From Ferrol to Pontedeume - English Way - Viajes Camino de Santiago

Information

We start our English Way in a placid stage ending in Pontedeume, with a mostly urban route, with hardly any slopes and spectacular views of the Ferrol estuary. Its main difficulty is that it can be too long for many pilgrims. But it can be divided into two comfortable stages of 15 kilometers.

We begin our English Way with a pleasant walk through Ferrol, and we start from the Curuxeiras dock, where a stone monolith located in front of the pharmacy marks the starting point where we head to Pontedeume. We head towards the church of San Francisco and a little further on we come across the Co-cathedral of San Xulián. We will go through most of the tourist and historical places to leave the city towards the industrial area of A Gándara.

We do not get to enter the industrial estate, we follow the signs and take two streets to the right to continue along a promenade parallel to the Ferrol estuary. We leave the asphalt behind us by an overpass and take a path parallel to the train tracks, arriving at O Couto, where the Romanesque church of San Martiño de Xubia is located. Visiting hours are quite restricted but we can take advantage of the garden to make a short stop.

We cross asphalted tracks with dirt tracks until we pass a Fenosa’s turret, where we turn right, meeting again the blue of the Ferrol’s estuary. We go down to the mill of As Aceñas and the place of O Ponto. We continue on a pleasant walk, except for the Megasa sidelurgical plant, which is totally out of tune with the surroundings. We go down to the Paseo da Ribeira de Xubia and continue parallel to the shore.

After crossing a park with grass and dirt roads, we have two options to cross the estuary: The most direct is to use a pedestrian bridge that will leave us in front of the hostel of Neda, or follow the indications of the official milestones that take a short detour over an old bridge for vehicles.

We recommend taking the first option and continue from the hostel along a pleasant coastal walk along the estuary, along wooden walkways that border the marshes. After 1 km we return to the official route, finding the church of Santa María de Neda, at the halfway point of the stage.

We leave Neda behind to continue through Regueiro, O Puntal de Arriba and Conces, until we enter Fene, a town known for its shipyards and which has all the services.

We follow the signs and take the opportunity to stock up, if necessary, in a bar or supermarket. We drive away from the urban centre along an asphalted road, we reach the Mundín washhouse and, after a turn to the left, we take the Camiño Real. Here we can visit the Chapel of Santa Ana.

We go through a motorway tunnel and continue to Rego da Moa. Parallel to the national road, we see a dirt road that we follow until we reach the industrial estate.

Once in the business area, we follow the indications marked by the arrows. We cross over the AP-9 motorway and arrive at Pena do Pico. We go past an area of mills and a stream, we reach the main road to Cabanas, which we cross. We take the detour on the right that takes us to the mill Sucursal de Priorato and the Church of San Martiño do Porto, which we can visit.

Back on the path, we descend towards the railway tunnel. The beach of A Magdalena and the fabulous pine forest of Cabanas appear, an idyllic place for refreshment. The last steps of this stage border the pine forest until reaching the bridge over the river Eume, built in the 14th century. We arrive, at last, to Pontedeume.

To consider

Some pilgrims cut 11 km of the route to Pontedeume crossing the bridge of the N-651 road that connects Ferrol with Fene. The viaduct has a pedestrian lane separated from traffic. We do not recommend this alternative as we would miss the coastal section of Xubia and Neda.