Very bright and sunny day on Camino del Norte| From Ribadesella to Colunga in Asturias, Spain – Day 21

On the Day 21 of our Camino de Santiago del Norte we hiked from the village Ribadesella to Colunga in Asturias.

Even though the day before was an easy one and we didn’t make lots of kms, in the morning we still felt broken apart. And now we were thinking of taking a day off the trail for one day. But we knew that we have to continue on and partly because we didn’t have the camping gas to cook on. And that is a really big deal for us.

The campground was quiet except for the jackdaws that were disturbing our sleep in the middle of the night. Maybe because they were escaping from the cat or something because there were lots of cats living in this camping.

We left the camping in Ribadesella and planned to get to Colunga till the evening. So we had to make 20+ kms that day which wasn’t our norm and we didn’t like it much. Because then we get too tired but we had no choice that day.

So we started hiking late as usual already when all the pilgrims are close to their final destination – we just start our day. The weather was drastically different from the last day with the hot sun above our heads and completely clear sky.

We were to follow Camino indicators that day because it seemed to be going fine and as close to the coast as possible. So first part was almost all uphill but with quite a lot of shadow so that wasn’t too bad. The route was going through the forest, fields and rural areas.

We got out to the first beach Playa de Vega which was long and nice beach and walked along it for a bit. Then we came out to the second beach Playa Arenal de Moris where we decided to take a break and have a snack. The place was really nice with two beautiful beaches nearby and picnic tables. We had a longer break that we planned for about an hour but it was fine because we could escape the hottest time of the day. Then we continued on hiking close to the coastline and enjoyed that part very much. The route was easy and flat for the most part and the scenery very picturesque.

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After passing by Playa Espasa we had to turn to the car road and walk all the last 5 kms on it. It was very straight and boring with quite a lot of noisy traffic. The afternoon sun was still very hot and the asphalt route with no trees on the sides was our killer in the end.

We were absolutely dead when we finished it and came to the town Colunga. We also remembered how we thought that the weather in the North of Spain will be much different from the South and it actually wasn’t. We thought it will be raining often and the wind will be cold. But most of the days we had were sunny clear days with few cloudy days. And just once or twice we had a pouring rain, for the rest it was just drizzling. So September is a great month for doing the Camino for sure. Also we were feeling like we leave the big mountains behind us and in several days it will be more flat and easy surface. It just seemed to us like this at that moment.

We had so much hope for the gas station to find our so much needed but sadly they didn’t sell it. We tried and asked in the other one that was in 2 kms apart but they had it neither. So it was kind of sad because it meant eating cold food at least for the whole next day. In general we found it a really huge problem to find a particular model of gas bottle that we have in this region so we were even considering to change the system and the stove for the other one more easily available. Because normally in every gas station they sold it in any region that we’ve been so far.

So we bought the food and headed to the camping that was also in 2.5 kms from the town. We got there very late probably at around 20.30 and didn’t see much of it. It was all flat, medium sized camping close to the beach with lots of caravans and quite a lot of people. Maybe because it was a weekend. So we checked in and found a quiet corner to set up a tent. Also we met one guy who said that he was doing the Camino as well and these meetings feed our hope that we’re not alone and some people like camping just as much as we do.

We prepared our dinner which was more likely a salad with tomatoes, rice, green peas and cheese. But to our surprise we ended up liking it. Also for the first time we saw the hair dryer in the camping that was in the right moment when we had to wash the hair and it was already too late to air dry it. So being very tired we felt asleep right away.

Here is the link to Google map to follow the hike: