Tui to Santiago stages: the Camino Portugués in 6 days

In 2025 some 100,835 pilgrims collected the Compostela having come in on the central Camino Portugués, according to the Pilgrim's Office figures picked up by the press: close to 19% of the total, the second busiest route after the Francés. From Tui, the last Spanish city before the Portuguese border, the stretch to Santiago splits into six comfortable stages, with gentle climbs and a public hostel network that — unlike the Francés from Sarria — still has a little more room to breathe.

How many kilometres it is, and why Tui

The Tui–Santiago stretch adds up to 116 km. That is what you get adding the six stages in the table below, one by one, with gronze.com's distances; gronze itself gives 115.8 km for the whole because it joins the first two days into one. That is the figure we use throughout the guide.

You will also see 118 km in some places, including on another page of ours. The whole difference is in the first stage: the Xunta, which runs the public hostels, measures Tui–O Porriño at 18.1 km and gronze at 16.1, because of small route variants within O Porriño. Two kilometres of nothing, but it is worth knowing where they come from. Either way the margin over the 100 km minimum the Compostela requires is wide: however you measure it, walking from Tui clears the requirement comfortably, with room for a detour without falling short.

How to get to Tui

The easiest way in is by train from Vigo: 30 to 45 minutes, fares from about 4 € and around 8 services a day. Vigo in turn is well connected by high-speed rail to Madrid, about 3h50-4h05. There is no direct train between Santiago and Tui — you need to change in Vigo — so the whole trip from Santiago runs 2h15-2h45. All these figures are indicative and worth confirming at renfe.com before booking, because frequencies and prices change with the calendar. One warning that comes round every season: the station is Guillarei, on the outskirts, and there is no stop in the old town — that and other surprises of the last leg are in getting to the starting point.

Tui is worth an afternoon's walk before you set out: its fortress-cathedral of Santa María, 12th and 13th century, with battlemented towers that remind you this was a frontier city, and the International Bridge over the Miño, built in 1878 by a pupil of Eiffel and today crossable without any checks thanks to Schengen. The first stamp in the credential takes no hunting: your own accommodation, the tourist office or any bar in the old town.

The six stages at a glance

* This table follows gronze.com's figures so the six stages can be compared on the same basis, and that is why it adds up to exactly 116 km. The Xunta gives different numbers on some stretches — above all the first, where it says 18.1 km instead of 16.1, which would leave the total at 118 km. You will see it set out on each stage page.

The Spiritual Variant: the detour by water

Where to sleep: the Xunta's public network

As on the other Galician caminos, the Xunta's public hostel network charges a flat 10 € a night, with no bookings possible: beds go in order of arrival, with priority for those walking over those cycling. They usually open at 13:00 and close the door at 22:00. Private hostels, more numerous in the bigger towns like O Porriño, Pontevedra or Padrón, can be booked, and it is worth doing so in July and August. Before setting out it is also worth going over whether to carry your pack and what footwear actually works on these tracks.

A route that is growing, but without Sarria's crowds

The central Portugués is a long way from the saturation of the Francés from Sarria, where five stages concentrate everyone who only has a week. Here the numbers spread more evenly over six days, and the Coastal variant takes a good share of the traffic until the two converge before Redondela. That does not mean it is empty: it is the fastest growing route in relative terms, and with the Xacobeo 2027 Holy Year around the corner, it is reasonable to expect more people in 2027 than in any recent year. If you want to plan stages to your own measure or compare this route with others, we have a stage planner — with the stretch already worked out in 5 stages if you are short on days, or in 7 and in 8 if you want an easier pace than these six — and a page of Camino statistics with the full breakdown by route.