We have had the good fortune to see a lot truly awesome places over the years, but there is something about Pompeii that makes it one of my favorites. We have a great tour guide and see all of the usual highlights, but my happy place is wandering down quiet side streets on our own, what remains of Mount Vesuvius looming in the background. Away from the crowds, it isn’t so hard to imagine life here two thousand years ago and the people then walking down the exact same sidewalks we are now.

We’re in no particular hurry, but even so, it all takes a little longer than it probably should as our events coordinator needs to stop and touch the “good luck” symbols peppered throughout the city. I guess Redmond must be a naturally lucky place as I definitely don’t recall this level of interest back home.

After a break for lunch, we hop back on the train and ride it to the end of the line in Sorrento (minus Sam, who has dipped in order to get back to the apartment and finish up a final assignment for his summer session). It is fun showing the boys the narrow streets filled with stores peddling all things lemon-related, and the beach we used to walk down to when we stayed here.

As with the rest of Italy, it is way too crowded this time of year for our tastes and, after a few hours of sightseeing, we are ready to call it a day. By the time we make it back to Castellammare di Stabia we’re too tired to even leave the apartment for dinner.

Tomorrow is our last day and, with no tours booked, we’re free to see whatever the boys want to check off their list. There’s talk of a boat trip down the coast or maybe taking a cable car up the mountain so we shall see what the morning brings.

Not much to report today as the bulk of it was spent packing up our things in Rome and transporting them to Castellammare di Stabia, where we’ll be for the next three nights. Our new place is in a residential part of town, so a bit of a walk away from the city center, but we have restaurants and a grocery store nearby meaning we don’t really need to leave the area if we don’t want to. The beach is also just a few blocks away, although away from the resorts there doesn’t seem to be any effort to clean up the cigarette butts and garbage that washes ashore.

We do luck into the best pizza we have had so far and you know you are off the beaten path when the price of calzone the size of a small baby is a whopping five Euro.

The primary target of relocating south is getting closer to Pompeii and checking that off of the list is the plan for tomorrow. There’s not much tree cover in a giant archeological dig so we’re booked in for as soon as the gate opens. At this rate, maybe we’ll retrain these kids to get out of bed before noon on their own.

It is amazing what trains zipping around at 300 km/h make possible. Florence is far enough away from Rome that it seems outside the boundaries of the typical day trip but, in practice, it is a bit over 90 minutes away. Compared to more local tours, where you can waste that much time picking up passengers from a dozen hotels in a crowded minibus, it is a pretty elegant option.

Our first order of business is to head directly for the Ponte Vecchio as our trip coordinator has been raving about the chocolate croissants we stumbled across the last time we were here. We also take a few sfogliatella, a lobster tail looking pastry popular in this part of the country. Thumbs up on the former. The latter I can probably live without.

Florence is a breathe of fresh air after Rome (quite literally, as there are np piles of garbage slow-roasting in the summer sun here). It is still way too crowded for my taste, and there is construction everywhere, but it just feels less chaotic.

We spend the morning on a walking our of the old city. This is something new for all of us and we have great guide pointing out things we completely overlooked when we were here on our own, like the monuments for the 1993 bombing, where the city was bombed to the ground in WWII and then rebuilt and, most importantly, a few places the locals like to eat.

The tour ends at the Accademia Gallery, where a nonstop parade of “influencers” line up for some quick selfies with Michelangelo’s David before rushing off in search of more “look how glamorous my life is” content for Instagram. We take a few ourselves but need way more work on our poses if we’re ever going to make it big.

For lunch we stop first at the lampredotto stand our guide pointed out. It is a classic street food here, made up of stewed cow’s stomach (just the fourth stomach though as that, apparently, is the USDA Prime one) on a roll. It is better than it sounds but remains, shall we say, an acquired taste. Nick, to his credit, gets back in line for another while we head off in search of something a little less adventurous.

Our final stop is the Uffizi Gallery. It is as overwhelming and mentally exhausting as it was the first time we saw it but I feel like I absorbed a bit more walking through it again. Perhaps after another fifty times or so I’ll finally get a handle on all of the priceless art gathered here and the fascinating history around it.

The return train whisks us back to Rome right around dinner and a final bit of time in the city. We’ll be right back at the station in the morning, bags in tow, heading to our final destination near Sorrento. Hotels are lights out expensive anywhere near the Amalfi Coast this time of year so we found an apartment just a few train stops away that should give us a good base to slow down a bit and enjoy our last few days in Italy.

We know there won’t be much shade today walking around the Colosseum and Forum so have picked a 9 am tour to try and beat the heat, even though you’d think we were prying our kids out of bed in the middle of the night by the speed they are moving. The apartment we have rented is right next to the main train station which makes it extremely easy to get places, although the neighborhood leaves a little to be desired (unless a bit of a Seattle underpass vibe is your thing).

Sam did this tour with his classmates a few weeks ago so it is only Nick and Joey seeing it for the first time but it is still hard not to be impressed walking through it all again.

It is midday as we make our way up Palatine Hill, and you know it is hot when my fellow adventurer accepts water from a public fountain intended for the common people.

Our guide spends far more time walking through the ruins on the hill than we did the last time around. It is a nice change as it makes this part of the tour mostly new but we get far less information about the Forum, which I think the boys would have enjoyed.

From there we head off on the Sam Tour of Rome – a combination sightseeing and culinary experience. First stop is his school, paired with stir fry noodles in the nearby plaza.

Then, after a quick detour to step inside the Pantheon, it’s across the river to his old apartment (which, despite appearances is not in the hood), accompanied by burritos from the restaurant down the street. Sam, it turns out, doesn’t really like Italian food and has spent most of the past few months finding places that serve everything but.

It has been a long day and the heat sucks your soul so, by the time we get back to the apartment, the entire squad is exhausted. No rest for the weary though. Tomorrow is an even earlier start as we’re day-tripping it all the way to Florence.

I said a few days back that sometimes you remember things being better than they actually are. Well, Rome may be a case in point. We were here in the fall last time around so maybe that made all of the difference but, in late July, the city is brutally hot, humid, crowded, and depressingly dirty. It has all the things I would look for when choosing a place NOT to go on vacation so is a bit of a let down from how much we enjoyed it before.

The boys (all three of them now!) don’t know any better so they are willing participants as we cram three or four days of sightseeing into the two we have available.

First there are the Spanish Steps…

Then the Trevi Fountain…

A quick drive by the Pantheon and Castel Sant’Angelo…

And finally, the Vatican Museum and St. Peter’s Cathedral, which are crammed to the point that you can’t really stop to look at anything for more than a few seconds (which actually works out fine since the two dollar radios out guide is using crackle like a New York subway speaker so we don’t really know what we are seeing anyway).

On the way back to the apartment, the boys spot a fast food restaurant called Jolibee and insist we stop there to eat. It is a fried chicken place but for some reason, with 10,000 pasta places to choose from, we also end up with spaghetti-type concoction that looks like it came directly from a high school cafeteria.

Maybe tomorrow we can really luck out and find an Old Country Buffet.

Sam finished up his summer session about a week ago and has been holed up in a hostel patiently waiting our arrival. Flights are running very full at the moment and the best we could get was flying together into Madrid and then splitting up, with two of us following into Rome a few hours later.

Joey and and I take the first shift and enjoy a nice trip with an entire row empty in front of us. This news does not please my fellow adventurers who were told at the gate that every seat was full so, no, they can’t switch to this earlier flight.

All is forgotten though once we touch down and catch the train into the city. There, waiting in there terminal for us is the man himself – Sammallama.

Our travel coordinator has planned a pretty packed itinerary for the handful of days we have here. Usually it’s me that drives everyone crazy to do things so I’m grateful for a little time off.

Rental cars, it seems, are not too common in Santiago de Compostela as the only ones we are able to find are at the airport. With a look of complete seriousness on his face, Joey says I should just get up early in the morning, take a cab to pick it up, and then swing back by the hotel so that he doesn’t have to get up so early. Flying quite close to the sun that boy.

It takes about an hour to get to the lighthouse at Finisterre and considerably easier in a car (thanks for the tip, Dale). It is just as amazing as we remember it, and we wander down past the crowds to find some quiet spots to sit and look out over the water. This definitely feels more like an ending so when my fellow adventurer tells me she’s been called back to do the camino again, I think we’ll add this last piece on again.

From here we plan to head north to Muxia, but first, we need to stop for food in the town of Cee, where Angela will tell you they serve the burger that saved her life. Somehow we manage to find it and, while things are often better in your head than they are in real life, this is by far the best burger we have had.

Muxia is a short twenty minute drive further on and, just when I thought it couldn’t get any better than Finisterre, now I’m not so sure. It is also a old fishing town but one that doesn’t really seem to have grown up. There are no tour busses and, this time, the end of the road takes you right down to the water.

There is a big bay here and you can see several sandy beaches around the rim that all seem completely empty. If I ever need to just disappear for a while, this feels like the kind of place I could do just that.

Back in Santiago, it is fireworks night (ostensibly for the festival, but I choose to believe they are because we finished the camino). We make our way back up to the cathedral and join the crowd of people that fill the main plaza. The TV personalities are there and we follow the countdown on the giant display.

At 11:00 the sky lights up in all directions. Or so it appears on the TV. The plaza is surrounded on all sides by buildings a few stories high making it quite possibly the only place in Santiago where you can’t see the fireworks. Fortunately, the show goes on for quite a while and by walking a block or so we are still able to catch a part of it. It’s not perfect, but still a pretty darn good way to close this chapter of our adventure.

For the first day in a very long time, there is nowhere we have to get and nothing we have to see. Stepping out of the elevator, there is a glorious spread of fresh fruit, pastries, coffee, juices, and all the yogurts you could ever eat and still leave some for other guests (Irish guy who bogarted all the yogurts in Reliegos, I’m talking to you).

We spend most of the day just wandering the streets of the old city, popping into shops here and there for souvenirs to bring back home.

There is also an excellent museum here dedicated to this history of the camino and it is interesting to learn some interesting facets of the journey we just completed that give it some additional perspective. For as difficult as we found it, a definite tip of the hat to those brave enough to attempt it in the days before there were even bridges across the rivers (what did those folks do on days they felt like carminoing?).

For dinner we end up at a tapas joint. The waiter does a double take when Nick rattles off our order and then includes a side of patatas bravas. The chicken fingers Joey wanted comes with potatoes he says, but we wave him off, confident we know what we are doing.

Five plates of potatoes later (since EVERY dish comes with them) it is now a test of will. But these are battled-hardened boys and, after a month of Spanish tortillas, a few lowly tubers aren’t near enough to break them.

They don’t have much left after that and head back to the hotel with mild cases of starch poisoning while Angela (off the trail she no loner goes by her trail name) and I stick around for a concert playing in the plaza next to the cathedral.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Spain and we’ve rented a car to take the boys out to Finisterre. There’s a part of me that wishes we had the time to hike it but I’m not sure I’d find many takers even if we did.

We did it! All 779 kilometers. Nearly 1,000,000 steps over mountains, across rivers, and through valleys. Past lonely villages, ancient ruins, and one-of-a-kind architectural wonders. Enduring scorching heat, violent thunder storms, and oppressive humidity. Meeting strangers from all over the world, sleeping in questionable accommodations, and eating more bocadillos than I care to count. It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t always fun. But, we did it!

Here’s how this last day went down.

Despite having a bit of a bad reputation, Efe Bomba has really taken the lead on early starts here in Spain and today is no different. We’re off before breakfast is being served, anxious to reach our destination (me the cathedral where the trail ends, her the Sweet Sleeper mattress at the Marriott). The marker shows just over 27km to go, so still some meat left on that bone.

Once again though, the crowds aren’t really anywhere to be seen. I’ll ponder this a bit more when we arrive to find the square in front of the cathedral packed with pilgrims (where did they all come from if we didn’t see them on the trail?) but I wouldn’t wish it any other way. How could I not miss this?

Before we know it, we pass this market – just 10km left to go.

We’re into the outskirts of Santiago now, although the hills keep us from getting our eyes on the prize. The boys take a detour to find this monument, and way off in the distance you can see the towers, but they quickly fade from view again, taking some much-needed visual encouragement away with them.

We enter the city, and still no cathedral. The distance markers long ago disappeared so we can only guess how far we have left to go. Maybe just over the next hill.

Nick has done this entire journey and is excited to finish, rushing ahead and then catching himself, turning back to wait for the rest of us to catch up.

And then we see it.

It is a grand finale but, after all of this way, there is something a little underwhelming about it. At any small town 10k run there is a big banner you pass under and a crowd cheering you on but, here, after 780k, there isn’t really anything. Nobody welcomes you. There aren’t any flags waving or fireworks going off. There’s not even a post with 0.000 on it like there is in Finisterre. Other than the cathedral, the only indicator that your journey is complete is this small brass plate on the ground surrounded by pilgrims taking pictures.

We take a few photos ourselves (OK, more than a few) and head off towards the Pilgrim’s Office where they check your credencial and issue the compostela. We’ve heard the line for this can be brutal and we are probably too late in the day to get through it before closing time, but we figure we can at least check out the process and try and estimate how early we need to be here in the morning.

There is a bit of a crowd and it isn’t exactly obvious what is happening but, after filling in a short online form, we’re quickly ushered into the office and, just like that, back out on the street with our compostelas, fancy Latin names and all, and a second certificate showing the distance we have travelled.

They also add the final stamps to complete our passports.

Some would say the greatest reward was saved for last though. Check in at a real hotel. It really hasn’t been long since we last stayed here and it is all very much the way we remembered it. We indulge in hot showers, high speed internet, and a bit of nap time before rallying up for one last task.

In the cathedral, they hold a Pilgrim’s Mass every evening at 7:30 (in Holy Years like this one they add 3 additional masses in the morning). Last year, we never actually made it into the cathedral as it filled up while we were still in line so it is a “must do” this time around. We’re not Catholic so the mass itself is just a curiosity, but, they have 180 pound incense burner here that eight people in robes yarding on ropes can get whipping 40 miles an hour. through the air. That I need to see.

The cathedral itself is impressive, like many others we have seen now, maybe a little larger. Of course, this one has the remains of St. James (so they say) it a tiny metal box under the altar.

The place is already packed when we arrive, but we manage to find a few square feet of floor space with a reasonably good view of the action. Once it gets going, the burner should fly right over top of us.

If you’re Catholic I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know but, mass is long. I suspect it feels even longer when 100% of it is in a foreign language but, this being my first Catholic mass, I can’t attest to that. A lot of singing (in latin, I think), plenty of standing up and sitting down, and waiting for hordes of people to get through the line for communion. My squad is getting a bit fidgety, but surely we’re getting close to incense time.

It is right about this time a man walks to the center of the altar with what looks like a large pepper shaker on a chain. It’s smoking, and he waves it a couple of times at us before repeating the motion towards the other sections of the cathedral. He then calmly walks back to where he came from. We’ve been bait and switched. By the church.

We use our final few steps of the day to return to the hotel where, tomorrow, we’ll wake up as just regular tourists.

One final shout out to this most excellent group of adventurers – truly the stars of the camino.

It is the penultimate day of our long journey and what a difference a few days makes. The trail is virtually empty and it all feels similar to those early days back in the Pyrenees where it was just us.

I have some anxiety that the end is now too close and that I haven’t had enough time to discover what about myself I needed to learn. Sure, I have had more opportunity to simply reflect than I probably ever have, but what if it isn’t enough? People say the camino changes you, but do I feel any different? What if nothing comes of this time away other than sore feet and a long-term aversion to bocadillos?

As we pass through Arzúa, the Camino Frances (the route we are on) merges with the Camino del Norte (the route that follows the coast) and I learn a bit more about that hike from a fellow pilgrim that has also travelled from France. Assuming our Buddhist friend is right and we will be called back here, I figure I might as well plan ahead. Efe Bomba does not seem on board with this plan.

We have just a few more more miles left to our final albergue in Salceda, and from there, just 27, mostly dowhill kilometers into Santiago de Compostela. We’ve booked rooms in the same Marriott we stayed in last year so once Efe Bomba smells that in the air, I know she’ll set a quick pace and help us finish strong.

It seems crazy, but we really have almost done it.