Camino Portugués
24.5 km, 228 m up and 220 m down, through 12 places, 6 of which have somewhere to sleep. Where you stop is up to you.
Every place on the path in order, with the distance from Caldas de Reis. Most are too small to sleep in — a fountain, a chapel, a bar that may or may not be open — but they are what the day is actually made of.
On the way out of town, it is once more along the N550 (which frankly will be the case frequently between here and Santiago). Leave it to your right at the first bend in the road.
The walk to Santa Marina is through a quiet forest, away from the busy road. The bar is friendly and makes a welcome morning stop if you've left from Caldas. The camino crosses the N550 to visit the church in the upper p…
A hamlet between Santa Marina and O Pino. No services.
The camino only touches the back side of O Pino. A bar and a large albergue are about 200 m off the track — the albergue is clean, friendly, and has a shaded park in front.
A modest church and a bar-grocery-everything store. The quaint countryside walking gives way to the sprawl of Pontecesures from here.
The arrows go under the road and over the bridge and across the Río Sar to Aduana. Here it runs all the way into Padrón.
A hamlet between Pontecesures and Padron on the main camino. No services.
Take a look at the elevation profile for an idea of what these last 24km will be like, many pilgrims underestimate the elevation changes which increase as you near Santiago.
Pass through Pazos, Rueiro, Tarrio and Vilar (albergue); none with services.
A hamlet between Iria Flavia and the approach to Santiago. No services.
A hamlet. No services.
A hamlet. No services.
A hamlet with an albergue but no other services.
In town, turn right off the N550 at the church, passing around its park. A country road takes you steeply uphill. You will pass through the hamlet of Cruces, Angueira de Suso, and into Areal before returning to the main road at Picaraña.
The path splits here and rejoins before A Escravitude. Both ways are below, because the question is which to take, and that is not a question two separate pages can answer.
To get there simply follow the red arrows marked Herbón. This detour if for anyone wishing to spend the night in the Albergue at the Monastery of Herbón (recommended). From Pontecesures it is 2.7km, with an additional 3km the following morning to bring you to Padrón. In all this detour adds 3.1km to the official route.
Distance, climb and descent are measured along the GPS track for this camino — 259 recorded points across this span, the same track the app carries. The town-to-town figures in my data put it at 24.5 km.
Esta entidad ha sido beneficiaria de una ayuda del Programa de incentivos a la movilidad eficiente y sostenible (MOVES III), gestionado por la Xunta de Galicia a través del Instituto Enerxético de Galicia (INEGA) en el marco del Real Decreto 266/2021, y cofinanciada por la Unión Europea — NextGenerationEU, dentro del Plan de Recuperación, Transformación y Resiliencia.