BY CLIFFS AND BEACHES TO SANTANDER

Breakfast the next morning was every bit as convivial as supper the night before, but eventually, it was time to go. My diary tells me that I was feeling glum, and didn't want to continue, but that the rising sun was a tonic to my spirit. From the albergue, I walked through the rest of the neighbourhood to a minor road. As I reached the junction of the main road to Somo, my Guemes experience was bookended, as Ernesto and Katia zoomed by in the little white van, beeping and waving!



The trail led through the streets of Galizano, a small town with an imposing church. Here I ran across the couple from Bilbao, who had decided to take a taxi to Santander as the rash on the girl's legs was much worse now. They'd been walking with Ramiro, so he and I now set off together to walk along the cliffs to Somo.

The weather was fine and we walked at the same pace. We both had bad knees, and it was nice to be able to say "Hey, let's stop for ten minutes" without feeling like we were holding the other one back. We talked about the usual things; our lives, our situations. We stopped to take pictures at the beauty spots, we photographed one another, trading cameras for "self" portraits.



We climbed bluffs, waded through tall grass, rested above sheer cliffs, and walked barefoot along fantastic beaches. We met holidaymakers, retirees mostly, and came across a encampment of travellers, who made Ramiro look positively staid by comparison. Ramiro talked about working in IT in Barcelona, and wanting to travel the Middle East, but also wanting to head home to Argentina to meet his new neice, who was nearly one year old already. He spoke with sadness about how the unrest in Egypt and other countries in the region would make travel there next to impossible for the next few years, even though he could probably escape notice because of his dark hair and eyes. He called himself a "moustache traveller". I had to look that up in case it meant something rude, but I think he only meant that he could blend with the appearance of the men of the region.




We got to the boat dock at Somo just in time to miss the boat, so had a half hour waiting in a shelter. The tide was going out by the time we boarded, along with a surprising number of other people, and the pilot had to manoeuvre his way carefully among the sandbars.



Soon we were in Santander, and easily found the albergue, which was not yet open. Time for lunch! I can't remember which of us treated the other, but it started a tradition. At each opportunity for the next few days, whenever we were together for a meal or a drink, we took turns to pay.



Santander had that same fin de siecle elegance which characterized all the seaside towns, but there was something hollow about the place, something grey, and grubby, and uninspired; and it smelled faintly of drains.