Camino de Santiago – Day 6 – Villafranca del Bierzo to O Cebriero

Friends, this is a long, long day. When planning your Camino, you might want to consider ending before O Cebriero. That way you would climb at the beginning of your day instead of at the end. It truly is all steep uphill for more than the last 5 kms. I want to say it was 7 kms of climbing, but it may have been a bit less.

Again, we started in the dark. We left our albergue at 6:44am.

Things you see on the way out of Villafranca del Bierzo…

My favourite thing is my favourite statue on the whole Camino!

On the way out of town, you have two options. Go to the left. I’ve heard from several people that the right is brutal. All climbing. You can tell just by looking at the right option that it’s crazy steep right from the beginning.

There are several places along the way that you can stop if you do the leg the same way we did it.

Our first stop… Las Coronas in Pereje.

Our second stop… In Trabadelo. In 2014 I stayed in this albergue. It’s lovely. We stopped at Bar Crispeta.

Right before you enter Trabadelo, there are stacks of logs. They were there in 2014, 2019, and today. Selfies each time. Here’s today’s…

As you leave Trabadelo, look into the attic windows. You’ll see this charming girl. She has always been there too…

Soon, you will find yourself alongside the highway for quite a while.

Our third stop…looked like a very cool place. Only 4 beds for this albergue. But it’s very rock and roll. You wouldn’t be making a mistake working it into your itinerary. Apparently, they also have rock and roll pizza. It wasn’t available when we went, but we just wanted an Aquarius. VEGABOND VIERIAS.

This was a long day. We don’t usually stop this much!

Catch the feats of engineering on these highways in the sky!!

I might be too afraid to drive on these.

Ruitelan was the small town we walked through next.

Soon after, we went to Las Herrerías. This is where we stayed in 2019. The albergue is fully closed and empty. It was a sad sight to see. It was beautiful. And we had great food there. It was an absolute charmer. It’s now up for sale. We were so looking forward to stopping here for refreshments.

A little further into town, we found an albergue to stop in. It was quite beautiful too. I would definitely stay there…

In Las Herrerías you can book horse rides up the mountain to O Cebriero. We saw them coming back down.

This good boy was going home on his own. He pulled over and stopped when a car went by, just like we did.

After Las Herrerías–and I mean RIGHT after–the steep climb begins!! Ugh. It’s so much work. The photos do not capture the incline, but your relation to the mountains does…

Once you’re almost to the top, you’ll come to the Galicia landmark. You have reached Spanish Nirvana. My favourite region.

O Cebriero is mercifully close. Once you see The Lady of O Cebriero, you can breathe a sigh of relief! You’ve made it! Isn’t she beautiful?!

O Cebriero is a gorgeous town! Father Elías Valiña, the parish priest of O Cebreiro, reinvigorated the Camino when he used leftover roadwork paint to paint yellow arrows all along the way. He did this along the French Way in the 1980s, and he now has a place of honour at the church in O Cebriero.

We checked into our albergue, Casa Anton, had quick showers, then went out for supper our first Caldo Galego! Galician soup!! I love it! Hope to have it every day going forward!