Leaving Santiago: Madrid, Porto, Ferrol and the coast

The problem with leaving Santiago is almost never a shortage of options. It's that people book late, search only for departures from Santiago, and take a "sold out" screen at face value when it isn't quite true. Santiago is the end of the Camino, but it isn't Galicia's transport hub: on the rails that's Ourense, and for long-distance coaches half the region has its own departures. Most last-minute panics are solved by changing the station you leave from, not the day you travel.

The detour almost nobody uses: change your departure station

Fast trains from Galicia to Madrid run through Ourense, and many of them start there. When Renfe's site says there's nothing left from Santiago, it's worth running the search again with Ourense as the origin: it's 30-40 minutes away by high-speed train and it opens up services that don't show up otherwise. The same trick works with Vigo (a little over an hour on a regional train, around €10) and, for coaches, with Lugo, A Coruña and Ferrol, which have long-distance departures of their own.

This isn't a theoretical tip — it's what locals do when they're in a hurry. It adds an hour or two, and it's almost always cheaper than the rescue taxi.

To Madrid

It's the most common exit and the first one to sell out. Three ways, all reasonable depending on whether you have more time or more money.

By train, from the Intermodal station, the fastest services come in under three hours while the Alvia trains with more stops run past four, so check the specific departure rather than just the fare. Booked ahead you'll find tickets from around €20-30; without that head start the jump is steep. Renfe also runs Avlo, its low-cost brand, stopping in Santiago.

By coach, ALSA lists more than seventeen daily departures to Madrid, the first around 05:45 and the last at 22:30, taking between 7h55 and 8h45. It's the network that copes best on the day the train fills up, and the overnight services get you in at dawn.

By plane — and here's a detail almost nobody has up to date: Santiago-Madrid is flown only by Iberia (including Air Nostrum services as Iberia Regional), roughly three flights a day, a little over an hour in the air. Ryanair closed its Santiago base and dropped the route, so any guide still naming two airlines is out of date. With a single operator and three frequencies, fares climb fast once the train sells out: it's still the last resort that usually has a seat, but at last-resort prices.

For the plane, count the transfer too: city bus 6A links the centre and the Intermodal station with the airport for €1, every 20-30 minutes and in about half an hour; a taxi is €20-25 and 15-20 minutes. It's all in the airport guide.

To Porto and the rest of Portugal

This is the second most common exit — plenty of people fly home from Porto because it's considerably cheaper — and the worst explained, because some of the connections don't show up in the mapping apps everyone uses.

The part almost nobody tells you: there are direct morning coaches and they are cheap. BlaBlaCar Bus runs six departures a day from the Intermodal, and three of them end at Francisco Sá Carneiro airport itself, which is the one that matters if you're flying out: getting off at the airport without crossing Porto saves a whole morning. Checked on their site on 17 August 2026 and indicative, because the fare moves with the date.

ALSA also covers the route and takes bicycles for a supplement of around €10, in a bike bag, not a box (sold at the ticket desk for about €15). FlixBus has another direct, but it leaves in the late afternoon, around 17:05, takes 3 hours 10 minutes to Campanhã and was costing between €53 and €80 depending on the date: three times the eight o'clock coach for the same trip. Its cheap alternative, from about €21, is the same route with a change in Vigo and stretches the journey to four or six hours. With direct morning coaches at €25, that detour no longer pays. Separate warning: FlixBus's own site advertises "2h10" and 24 daily services, and that doesn't show up when you search real dates.

Then there's the classic pilgrim alternative: a coach to Valença do Minho, on the border, and a Portuguese train from there. The CP train Valença-Porto is the easy, cheap part: about €11.30 on a Regional service, with thirteen or fourteen departures a day and a journey of ninety minutes to two hours. One detail that throws people: the Portuguese operator Rede Expressos, which covers part of these journeys, doesn't appear in Google Maps, which is why many conclude the route doesn't exist.

To Ferrol: the Camino Inglés in reverse

Plenty of people make this trip after finishing in Santiago in order to start the Camino Inglés, or the other way round. Monbus covers it from the Intermodal station: eight departures on weekdays — six on Saturdays, five on Sundays — taking between 1h20 and 1h45 depending on the stops, at €8.40 for a single with no discount. None of them is a pure express: even the fastest calls at San Caetano, As Cancelas, San Lázaro and Fene.

Worth knowing: there is no direct train Santiago-Ferrol. You'd have to go via A Coruña, where works at the station through 2026 forced road transfers, so the coach doesn't just win on time — it's also the one that doesn't change.

Carrying on to the sea: Fisterra and Muxía

Not everyone goes home. The classic continuation is to walk three or four more stages to Fisterra and Muxía, but you can also go by bus and come back. Monbus links Santiago with Fisterra from the Intermodal — eight departures on weekdays, seven on Sundays, €7.35 single — and with Muxía — four a day, €6.85.

And here's the detail that decides your morning: most services take a long detour via Noia, Muros and Cee, running 2h10 to 2h55. There are only two expresses, both little over an hour: the 08:00 to Fisterra (1h15, Monday to Friday) and the 14:30 to Muxía (1h16). Taking the 09:30 instead of the 08:00 costs you an extra hour and a half for the same fare.

If you want to see both in one day, one line links all three points on the same bus, inland via Negreira and Dumbría: it leaves Santiago at 09:00, reaches Fisterra at 11:15 and Muxía at 11:48. All of these are high-season timetables and several lines change in early September, so confirm on monbus.es for your date.

Which airport should you fly from?

Santiago (SCQ) is 12 km from the centre and it's the convenient choice, but it has shrunk: it now serves around 29 destinations, considerably fewer than two years ago. Less than an hour away by train or bus are A Coruña (LCG) and Vigo (VGO), but they're smaller still and rarely justify the transfer.

The one that does change the arithmetic is Porto (OPO), about three hours away by direct coach: Ryanair alone flies there to more than seventy destinations, and the price gap to the rest of Europe is usually wide. The practical rule: if the saving doesn't justify five or six hours of transfer and the risk of missing the flight, leave from SCQ.

How far ahead to book

In August and September, when most people finish the Camino, the short answer is "sooner than you think". One measurement taken the day we wrote this, for the Santiago-Barcelona flight: leaving that same day cost around €312; in ten days' time, €179; in a month, €47. Nearly seven times more expensive for booking late — and that's the pattern across every exit from Santiago in high season.

The real bottleneck is thin supply meeting a lot of simultaneous arrivals: Santiago-Madrid is flown by one airline with three frequencies. Coaches cope far better because they run many more services.

And watch out for Sundays and public holidays, because the drop in frequency is real and written into the lines' official calendars. Measured in August 2026: A Coruña has 25 departures on a Thursday, 14 on Saturday and 15 on Sunday; Ferrol has 8, 6 and 5. On non-transferable national holidays — 15 August, 1 November, 6 and 8 December — the Sunday calendar applies and it drops further still: A Coruña to 10 departures, Ferrol to 4. Monbus timetables flag it service by service with a note along the lines of "except 15/08". If you're travelling on a holiday, check first.

The underlying advice: book your journey home the day you book the bed for your last night in Santiago, not the day you arrive. It's the most repeated mistake and the most expensive.

Where to leave your backpack on your last day

If you're leaving in the afternoon and don't want to drag your pack around the city, there are two public options. The Intermodal station has left luggage for bags and cases, which is the convenient one if your coach or train leaves from there. And Correos has another at Rúa do Franco 4, 150 metres from Obradoiro, taking backpacks, suitcases, poles and bicycles.

Neither publishes rates, so you have to ask on the spot: the prices circulating online are from private luggage-storage operators, not from the station or Correos. And one warning against a widely repeated claim: the Pilgrim's Reception Office at Rúa Carretas 33 — open 9:00 to 19:00 every day except 25 December and 1 January — does not offer left luggage on a regular basis.