News and Notes from the Mar

It’s awesome to be back on the Camiño do Mar, and to really see the route taking shape. When I came here the first time, it was like a treasure hunt, cobbling together an almost useless map with comments from a handful of forum members, and then searching assiduously at every trail intersection for a rumor of a waymark. Now, though, yellow arrows are plentiful! It’s not perfect yet, of course, and there are some places that need attention. (Albergues are needed, too!) But through the first three stages, at least, I think you could easily make it through 80% of the Mar, maybe 85%, on the yellow arrows, in conjunction with the Cantabrico markers.

Some notes on each stage that I’ve cleared thus far. One overarching caveat: every time I point out a problem with waymarking, I’ll fully acknowledge that the failure may be on my end!

1) Ribadeo to Praia das Catedrais

• Almost no yellow arrows exist prior to Rinlo. It’s not a problem–just follow the Cantabrico along the coast.
• I didn’t find a functional fountain until a couple km after Rinlo. Lots of broken ones!
• I made a reservation for Praia das Catedrais, but nobody checked. Maybe just because it wasn’t low tide yet?
• I departed Ribadeo at 7:30. It was a Sunday. The first open bar I encountered was at Catedrais
• Not much else to note on this section, but it’s an easy one–unless there’s a vision for the Mar to not follow the coast all the way around, and instead cut across inland (which I would disagree with), the Mar and Cantabrico are synced up throughout

2) Praia das Catedrais to Foz

• The biggest development is that the Mar turns left off the Cantabrico farther west than it used to, and then it generally proceeds westward along very quiet paved roads. It no longer goes all the way south to the N634 for most of this section, and eventually passes an Eroski supermarket and the Igrexa de San Cosme de Barreiros (as it used to, just from a different angle). This walk is an improvement and the waymarks are good! I’d still recommend staying on the Cantabrico, plus the shortcut advised in the book, but I appreciate this
• The waymarks suddenly evaporated just as the route approached the N634 before the approach to the Rio Masama. I feel pretty good that this one’s not on me, as a biker passed me in this moment, and I saw him pull over and consult his maps soon after, just as I was hunting in vain for an arrow
• That said, the arrows picked up quite reliably in the turnoff for Vilaronte, and the arrows are excellent from there onto San Martiño de Mondoñedo. The bar in Vilaronte was closed, but the one in Mondoñedo was open!
• The yellow arrows and San Rosendo are synced up leaving Mondoñedo. These follow a different approach than what I have mapped in the book. If you want to go into the center of Foz, I strongly recommend my approach. The yellow arrows seem to bypass Foz center, while the circuitous approach followed by the San Rosendo… I mean, it’s just silly

3) Foz to San Cibrao

• I followed the Cantabrico from Foz to Burela. There’s significant construction work going on with this path over the 2km before Fazouro, so be ready to divert to parallel roads. I just don’t think it’s worth climbing into the hills to get to the official Mar in this section
• Yellow arrows pick back up around Nois / Cangas de Foz. Cangas de Foz has a pretty reliable bar and small grocery just off the Cantabrico
• Last time I was here, highway construction before Burela caused me a lot of trouble, as it disrupted the route. All of that is done now, and the Mar/Cantabrico are synced up for that approach. Some of the waymarking hasn’t made it back, but just stick with the trail. One tricky part: when the highway passes underneath the footpath, at the point where that construction project was most intensive, the footpath splits, with one going downhill to the left, and the other going uphill to the right. Go down and to the left! You won’t see any waymarks until you reach the end of the footpath, where you’ll see Mar and Cantabrico markings
• Thanks to that construction, you no longer have to go all the way down to the port and then backtrack up a steep hill. Instead, catch the yellow arrows calling for a turn uphill. They’re pretty reliable leading you out of Burela
• The walk from Burela to San Cibrao is, in my view, the place where the Mar is loads better than the Cantabrico, and I’m thrilled to see pretty good waymarking here
• In particular, the arrows leading to the Sagradelos ruins is super reliable. It follows a slightly different trajectory than what I mapped out (going one track over to the south for a bit), but it’s easy to navigate. (One small exception–there’s a turn where the arrow is at the base of a power pole, and that pole is covered in bushes
• All of that said, the waymarks pretty much stop the moment you arrive in Sargadelos, and they remain super unreliable until the outskirts of Cervo
• The Sargadelos ruins are so great! There was also an open bar there, which makes everything better
• Arrows from the outskirts of Cervo to the outskirts of San Cibrao were great
• San Cibrao remains one of my favorite spots on any Camino. Even with some brief rain squalls

4) San Cibrao to Viveiro

• The big news is that clear waymarks now guide pilgrims through Xove. The Mar splits with the Cantabrico soon after Hotel/Bar O Castelos, and the yellow arrows are clear. For a bit
• However, after turning left onto a dirt track, they become very spotty. For the most part, it’s intuitive–just keep going straight, ignoring turns. Merge onto the highway. (A good, clear wm will take you back off it before too long.) In Xove, though, it’s pretty bad. Keep going straight. Note that, when you reach the bus station on the right, there’s a bar down the street to the left that was open for breakfast. Otherwise, keep going straight, eventually making a right turn to reach the church. I did not see a waymark there. Then turn right again, looping behind the church. (Note there is a fountain on the right, behind the back gate to the cemetery.) There is a very, very faded arrow here–it looks like someone tried to erase it. Arrows become more consistent again after this, for a bit
• Unfortunately, the arrows evaporate again near a complicated intersection when you rejoin a paved road. Turning right leads to another intersection, with roads going towards Portocelo and Vilachá. The correct move is to loop all the way back around to Portocelo, where the arrows pick back up
• The last 10km of this walk follows the coast, so it’s a decent mix of interior walking (looping past a handful of small churches) and seaside. For me… I think I’d still prefer the Cantabrico. The distances aren’t that different, and Xove wasn’t particularly interesting. Now, if Xove would like to open a municipal albergue…
• The fountain at Praia de Esteiro is broken
• The Cantabrico and Mar appear to be synced up from just before the Mar reaches the coast to Celeiro
• Now, I thought they were synced up all the way to Viveiro. But Oliva at Oli Vita Hostel alerted me to the fact that the Mar is intended to turn inland in Celeiro (as opposed to the Cantabrico, which turns right to join the waterfront promenade), and then take a higher level approach into Viveiro. I couldn’t find waymarks for that anywhere, and I also tried backtracking for a bit from Viveiro. I can see the appeal of that approach–there’s a good stretch of highway walking on the Cantabrico into Viveiro, but I wouldn’t try it without gpx tracks
• Oli Vita Hostel in Viveiro is highly recommended! Oliva is such a huge advocate of the Mar. She even has two sellos available. Some pilgrims opt to stay here for multiple days. The hostel is quite close to the train station, and the old FEVE line passes through many of the towns on the Mar, so it’s totally possible to walk a ways, train back to Viveiro, then pop back ahead the next morning.

5) Viveiro to Cuiña

• Oliva at Oli Vita confirmed for me that my rendition of the Mar for this stretch remains accurate, so that left me heartened and confident to go full coast for this section, as the Cantabrico splits with the Mar just after Covas and doesn’t reunite until Cuiña
• The Cantabrico, too, remains unchanged in this, its last section. However, some of the signposts are aging poorly, and I suspect that some of them have been lost, as there were some thinner stretches for waymarks than I remembered from last time. Nonetheless, there are really no challenges, and I spent the day with minimal glances at the gps
• The walk from Esteiro to O Porto de Espasante might be my favorite section of the Mar. It’s just spectacular. Even has the “best bench in the world”
• Dang, the walk from Ladrido, where the Cantabrico ends, through Cuiña is just so, so bad. It’s all highway, the shoulder is wide enough for a walker but not much more than that, and the only real break from that comes in Ortigueira. Next time I’m here, I think I might try to cobble together a different approach from O Porto de Espasante, as even the final stretch of the Cantabrico to Ladrido is road-bound the whole time, and it looks like there might be something viable from O Porto. If you’re not insistent on walking every step, absolutely take the train from O Porto southward
• And that’s the trade-off in this section, really: you can have the highest of highs and the lowest of lows if you follow the Cantabrico, or you can have a very consistent “ok” on the Mar

6) Cuiña to San Andres de Teixido

• Apologies again for the very inconsistent work with tildes/accents. Having real issues cracking that nut on this keyboard
• The Mar waymarks from Cuiña to A Ponte de Mera are more good than bad, though I ran into some badly faded ones that would be easily missed
• The Mar takes a wider berth around A Ponte de Mera than I have laid out in the book. First, if you look east of A Ponte, you’ll see a point where the highway curves sharply to the north, and I have the Mar joining it at that point. Instead, the Mar turns southward, and then turns right onto an older paved track through the trees. There is a fountain at that second turn. Later, instead of turning right under the train tracks and doubling back to the train station, the Mar continues further south, passes the church and continues south, then goes north, then turns left and goes south again, and then turns right on an easily missed path in the trees onto a bridge, before finally committing to a northward turn into A Ponte. There’s another fountain in this stretch and a park that would be a most excellent camping area. But… really, if you’d like to shave off a km, you could take a much more direct approach into A Ponte
• I only saw one yellow arrow after leaving A Ponte, but I was focused more on the trajectory towards the coastal alternate, so the error may well have been mine. Regardless, I’d keep an eye out for the turn-off to the Mar if that’s your priority
• The walk from A Ponte de Mera to Cariño mostly follows the highway, alas, and the shoulder is tighter for around 5km of that. It’s not terribly busy, and the views are often nice (if you’re willing to take your eyes off the road), but it’s far from ideal. I don’t see a work-around, unless someone would like to launch a pilgrim ferry between O Porto de Espasante and Cariño, which would be amazing and solve all of the problems
• I really like Cariño. The old town has more charm than some of the other villages along the coast in this section
• Last time I was here, I discovered a couple of rogue yellow arrows on the footpath to San Xiao after Cariño. This is also where a seemingly random Camino Cantabrico epilogue appears. Well, those few yellow arrows had been freshened up this time, so I decided to follow them. They lead back on the highway a little ways from San Xiao, and then a yellow arrow calls for a right turn on an overgrown track. I wasn’t convinced this was correct, so I walked on a bit, but then I gritted my teeth and dove in. It’s a bit overgrown, which some prickly stuff, but not terrible. And later I discovered a very, very faded yellow arrow on a eucalyptus (not the best medium for waymarks, but the only option), and further on I found much more convincing arrows on stone. This actually is another branch of the Mar, and it leads up eventually to what I have mapped out as the coastal variant to Teixido. So, in this section, there are TWO Caminos del Mar
• I ran into not one but TWO pilgrims on the Camino del Mar at the viewpoint by the windmills. Pretty amazing
• I know I just said the stretch in the previous stage is probably my favorite on the Mar, but I love, love, love the higher level walking above San Andres. Totally exhilarating
• Water is good on this route until San Xiao (where there is a fountain). I found nothing after that
• The footpath prior to the cross / Howard memorial is muddy and has a lot of overgrowth. (And it has been pretty dry for a while.) Might be better to stick with the road. And the trail from the memorial is as rocky and wet as ever. Pretty nasty, but I suppose also kind of evocative!
• There is now a Casa Rural in San Andres. It’s incredible. Definitely more expensive than I almost ever go for, but not egregious (I’m spending 90 euros in the peak of summer), and impressive value

7) San Andres de Teixido to Ferrol

• This is a long but potentially workable “stage” if you’re following the Mar (interior approach) direct from Teixido to Naron. I was following the coast. That might make more sense as three stages. Hell of a day, just awesome and something I’ll remember forever
• The opening section, from Teixido to Cedeira, is marvelous coastal walking, high on the cliffs above the Atlantic. The arrows (paired yellow and white) are perhaps a little faded in places, but very consistent. I had to navigate around some logging work along the way, but it wasn’t a big deal
• Leaving Cedeira is fine at first, but what follows is probably the worst stretch of this stage, with long chunks of walking on the highway. The shoulder is sufficient and the views are often quite nice, but it’s prolonged
• The day really picks up after that, though! The walk from Playa Pantin to Valdovino is lovely, and I was struck again by how lively the latter is. Very, very popular with surfers
• The biggest discovery I made this time is that it’s actually possible to follow the beach all the way across from Valdovino–even at high tide, which is basically when I hit it, it was still safe to go all the way along Frouxeira. This saves a good chunk of kms, most of which would have been on pavement
• I also better appreciate the value of the Costa Ártabra, a waymarked route that picks up soon after, now, and will shift some of the mapped bits over to better align with that. Absolutely fantastic coastal walking along a dirt track
• My plan had been to camp along the route, but the weather made that unpalatable, so that necessitated cutting off the last chunk of the coastal approach, cutting across the interior. Even that, though, proved valuable. I linked together other, different parts of the Ártabra, which are particularly well marked leading from Ferrol northward with paired purple and yellow arrows. Eventually, this led me to the Ermita de Chamorro, which overlooks all of Ferrol, and I understand is a significant local pilgrimage shrine. I was thrilled to even find it open

​It’s a tricky walk overall, as that highway section after Cedeira is rough, and accommodation is super limited after that point as well. Given how much longer it is than the Mar, too, I imagine it’s a tough sell. But it is absolutely stunning landscapes, and I will be excited to return.

For now, though, it’s onto the Camino Ingles, which I began today.