Arzúa

How long to stay?

One evening is enough. Arzúa is a modern small town on the main road, with a church from the 1950s and a medieval chapel. You arrive, eat cheese, sleep and move on. For most, Arzúa is the second-to-last or third-to-last night, and the excitement is already on Santiago.

Arzúa in Ninja numbers

• 38.4 kilometers are left from here to Santiago, two short stages or one very long one.
• 737.7 kilometers lie behind you on the Camino Francés since Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port.
• Around 812 kilometers have the pilgrims on the Camino del Norte covered since Irún when they meet you here.
• Three Caminos walk together from Arzúa: Francés, Norte and the Camino Primitivo, which already joined in Melide.
• On the first Sunday in March Arzúa celebrates its cheese festival; in 2025 it turned 50 years old.

Arriving: over the Iso into the cheese town

From Melide it is 14.2 kilometers with 323 meters of ascent and 392 meters of descent, in constant ups and downs over Boente and A Castañeda. Three kilometers before the town lies Ribadiso: a stone bridge over the Iso and beside it a medieval pilgrim hospital that has been a Xunta albergue again since 1993. At 305 meters, this is the lowest point of the stage. After that you climb up to Arzúa. The public albergue is in the middle of town, exactly where the Francés and the Norte meet.

In brief: hospital, convent, cheese

In the 14th century, Augustinians founded a convent in Arzúa with a hospital for pilgrims. It had been endowed by two nobles of the area, Alonso de Muñiz and Iván Giráldez, whose grave lies in the surviving chapel. By the end of the 17th century the convent was abandoned. Of it only the chapel of the Madalena remained, which was restored in the 1980s. The parish church is new: it was built from 1955 to 1958. What makes Arzúa known today comes from the pastures all around: Arzúa-Ulloa cheese carries a protected designation of origin, and the town calls itself "Tierra del Queso", land of cheese.

A cheese that ripens

Arzúa is the place where the Camino ripens. The pilgrims from the Norte come from the coast, those from the Primitivo from the mountains, you from the Pyrenees. Each has weeks behind them, and none has more than two days ahead. In the albergue, pilgrims from three Caminos sleep under one roof. And the cheese, mild and soft, is what you should eat here, not what you have to carry along: until Santiago you carry only what you really need anyway.

Three Caminos, one town: what to see

• Igrexa de Santiago: The parish church was built from 1955 to 1958 and is no work of art, but it has two figures of St. James that you can compare on this Camino: once as a pilgrim with hat and staff, once as Matamoros, the Moor-slayer on horseback. We did not find opening hours.
• Capela da Madalena: The only remnant of the Augustinian convent from the 14th century, church of the old pilgrim hospital. One nave, a rib vault, a bell gable without a bell, the grave of the two founders. Since 2006 it has been a hall for exhibitions and lectures. It stands near the town hall and the public albergue.
• Ribadiso, three kilometers back: Whoever did not stop there today missed something. The stone bridge over the Iso and the old hospital beside it are a good place for a rest.

Food and drink

Eat cheese. Queixo Arzúa-Ulloa is a soft cow's-milk cheese from the area, and in Arzúa it is on almost every menu, often with quince jelly. If you are here in March: on the first Sunday of the month the town celebrates its Festa do Queixo. There are shops, bakeries and a butcher in town, plus several supermarkets near the public albergue.

Honestly

• Little to see. The church is from the 1950s, the chapel small. The best of the stage lies in Ribadiso, not in Arzúa.
• The town lies on the main road. The N-547 runs through the town, and the public albergue is a few meters from it.
• The Xunta albergue is functional. Pilgrims complained in 2025 and 2026 that the kitchen has no dishes, that only a few sockets work and that the men's showers have no doors.
• Many private albergues close in winter. Several are open only from March to November.

Where pilgrims sleep

The Xunta's Albergue de peregrinos de Arzúa is on Rúa Cima do Lugar in the middle of town, near the town hall and the Capela da Madalena. It has 56 places in three halls, two of them accessible, and costs €10 with disposable bed linen. Admission from 13:00 to 22:00, out by 8:00, all year, no reservations (as of October 2026). The kitchen has a microwave and fridge, but no dishes. In addition there are many private albergues, mostly for €14 to 20; several are closed from December to February. If you want to stop earlier: in Ribadiso, three kilometers before Arzúa, the Xunta albergue stands in the old pilgrim hospital by the river, also for €10.

Ninja tips

• Charge your phone early. In the Xunta albergue only a few sockets work, most of them in the kitchen.
• Bring a cup and cutlery. Here too the kitchen has no dishes.
• Rest in Ribadiso. Bridge, river and meadow at the old hospital are the best place for a break between Melide and Arzúa.
• Compare the two St. James figures. In the parish church the pilgrim and the Matamoros stand side by side; in Santiago you meet the Moor-slayer once more.
• Plan the last 38.4 kilometers now. The classic stage ends in O Pedrouzo, 19.1 kilometers further; from there 19.3 remain to Santiago.

Practical tips for pilgrims

• Stamps: On the last 100 kilometers you need two stamps a day for the Compostela.
• Supplies: ATM, pharmacy, grocery stores, bakery. Health center: tel. 981 500 450.

Onward: through the hamlets to O Pedrouzo

The stage to O Pedrouzo (km 756.8) is 19.1 kilometers long, with 365 meters of ascent and 462 meters of descent; the highest point is 410 meters, near Santa Irene. You walk through a chain of small hamlets, A Calzada, A Calle, A Salceda, A Brea and Santa Irene, and reach O Pedrouzo shortly after A Rúa. From there it is another 19.3 kilometers to Santiago.

What awaits you tomorrow

O Pedrouzo, the last stage town before Santiago. For many it is the last night on the Camino, with only 19.3 kilometers left to the cathedral.

Deep dive: Arzúa, where the Caminos ripen

A short read, in case you want to learn more about Arzúa. About three minutes' reading.

The place of arrival before the arrival

When you stand in front of the public albergue in Arzúa, you stand at a crossing you cannot see. Here the Camino from the north coast comes in, the one that begins in Irún at the French border. It is about eight hundred kilometers long, and shortly before Arzúa it passes the monastery of Sobrado dos Monxes. From here on, the pilgrims of the north, the pilgrims from Oviedo and the pilgrims from the Pyrenees walk the same Camino. Arzúa is the last larger place before they all arrive in Santiago.

A convent for pilgrims

The pilgrims who arrived here six or seven hundred years ago found a house of the Augustinians. In the fourteenth century two lords from the area founded a convent, and the monks took in pilgrims. The two founders, Alonso de Muñiz and Iván Giráldez, are buried to this day in the chapel, which is the only thing left of this convent. At the end of the seventeenth century the monks left the house. The chapel fell into disrepair until it was restored in the nineteen eighties. Since 2006, exhibitions and lectures have taken place in it.

A house by the river

Three kilometers before the town, in Ribadiso, stands a second old pilgrim house. A hospital from the thirteenth or fourteenth century on the bank of the Iso, right next to the stone bridge. In 1993 it became a Xunta albergue again.

The cheese

Arzúa calls itself the land of cheese. Arzúa-Ulloa cheese carries a protected designation of origin, and every year on the first Sunday in March the town celebrates a festival for it. In 2025 this festival turned fifty years old. For pilgrims the cheese is above all one thing: the food of the second-to-last evening.

What Arzúa gives you

When this text was written, in autumn 2026, Arzúa was a town without great sights and with many beds. Precisely for that reason it is a good place to pause. You are no longer at the beginning and not yet at the goal. The people around you came on three different Caminos and will continue tomorrow on one.