.  This is a home of a girl and her boyfriend that we were sharing an apartment with… She answered the door in her PJ’s and we met her, her boyfriend (who laid on the couch the whole time) and her two cute cats.  She spoke pretty good English and showed us to our room, the 2 bathrooms and the kitchen where she would have breakfast laid out for us every morning.  She also showed us where to park which was conveniently right across the street in a park.   We got settled into our room and took a siesta before going out to check out the city. 

The apartment is right on the edge of Old Town and an easy 15-minute walk, and mostly downhill.  We walked all over Old Town and saw many sights.  It is a great Old Town to get lost in as there is something cool to see around every corner.  We mainly focused on taking photos tonight as the lighting was getting perfect for evening/dusk photos and was absolutely beautiful.  Here are some of the things that we saw tonight…

Catedral de Santiago de Compostela is the reputed burial place of Saint James the Great, the apostle of Jesus Christ.  It is also one of the only three known churches in the world built over the tomb of an apostle of Jesus, the other two being St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City and St. Thomas Cathedral Basilica in Chennai, India.  The original church dated back to the early 800’s.  The building is a Romanesque structure, with later Gothic and Baroque additions.  It is huge and beautiful.  More information will be explained in regards to the cathedral in upcoming blogs.

The cathedral sits on the Praza do Obradoiro, which is a beautiful square in front of the cathedral from 1740.  It is surrounded by four important buildings, said to represent the four powers of the city: the aforementioned cathedral to the East (the Church), Hostal dos Reis Catolicos  (the doctors and bourgeoisie and also the oldest hotel in the world dating back to the 1400’s to cater to the needs of pilgrims) to the North, Pazo de Raxoi  (the government – a palace from 1766) to the West and the Colexio de San Xerome (the university dating back to 1501) to the South.  The floor of the praza is decorated by eight rays starting from the center, where a plaque commemorates the World Heritage Site Pilgrims’ way of Camino de Santiago, whose final target is in this area. More on the Camino de Santiago in the next blog.

San Martiño Pinario is the second largest Benedictine monastery in Spain. It was established in the late 9^th century, but very little is left of the original structure.  The current structure was built in the 16^th century and is currently used as a seminary.

Praza da Quintana is a small square with a great side view of cathedral.  It’s also one of the entry points for the Cathedral.  There is also a beautiful large water fountain there.  Many cafes have table set up here.  It is a great place to sit and people watch.

We also visited Alameda Park which is a beautiful lush park and also a nice place to visit. There is a statue there of two women. The statues are replicas of the Spanish sisters Maruxa and Coralia Fanino Ricart. Although brightly dressed and offering an open hand in a warm gesture, the faces have a solemn undertone representing their troubling story and how they became the Two Marias of Alameda Park.

The sisters were raised in a family of  13 siblings. During the brutal regime of Francisco Franco, three of the brothers had an active role in the Confederacion Nacional del Trabajo, an organisation fighting against the sovereignty of the Spanish general. The story goes, the brothers were arrested and detained in the early 1950’s and experienced consistent emotional abuse, torture and excessive physical brutality. Upon release, a brother passed due to injury whilst the other two went into hiding.  The family was consistently interrogated as to their where abouts, as well as, persecuted for harboring fugitives. The impact of this led to the death of the women’s parents and many of the siblings.

Both ladies were trained as a seastress; however, because of the pressures and attention on the family, they were often unable to find work. Many of the locals were known to donate food and other items to the women.  In the early 1960’s, it was reported that a storm tore down the roof of their home and the town collected donations for the ladies to purchase a new flat.

Along with another sister who later died, the ladies would habitually enter Alameda Park at 2 PM dressed in bright clothing, high heels and even brighter make-up. They would gallivant around and flirt with the local university students.   Many locals suggest the women experienced poor mental health due to the trauma which led to this exuberant behaviour; whilst others thought the women were simply trying to find some enjoyment in their troublesome life. The women were regularly seen until the 1980s when Maruxa passed. Coralia left the town of Santiago and died three years later. Check out the pic of the Two Marias below.

SdC is a beautiful city and I can tell we are going to love it here.  More later!

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