As many walkers know, walking is far easier in beautiful surroundings than walking along a busy main road, where one is worried that a car driver is more interested in their phone than the road – which happened to me today.
In many respects today was a pleasant walk, starting with an uphill climb leaving Setubal in beautiful sunshine. I passed a statue dedicated to Mariana Torres who was murdered in 1911 during a demonstration for better work conditions. As soon as I had left the suburbs and reached the countryside, the path was blocked by a lorry collecting branches. The driver told me that he wouldn’t be moving for a couple of hours, and whilst I could perhaps squeeze past the lorry on one side, there was a barbed wire fence at face level to contend with. I walked back and forth for 15 or so minutes trying to find alternative paths around the lorry, but to no avail, and ended up on a ca. 1 kilometer long, but pleasant detour.
There was a lot of road walking today, starting with a couple of kilometers downhill on the N10, luckily with a wide shoulder to walk on. Back on quieter back roads through the countryside, up and down hill, I reached the small village of Vendas de Azeitai where I stopping for a coffee with a waitress who, during the 10 minutes I was there, asked me at least 10 times if everything was ok! I began to wonder if I didn’t look well.
Leaving the village along small roads (and passing a multi-coloured house) led onto a dirt track through not looked after countryside, used as a tip by builders. On the outskirts of Coina I passed a sign offering a burger with “gratis fever” in what seemed like a very run down town with many derelict and run down buildings in the areas I walked.
In Coina I needed to decide whether to walk towards Seixal or Barreiro, both of which have ferry connections to Lisbon. I choose the later, which included a lengthy 7-8 kilometers along a very busy main road and surprisingly many with phones in their hands whilst driving.
I passed an army fusiliers training camp with high walls and barbed wire keeping people out or the soldiers in? Finally I hit the coast again shortly before the ferry terminal and a short wait before a short ride to Lisbon.
I still needed to walk a couple of kilometers along the coast to the hotel sitting above the Santa Apolónia station and had a train theme.
This marked the end of the first part of my walk, closing the gap between Porto Covo and Lisbon. The route is not an official Camino route, nor did I find any other predefined trails to follow, nor did I meet any other walkers. I would say that the main reason that there isn’t a planned walk between Lisbon and the start/end of the Fisherman’s Trail, is that it isn’t super interesting. This is partly due to there being few stretches hugging the coast, most of the walking is behind the dunes and partly due to the amount of road walking added to the very limited service infrastructure along the way. On saying that, the walk certainly had it’s moments – Sines and Setubal are short visit’s worthy; leaving Porto Covo offers great views of the coast, the rice paddies and birds at Comporta were also interesting, as was walking through Troia. A path closer to the coast would have been great.
It was 16.30 when I checked in and it was still light outside. My legs in good shape after 28kms to Barreiro. So I walked an hour of tomorrows stage as they forecast rain in the afternoon. I had ramen for dinner before taking the bus back to the hotel.
What a lovely interesting walk.