Often with a day to spare in Santiago de Compostela, the pilgrim will spend 6 hours on a bus for the return journey to Finisterre. And for what? While the scenery on the bus trip itself is beautiful as you run along the coast, Cape Finisterre is under whelming to say the least. And what does it have to do with the veneration of St. James?

But closer to hand, and an altogether more delightful and historic place is Padrón. In his 1976 book "The Way of Saint James", T. A. Layton writes :-

About 11 miles from the Atlantic coast, on the River Sar and near its confluence with the swift flowing Rive Ulla, is the town of Padrón, with 8,000 inhabitants, known and important in Roman times as Iria Flavia. It is a charming, untidy, multi-styled town which was of such moment to the pilgrims that they grew up saying:-

"Quien vay a Santiago e non va al Padrón
O faz Romario o no"

"He who goes to Santiago and not to Padrón
Either does the pilgrimage or does not"

It was St James the Greater who caused the change of name, for when his disciples brought his body to Iria Flavia the boat was moored to a stone pillar or pedron which was part of the Roman altar that can still be seen and venerated under the high altar at the parish church. I have wandered around the town so many times that I think I really have the feel of the place. By the main square is a lovely, old pilgrim's cross and near by the Carmen fountain with a modern though excellent representation of St James in the little boat that brought him to Galicia; on the other side of the Sar, which has a long tree-lined esplanade beside the river, is the seventeenth-century Convent of El Carmen

You can travel to Padrón by bus or train, but the former is probably the most convenient. Buses depart from the "Estacion Autobus" frequently and the cost of the return ticket is Euros 4-20.