Ribadeo to Gondán
Inland at last
- Distance
- 20.9 km
- Climb
- 490 m up, 370 m down
- Ground
- 40 to 290 m
- Time
- 5 to 6 hours
- Difficulty
- moderate
- Underfoot
- forest, dirt, paved, mountain
Where this day sits on the Camino del Norte
Above, the highest and lowest ground of each of its 34 stages. Below, the word each day is given.
From open-pilgrimages: each stage's highest and lowest ground and its interior theme.
The day
The Camino turns inland for the rest of the journey. After 26 days of the Cantabrian coast, the sea is now behind you for good. The Galician interior is different from the coast — smaller villages, Celtic hórreos (wooden granaries on stone stilts, distinctive from Asturian ones), oak and chestnut forests, and the Galician language everywhere. You walk through Vilela and small Barreiros hamlets, climb a low ridge, and drop into Gondán in the late afternoon. The albergue is quiet, set beside a merendero and a small chapel dedicated to the Virgen del Pilar. A bar ~500 m away stamps credentials. The evening is the quietest of the whole Camino so far.
What pilgrims often meet here
- First Galician hórreos — wooden granaries on stone stilts, different from Asturian ones
- The shift in landscape from Cantabrian coast to inland Galicia
- Galician spoken around you for the first time — a different sound from Spanish or Asturian
- The quiet of Gondán at the albergue
The sea is gone. What fills the space that the sound of the sea used to fill?
The ground
Leaves Ribadeo inland through Vilela and Villamartín Pequeño, then turns south through Barreiros countryside to the small hamlet of Gondán. Moderate climbs and descents on country lanes and forest tracks. Gondán has a pilgrim albergue (converted old school, ~30 beds) and a merendero area.
The light
Sunrise and sunset in Ribadeo depend on the day you walk.
Walk it with Pilgrim
In Pilgrim's Honor mode you can walk this stage as it is drawn here, and save its maps for days with no signal. The morning opens with this day's word, Inland at last, and its story. When you arrive, it asks the question above, and you can answer out loud. Your walk stays on your phone.
With Pilgrim on your phone, this opens the stage, ready to begin. Without it, you'll see the stage and where to get the app.