Mondoñedo to Abadín
Onto the plateau
- Distance
- 16.6 km
- Climb
- 580 m up, 255 m down
- Ground
- 140 to 520 m
- Time
- 4 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
Today is a climb day. You leave the Mondoñedo valley and climb onto the Terra Chá — the 'flat land' of interior Galicia, a high plateau that feels more like Castile than like the Cantabrian coast. The weather changes: cooler, more wind, frequent rain. The villages thin out. Abadín is small. The evening feels like the countryside of Galicia rather than the coast of Spain. Tomorrow is Vilalba.
What pilgrims often meet here
- The climb out of Mondoñedo into the plateau air
- First Galician meseta sensation — flat, windy, bright
- Small villages with nothing open at lunchtime
- The colder evening in Abadín compared to the coastal towns
The plateau is different from the coast in a way that takes a whole day to understand. What have you learned that you can only articulate in retrospect?
The ground
A climb out of the Mondoñedo valley onto the Galician meseta. Passes the village of Lousada and the Capilla de Gontán before reaching Abadín on the high plateau. This is where the Camino leaves the Cantabrian hills and enters the inland Galician tableland.
The light
Sunrise and sunset in Mondoñedo 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, Onto the plateau, 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.