Epilogue in Spanish (Camino Portugues 5+1)

Wednesday marked the end of our pilgrimage for the time being. Our last challenge was the departure; after all, Rubiäes was in the middle of nowhere, and the nearest bus stop was 2.5 km away. What to do?

We chose a taxi service. For a few euros, the driver would take us to Valença. Just moments ago, we were sitting among the pilgrim community at Café Sao Sebastiao enjoying milk coffee and Pastel de Nata, and now we were sneaking down the road to the main street at 8:40 AM to load our clothes into a white Dacia Jogger. Chauffeur Lucas then drove us 20 minutes to Valença at the train station, where we purchased train tickets for 2 PM to Lisbon.
This way, we had effortlessly completed the last Portuguese leg. In Valença, we toured the historic fortress, mind you, with our travel backpacks. Afterward, we crossed the Spanish border river Minos and made our way to the cathedral of Tui, fully equipped. During our city tour, we encountered at least three other familiar pilgrims who had reached their destination early in the afternoon and looked at us in confusion, utterly perplexed as to when and how we had covered the last kilometers with such an advantage.
On the train, we were finally tourists again, enjoying how the landscape passed us by. Furthermore, the train made stops along the way to Porto in some towns we had painstakingly left behind in the previous days. Now, for example, Lima, Tamel, and Barcelos flew by us in just a couple of hours.
Around 8 PM, we arrived in Lisbon. A hotel room booking error from the reception further delayed our evening conclusion. Instead of a suite for three people, we had to settle for a three-person room for this night. After the previous nights, we were accustomed to worse.
After a short city walk in search of dinner - I opted for mango curry - we fell into our beds around midnight. The pilgrim life was over. However, we prepared ourselves as tourists for the next day and set the alarm for 7 AM, as we needed to be in Sintra by around 10 AM.