Cash and ATMs on the last 100 km of the Camino

The question nearly always arrives in the same shape: «is there an ATM in Portomarín?», «can I pay by card in the albergues?», «how much cash do I need for Sarria to Santiago?». The short answer is that every stage end on the Francés has a bank, that the Inglés and the Primitivo each have one night with nothing at all, and that the problem isn't the money but knowing which town to withdraw it in. What follows is that map, told with the ATMs and branches OpenStreetMap has drawn within 700 m of where the Camino passes through each place, as of 16 September 2026.

How much cash to carry, and why

The Galician Camino takes cards and Bizum more every year — it's the line we use in the FAQ and it still holds — but the growth is in the towns, not in the hamlets. What you pay in cash, in practice, is this:

• Public albergues and the small private ones. A bunk in the Xunta's public network costs €10, paid on arrival; we haven't checked albergue by albergue which ones have a card terminal, so the prudent thing is to carry that €10 in notes and not assume the card will do. In a hamlet's private albergue, run by one hospitalero and a notebook, the same applies.
• Hamlet bars and the mid-morning coffee. Many have a terminal; the one that doesn't, or where «it's not working today», is exactly where there's no alternative. A coffee, a slice of tortilla and a stamp get settled in coins.
• Donations. Donativo albergues, the box in a chapel, the stamp at a private house. There's no way to leave something other than in cash.

A rule of thumb that works, offered as a guide and not a figure: withdraw in each town with a bank what you'll spend until the next one, which in the tables below is never more than two days' walking; on the frugal budget in how much the Camino costs per day that's a small sum, and carrying more only raises what you lose if the wallet goes. What you shouldn't do is arrive in Sarria, Tui, Ferrol or Lugo with nothing and plan to withdraw «in the next village»: the next village with a bank can be 48.7 km away.

Camino Francés from Sarria: a bank at every stage end

It's the most-walked route and the most predictable: on all five nights of the classic split there's a bank when you arrive. Sarria has 6 branches and Portomarín 4, with 2 ATMs mapped separately; in Arzúa (3 banks) and O Pedrouzo (2) the map draws no standalone ATM, but these are branches with a machine in the wall, nothing to worry about. The stretches with nowhere to withdraw are 22.2 km between Sarria and Portomarín, 25.1 km between Portomarín and Palas de Rei, 14.7 km between Palas de Rei and Melide, 14.1 km between Melide and Arzúa, 19.6 km between Arzúa and O Pedrouzo and 16.2 km between O Pedrouzo and Monte do Gozo: in between, in Barbadelo, Morgade, Ferreiros, Gonzar, Ligonde, Boente, Ribadiso, Salceda or Santa Irene, there's neither bank nor ATM, and anyone sleeping outside the stage towns — the advice in the last 100 km — pays for the bed and dinner with what they took out in the previous town. In Santiago, the 11 ATMs and 17 banks in the table are only those in the old town, around the Cathedral.

Camino Portugués from Tui: the best-served route

It passes through two cities and through sizeable towns, and no night of the classic split is without a bank. The longest stretch with nowhere to withdraw is 20.7 km between Pontevedra and Caldas de Reis, and even that is crossed in a day. The Tui row misleads: the map gives it 1 bank within 700 m of the waypoint because the Camino enters along the edge of the old town, but it's a town of more than fifteen thousand people with plenty of branches; read it as «at least one», not «one».

Camino Inglés from Ferrol: the night without an ATM

The Ferrol row needs a note too: the starting point is the harbour, and within 700 m of the quay the map sees only 1 ATM and 0 banks, but it's a city with branches of every bank a few streets away. The sensible thing is to withdraw in Ferrol before getting the departure stamp, or in Pontedeume and Betanzos, which have banks to spare.

Camino Primitivo from Lugo: two days on what you take out in Lugo

Lugo has 8 ATMs and 11 banks around the city walls, and after that there's nothing until Melide (2 ATMs, 4 banks): 47.2 km, with the night in A Ponte Ferreira in the middle, the other classic stage end on the four routes with neither bank nor ATM (0 and 0). Take out two days' worth in Lugo — albergue, dinners, the bar in whichever hamlet you stop at — and from Melide the Primitivo follows the Francés, so the rows above apply.

Fees, and ATMs that don't belong to a bank

There are two kinds of ATM in the table and it's worth telling them apart. One belonging to a bank — Abanca, BBVA, Santander, Caixabank, Sabadell, the Caixa Rural — charges cards from other banks whatever fee its agreements set, and it's the fee shown on screen before you confirm. Then there are the independent machines, which appear in the table as Euronet in Sarria, O Porriño, Ferrol and Santiago: they charge their own fee per withdrawal, often a higher one, and to foreign cards they offer «dynamic currency conversion», that is, charging you in your own currency at a rate the machine sets. Always decline it: choose to be charged in euros and let your own bank do the conversion, which is almost always cheaper. The same goes for the restaurant's card terminal when it asks whether you'd like to pay in pounds or dollars. And when you do withdraw, take out several days' worth at once: the fee is per transaction, not per amount.

If you lose your card

First, block it from the bank's app, which takes a minute and works from an albergue with no phone signal. Second, don't call 112: that's the emergency number and this isn't one. To report the theft or loss — your insurer will ask for the report, and the bank needs it to refund charges — the Policía Nacional has stations in Santiago and the larger towns, and in the Camino villages the nearest post is the Guardia Civil's; the numbers and the order of steps are in the safety guide, which also describes the «blocked card» scam: if someone walking with you says their bank has blocked their card for seventy-two hours and asks for cash in exchange for a Bizum, it's a script, not a pilgrim in trouble. Against loss there's a cheap defence: two cards from two banks, kept in two different places in the pack.

How this was put together. The ATM and bank counts are from OpenStreetMap (ODbL), as of 16 September 2026, within 700 m of the point where the Camino passes through each place in the network of waypoints used by our planner; the gaps are the distance between two consecutive places with at least one bank or ATM, and no number on the page is typed by hand. A zero means «not mapped», not «doesn't exist», although banks are mapped far better than bars; and a branch on the map guarantees neither a machine open around the clock nor one that takes your card. Names are quoted only for the towns, and a bitcoin machine and the sign of a bank that no longer exists have been dropped from the list. The advice on fees and currency conversion is general knowledge, without figures because every bank sets its own. If an ATM in the table has gone, or there's one the map doesn't see, the correction button at the foot of the page gets it to us. Where to shop and when the kitchen is open in these same towns is in eating on the Camino, which uses the same data.