Porto to Vilarinho

This was an odd day! First I quickly found my way to the cathedral in Porto and was easily following the frequent way marks. But suddenly they were gone. Porto has so many twisting and turning streets that I was so confused that I wasn't even sure where I had come from, much less where I was. So I went through the usual procedure of asking people and getting misled by their directions. Finally I programmed a known point on the route into my iPhone map program. But even that was confusing because the little blue indicator kept jumping all over the screen. When I was about at the point of tearing my hair out I suddenly saw a yellow arrow. I really had no idea where I was, but I knew I was heading in the right direction.

I continued in that direction through endless city streets for several hours. The weather was kind enough to hold off on the forecast rain during that time. I did have the same strong winds from yesterday however.

Then it started to rain lightly so I reached for my umbrella, immediately realizing that I was no longer carrying it! I believe it was last seen at a cafe bathroom somewhere back in the maze of Porto when I was lost. Hence, the reason I didn't bring my expensive trekking poles with me. I backtracked numerous times last year on the Camino Frances after leaving them in various places. And also there are a couple of lovely hand carved walking sticks left behind in bathrooms along the Shikoku 88 Temple Pilgrimage route in Japan. The final one was last in my hand somewhere in Tokyo station.

So I no longer have my cute pink polkadot umbrella. But it's probably just as well because the winds today would have been too strong for it anyway.

I met a couple of lady pilgrims in a little cafe in Mosteiro. They had walked from Belgium, had already been to Santiago but had walked to Porto and were on their way back to Santiago. I suppose they plan to walk back to Belgium but our language barrier prevented me from learning the rest of their story. We parted on arrival in Vilarinho.

Vilarinho greeted me with another cloudburst and once again I was soaked to the skin. I had a hotel reserved in Vila do Conde because I really wanted a private room. So I had a lady at the cafe where I ran for cover, call a taxi for me. I am spending the night here in Vila do Conde. It's a really nice town but it is still raining too hard to explore very much. I did take a walk down to the river and back. I also found a cafe and got a sandwich for dinner. I'll take a taxi back to Vilarinho in the morning and continue where I left off. I hope it stops raining. My continually wet feet are getting some blisters now. My shoes have been soaking wet for a week!