My Pilgrimage – Camino de Santiago Portuguese Part 1

It’s taken a month since my pilgrimage to get back to something like normal. I wrote about my reasons for walking the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage in this post before I went. Now it’s time to share my experience.

For about 10 years in my former life in the corporate world, I was a frequent flyer, often flying 2 or 3 times a week. So the prospect of a 7-hour flight to Porto did not worry me. I flew from the small airport in London 40 minutes away to avoid the traffic and parking expenses of getting to Pearson Airport in Toronto. It was a real pleasure to check in at a small airport and then to learn that I would not have to go through another security check at Pearson.

As I sat down in the terminal waiting for the check-in counter to open, the clip on my belt pouch opened. For security, I had my passport, ticket confirmation, bank card and cash in the pouch. On examination, it was obvious that the large, seemingly well-designed clip fastener was not going to be reliable. As I would be walking in shorts with no pockets, I wanted to use the belt pack for both security and easy access when I took off my backpack.

Luckily I remembered that I had used some baling twine to tie a red flag to an overhanging piece of timber on my trailer a few days previously and the twine was still in the car. I found the piece of blue baling twine and used it to keep the belt fastener together. It did the job every day.

My travel agent had assured me that my backpack and walking poles were acceptable as carry on luggage so I would not have to wait to retrieve them at my destination or pay a baggage fee. I was relieved that I had no problem on Air Canada flights. Iberian Air in Spain was a different story.

There was a two-hour stopover in Toronto. By a pleasant coincidence, my son Shaun was returning from a business trip to the East coast and had a stopover that coincided with mine so we were able to have supper together at the airport.

Bad Pilgrimage Assumptions

While planning my trip, I had read some horror stories about using debit cards in ATMs in Europe with several cases of stolen information and emptied bank accounts being mentioned. I like to live without using credit and have not had a credit card for years, only a debit card. My bank also suggested that I should take a credit card and leave my debit card at home. The prospect of spending nights in large dormitories made me nervous about carrying too much cash.

So the bank arranged a new business credit card which arrived the day before I left.

At the airport I mentioned the credit card to Shaun, he thought it might be a good idea to use it at the airport to make sure it would work in Europe. After supper, I went to the duty-free shop and bought a book to read. I paid for it by tapping the card, it worked.

On the plane, I suddenly realised that I had forgotten to set up a pin for the card. As I had, what I thought would be enough cash and assumed that my card would work with the tap facility at hostels and restaurants, I was not too concerned.

Bad assumption as I was to find out as the days progressed.

The flight and Arrival in Porto

The flight was on an Air Canada Rouge plane. Legroom was tight and not much in the way of refreshments or snacks. However, it was a night flight, the person in the next seat was quiet, the journey passed quickly enough and I arrived at a busy Porto airport in mid-morning. At customs, I was in a long queue behind three other Canadians with backpacks and walking poles. Then I realised that as a dual Canadian / British citizen, I could use my British passport to join the shorter, faster-moving EU queue at security and customs.

I was soon in the concourse looking for a place to get a coffee. No Tim Hortons, Macdonalds or Starbucks. My poor attempt at ordering in Portuguese resulted in two cups of Espresso instead of one cup of cafe con leite with two cream that I thought I was ordering.

Then to find the metro (subway) station to get into the city. Fortunately, most of the signs were bilingual with Portuguese and English. A very helpful woman with fluent English at a table at the ticket office explained that I could get a 24 hour pass for the metro and bus service for 7 Euro. I tapped my card, it worked and I set off for my great metro adventure.

I have lived on a farm or in outer suburbs for most of my life. I have only used public transport when on holiday in the UK when told by relatives to get on a train here and get off there. The prospect of navigating the metro was more frightening to me than walking in the wilds of the African bush.

Perhaps because of my bewildered look, I was befriended by a late 60 or early 70 ish American couple from upstate New York who was travelling light with just backpacks. They were not doing the pilgrimage, just travelling light to avoid paying airline baggage fees. They were going to the centre of Porto so they kindly showed me how to decipher the metro plan, get on the right train, change trains and get off at the correct stop.

That got me to the Cathedral, the official start of the Camino in Porto. It was also the easiest part of my Metro experience. I got my Pilgrim Credencial stamped at the Cathedral office, wandered around the centre of the city then got back on the metro to head out of the centre to start my pilgrimage

I will continue my pilgrimage experience in the next post.

Today’s commercial spot

A few months back I attended Paul Oehm’s first Biz Coach Academy Workshop. He has since developed this into his Boot Camp programme and added important new modules. If you are a new entrepreneur or a small business owner trying to do everything yourself, there are some good resources here to help you. Check out his free Biz Coach Academy What if Breakeven Analysis Calculator.

Want to live healthier? Noom has a programme to help you over the holiday season.

Clicking on some links on this site will let you buy products and services which may result in us receiving a commission, however, it will not affect the price you pay.