17 June 2025
Our day started with a beautiful sunrise through our 4th floor corner hotel room giving us a full panoramic view of Laredo and its super long beach. We rocked up downstairs for the start of the breakfast service with only us and a Canadian couple of similar vintage also walking the Camino Del Norte and doing their 6th Camino! We had a ferry crossing and needed to catch our amigos who’d had an earlier start as they had a basic hotel breakfast on offer.
Whilst the ferry service started at 9am it was closer to 10am by the time we had walked the 4km to the end of the beach and finding the track closed found the longest way possible to where the ferry departed from! The ferry service that runs between Laredo and Santoña has been ferrying pilgrims walking the Camino del Norte for many years and has been known to be a part of the Camino tradition since the 15 century.
We met up with our amigos and made tracks and were soon beach walking enjoying a gentle sea breeze giving us a pleasant relief from the hot sun.
Other than the ferry crossing, the main highlight of the day was the beach walking and seeing so many locals or holiday makers out enjoying a great day at the beach. It would be crazy here at the height of summer!
We left the coast and headed inland and before we knew it had knocked off another 20km day and arrived at the very small town of San Miguel de Meruelo. Really not much to say about this little town and the hotel we are staying at after leaving Laredo, but you do need to experience the not so good to appreciate the good!