Fene

The Camino Inglés way-markers click past 89 km, thighs still warm from the climb out of Ferrol, and suddenly a Gadis supermarket appears like a mirage. That’s Fene: practical, upright, and exactly where a walker needs it to be. Most pilgrims march straight through, refilling water bottles in the car park before pushing on to Pontedeume. Stay a night, though, and the town rearranges itself into something more interesting than a supply halt.

Between Parish and Pier

Fene keeps its back to the AC-862 for much of the day. Slip off that main drag, however, and you’re in a lattice of stone walls, smallholdings and parish churches whose bells still dictate lunch-time. The lanes have no pavement, so you step onto springy grass while a farmer in boiler suit and Sunday-best cap steers a coughing Seat Terra past a greenhouse of lettuces. Every ten minutes the view opens and there’s the Ría de Ferrol again, flat as polished pewter, Navantia’s yellow dock cranes reflected across the water like a child’s drawing of a dinosaur spine.

The harbour isn’t chocolate-box pretty: trawlers list against rubber-tyred fenders, diesel rainbows swirl in the slack tide, and gulls scream over bins of fish guts. Yet the scene feels alive rather than grimy. Walk the breakwater at 6 p.m. and you’ll share it with grandmothers in quilted coats gossiping in Galician, teenagers vaping beside motorbikes, and a lone angler landing small red mullet for supper. Nobody’s posing; nobody’s asking for tips.

Forest, Not Facades

Forget ticking off a medieval centre—Fene never had one. What it does have is the Fraga de Fene, an Atlantic oak and chestnut wood that begins two streets behind the health centre. A signed footpath (wooden way-marks painted the Galician colours) follows a stream for 3 km, climbing gently through mossy boulders and wild hydrangeas the size of footballs. In October the chestnuts drop in their spiny shells; locals arrive with carrier bags and toddlers to fill pockets. The air smells of leaf mould and wood smoke from a distant farmhouse. You might meet one dog-walker in an hour—otherwise it’s just robins and the soft clack of eucalyptus trunks knocking together in the wind.

After rain the stone steps turn lethal. British walking boots with decent tread are advised; fashion trainers will have you surfing downhill on your backside.

Eating, Timetables and Other Battles

Galicia keeps Spanish hours, but Fene adds a rural shrug. Lunch runs 14:00–15:30; dinner rarely appears before 21:00. If you arrive footsore at 17:30 expecting a restorative sandwich you’ll find shutters down everywhere except the Gadis café, where day-trippers queue for €1.20 cortados and slices of airy sponge called bizcocho.

For a proper feed, Restaurante Muiño do Vento grills hake until the skin blisters and serves it with olive-oil drizzled potatoes. Portions are built for shipyard workers—halving is allowed, even encouraged. Vegetarians can fall back on caldo gallego, a hearty greens-and-bean broth, and on tortilla thick as a paperback. Expect to pay €12–€14 for the set lunch menu, wine included. Card payments usually work, yet it’s worth carrying €20 in notes; the card reader will fail the moment your churrasco arrives.

Beds for Boots

Accommodation clusters on the western edge where the camino slips out of town. Two purpose-built albergues opened post-2019 and they feel more Swiss hostel than Spanish farmhouse: sealed parquet floors, motion-sensor lights, USB sockets by every bunk. Prices hover around €12; blankets are provided but you’ll still want a sleeping liner for the October chill. Private rooms (€35–€45) appear in small hotels along the same strip—spotless, plainly furnished, and booked solid when a cruise ship docks in Ferrol and coaches disgorge pensioners doing the “last 100 km”.

Noise travels. Ask for a room at the back if you’re allergic to 6 a.m. rucksack zippers.

Moving On, or Not

Fene makes a workable base for day trips. Ten minutes west is the medieval bridge of Pontedeume; ten minutes east the artillery batteries of Palma castle stare across the same water German U-boats once prowled. Both fit neatly into a morning before the afternoon rain rolls in—because rain will roll in, even in May. Carry a packable waterproof and treat sunshine as a bonus.

Public transport is patchy. Buses to Ferrol run hourly on weekdays, Saturdays less, Sundays barely. A single ticket costs €1.35; buy on board and hoard coins because the driver won’t break a €20. Taxis back from Ferrol clock in around €18 if you miss the last bus at 21:15.

The Honest Verdict

Fene won’t plaster your social feed with honey-coloured arcades or fishing boats called Esperanza bobbing at sunset. It’s a working municipality of 5,000 souls where supermarkets outnumber souvenir shops and the industrial skyline is part of the bargain. What you get instead is rhythm: timber lorries growling down at first light, women in black coats swapping rosaries for mobile phones as they leave Mass, the smell of sawdust drifting from a carpenter’s open door. Stay a single night and it feels functional; stay two and you start synchronising with the bells of San Martiño, recognising the barman who remembers how you take your coffee, realising the ría changes colour nine times before lunch.

Come if you’re curious about everyday coastal Galicia, if you’ve time to walk the forest track without checking your watch, if you don’t mind sharing a dining room with German cyclists and Galician grannies. Keep moving if you need a quaint fishing village or boutique hotels with sea-view infinity pools. Fene offers neither—and seems perfectly content with the omission.