Cruising down the Spanish coast

Spanish Sunday lunch must be an institution. We have been trapped in a carpark surrounded by cars that parked where cars are not intended and nudged right up against us in their fervour to get off to a long Sunday lunch.

Glad to escape the melee, we set the satnav without checking the route. Herself in the satnav intended to add extra stress to our day by sending us over a steep, narrow mountain pass with Spanish lunch partakers out in force. The road seemed to go on and on, becoming narrower and steeper, Spain is a very mountainous country. Sundays in Spain are becoming our bete noir (or Spanish equivalent), but we finally popped out onto a motorway. A fog had settled in and as we travelled over massive viaducts we had no idea what the surrounding countryside looked like.

There was a steep descent down to the harbour where we parked right in front of the water in Cudillero, we glimpsing some brightly coloured wooden boats bobbing on the water when the fog opened for a minute or two. Dotted about the port walls were signs saying ‘no autocaravanas – E300 fine’. We didn’t like the idea of the fine but there were only 6 motorhomes at the port so when the local police did their rounds Stuart spoke to the Gardia about the parking and was told “it isn’t allowed - but I don’t have a problem”.

Senda de Oso cycleway

Before we had set off I loaded my washing machine (black plastic box) with warm water, a few clothes and detergent. The place we arrived at had no motorhome services for rinsing the washing and I carted my washing machine around to some fishing shacks and filled the machine from a tap attached to a fishing shack. I thought I was hidden, but an old Spanish lady, smartly dressed for lunch, wanted to see the pesche (fish) in my black washing box. My small bit of Spanish didn’t help so I showed her the washing. She nodded in understanding and walked away, probably disappointed.

Lonely Planet recommended a restaurant in Cudillero, it was expensive by local standards but something was lost in lost in translation and not what we expected. In Europe bars serve drinks and restaurants serve food; as we had arrived too early at our restaurant of choice we had to kill half an hour so we went to the bar next door. I asked for sidra but was offered a 750ml bottle only. I declined but was interested to see how the local flat cider is served . The bottle is inverted on a machine and the cider is sucked up by pump action and squirted into an angled glass. The customer only take a small amount at a time – the machine aerates the flat cider which is a bit like scrumpy. It does serve a medicinal purpose however, as I described to Tim – it has the effect of All Bran but doesn’t taste as nice.

The fog never really lifted totally so the next afternoon we headed to Teverga, the terminus of the Senda de Oso – cycleway/path of bears. The trip was easy on big main roads, a nice change from our previous difficult trip. The towns we passed through are shabby looking with litter and some graffiti. The footpaths etc are not maintained and it looks like a general lack of money is the reason. The aire at Teverga was not too bad and had a backdrop of white rock mountain and lots of trees.

Our plan was to cycle from the aire end of the cycleway and then back again. It was easy peasy lemon squeezy getting to the other end of the cycleway, I don’t think my feet turned the pedals at all. That is never a totally good feeling. We passed the enclosures of the brown Cantabrian bears and I saw 4 bears who happened to be close to the perimeter fence (lunch time for bears). They look quite docile with soft brown fur and are large. We cycled through some little villages and took photos of the traditional storehouses that are still used. The storehouses sit off the ground on stone pillars and have a large plinth on top of the pillar that the actual storehouse sits on – it looks rodent-proof. Of course the cycle back to the truck was all pedal-pedal for 20km, we went back through tunnels and underneath rock overhangs. The cycleway is a disused little railway track with lots of chestnut trees lining the route. The discarded cases of the chestnut are like little squashed hedgehogs. People were out collecting the chestnuts, examaining the green hedgehogs for any shiny brown nuts inside. Autumn colours were everywhere and I enjoyed cycling through big drifts of crisp brown leaves making a satisfiying crunch under Hildas wheels.

Storehouse

Foz was next on the list, a small town on the edge of the Atlantic. Once again we had a waterfront view and there were bars and restaurants close by. We are in the off-season now and it was quiet, turquoise water was rolling in breakers on the beach and harbour walls protected the boats. Other seaside towns on the coast have the same set up. The towns we have passed through have a lot more high rise apartments than we see at home, and in this quiet season the shutters are down and there is a deserted air about them. I keep thinking that the short European holiday time leaves such a waste of resource in all the empty hotels/apartments/etc

City life, we passed through a couple of large cities – Ferrol and A Corunna which just confirmed my idea that motorhomes and cities don’t really go together. We ended up parked for the night under the Tower of Hercules in A Corunna. It was a nice spot close to the water but also close to the football stadium. The Tower of Hercules is a lighthouse built by the Romans in 1 AD but re-clad much later on.

Pilgrims outside cathedral in Santiago

Compostela de Santiago is the end of the pilgrims‘ route, with a visit to the cathedral the purpose of their whole trek. We walked into town and followed the crowds to find the cathedral. A lot of gold was glittering in this church and it was undergoing extensive renovations. Crowds were mooching around in the large paved square in front of the church, people were carrying sticks and backpacks with the scallop shell (icon of the Camino de Santiago). I heard a lot of American accents. We walked around the charming old area of the town and along some streets with restaurants displaying incredible arrays of seafood and beef waiting to be cooked. It didn’t look like budget pilgrim food.

It was a short drive before we reached our place to stay for the night and whoo-hoo – a laundromat. The laundromat was next to a supermarket so we loaded up the machine, did the shopping and came back to transfer the washing to a dryer. Within 20 minutes the powerful dryer had my washing crisp and dry. Simple pimple, we didn’t even need laundry powder, it was all included in the price.

We are headed toward Portugal and made a random stop on the coast at a place called Arcade. Our site for the night is on the waterfront with a choice of restaurants to go to, but we didn’t – too hungry to wait for opening time at 8pm.

Arcade

I haven’t got into Spanish time, they stay up late, have long lunches and the shops don’t open in the afternoon until sometimes 5.30pm. By that time I am over the idea of shopping and flag the idea, I suppose it is a money saver.

We are not far off Portugal with a whole new language. Thank you is obrigada for me and obrigado for Stuart (we will see). Hello is still ola.

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