O´Cebreiro is the first of only two miserable stays that I´ve ever had on any camino.
I came grateful to the top after ending an agonizing rainy day where the ascent was like going up an extended stairwell, where ten lorries had dumped their rubble down the shaft and started the water coming as well.
The hospitalero at the municipal declared the place full. I said I was willing to sleep anywhere, on the floor, under a table, but no....
When a passer by stated the top floor was still unopened, I inquired if this could be opened, I would do chores if it needed attention , but no....
It was when he started shouting as if if I was an idiot school boy, I started to fluster; I was tired, cold, I needed a shower and to rid of my wet clothes.
Turned out the only place I could stay was at a 44 euro place that his wife apparently owned (!!)
Being still furious, I had to borrow around to collect the cash needed, too late and too dark to go further, or to down to the German hostel that I had passed...
At last I collected what money and loose change I had and booked the room, she, the wife, was visibly uncomfortable when I told the story.
At the restaurant/café, very late, all I could afford was a scalding hot Caldo Gallego and spring water, as the now infamous Hospitalero stepped in and tried to chat up the young waitress, but she wasn´t having any of the smirking. My only satisfaction at the moment was burning my evil gaze into his back and hoping he was tossing and turning in the night himself!!
The expensive room had a minimum of hot water, only electric heating for one hour and the coldest stone building that I have ever slept in, I felt colder than a well diggers a****.
Needless to say, I would have loved a warm and cosy dormitory and would have suffered any number of three part harmony chorus of Roncadores !
- I agree with t2andreo, that only tourist will complain, but here I could not communicate and whether it was due to the roof actually having been caving in, or that he was just happily indifferent, I shall never know, but I have really, really tried to forgive him, but I still cannot....
On the evening however, I was warmed at the Caldo Gallego and then met Jimmy for a chin wag into the small hours, and whose tale of exile from the States touched me and I still remember.
Concluding: - here the Camino did not provide, but it persisted.....I was thouroughly being tested...