Day 27 - Villafranca del Bierzo - Sarria

We had to cheat on this stage!
Our friend, Richard, who had gone a day ahead of us while we had a day off on Christmas day had made the climb up O Cebreiro yesterday.

We received this email from him late last night:

"I nearly died today. The camino to O Cebreiro was blocked with metre high snow dunes and I had to climb over them. I thought that I would never make it. Oh, and my headlight went dead and it was pitch black outside. Someone was watching over me this evening."

So we are skipping the stage climbing up and the stage climbing down.

Another friend, Janine, who was a day ahead of Richard described the descent as he was ascending when we caught up to her a few days later:

"The descent was very scary.  There was about ten of us coming down the hill in a blizzard.  We had to stay in a chain of people about 2m apart so we could see each other."

So, even though I would have loved to attempt it (ooh - did my nose get longer?) we skipped over the mountain range…

So Gordon, Andrew & I caught a taxi:

In other news we reached the 500k mark today!

An here are some more photos.

So, what's a nice girl like you doing in a dump like this?

Go on, give us a kiss!

The countryside can be picturesque:

Of course, we need a panorama:

Wayne following Gordon.

More scenery:

Sometimes it's hard to look at the scenery as the ground underfoot is unstable (and often steep or puddles).

Keep watching where you put your poles and your feet!

When we got to Sarria we joined Gordon at his hotel's bar (we were staying in the Albergue) for happy hour.

This place was particularly good as it had tequila which made Andrew happy: