Ría de Ares

21^st September 08

Well, I see I haven’t written a blog for about 11 days. So here goes.....

We were getting quite settled in Viveiro and making friends with other Brits on boats and with the port staff. One of them looked like Peter Sellers and had a similar enjoyment of a joke. He was particularly animated the day after the boss guy came in with his arm in a sling. Apparently he’d had a tankful the night before and crashed his car on his way home. I asked in Spanish if his arm was broken. I was told no, just cut and stitched. When I asked if his car was broken, Peter Sellers cracked up completely, while trying to hide his amusement from his boss.

We had more or less decided to pull the boat out there for the winter and spend three weeks having a holiday. There was a handy boat-hoist; the supermercados were close; there was a nice beach nearby; the showers, though basic, had plenty of hot water. We booked our flights home from La Coruña. The journey to the airport was going to be slightly cumbersome, however we discovered that the journey back from the airport to Viveiro would have been impossible without staying a night in a hotel, so we decided to carry on and get a bit closer to La Coruña. Also, with one of the hoist drivers having put off his operation to cure tunnel vision in order to cover for the one with his arm in a sling, we thought Sally might prefer to be lifted out elsewhere.

We left Viveiro in what we expected to be an Easterly force 4 to 5, but turned out not be much wind at all, so we ended up motor-sailing to the next Ría, which is Cedeira. That was such a lovely place to anchor overnight and it was free. It is a completely sheltered bit of water surrounded by wooded hills, rugged cliffs and golden beaches. We both think it was the nicest place we’ve been to on this trip. We had a brief foray ashore, before going to have drinks on a Cockney couple’s catamaran (nice bit of alliteration). The little town on the river was absolutely charming, with the main square having a lovely beach at one end. We would like to have stayed there for a few more days and explored, but heavy weather was forecast for the Friday. We needed to check out whether Ares would do for over-wintering the boat, because if not, we would have to find somewhere else; so we set off next morning round the north-west corner of Spain.

Again, there was less wind than forecast and again we motor-sailed. The coast-line here is rugged and beautiful. Unfortunately it is mostly shrouded in a hazy mist. We were visited by a pod of dolphins again, which played and raced around the boat for about 20 minutes. I sat on the foredeck and watched them while my Magnum photographer took pictures of the water where the dolphins had just been. It was a nice way of marking what may well be our last sail of the year.

We’ve done 906 miles since leaving Poole in June and about 3,000 miles altogether in Sally since we bought this boat 3 ½ years ago. Now we are going to leave Sally here in the Ría de Ares which is the next one along from El Ferrol and opposite to La Coruña. It is quite a small town (only one supermercado) and a bit of a backwater. The marina has been enlarged in recent years and has plenty of room. One advantage is that the guy who works in the office was brought up in London, speaks perfect English and is a willing translator when it comes to negotiating with the boatyard guy. He is also a very useful source of local information and says he can book us taxis and so on. I am managing to make myself understood in Spanish, but the locals all speak Gallegan (Galician Spanish which is a bit a mixture of Catalan and Portugese), so I’m finding it very difficult to understand them.

So far it has been quite warm here. In fact, yesterday was so hot we had to put up the sunshade over the cockpit. We also cycled round to one of the beaches for a refreshing swim. Although a bit cloudy today, it is still warm. I hear that the weather has improved in England, but I’m still not really looking forward to it. Here in September, it is like a hot June day in England, if any of you can remember what that feels like. I am, however, looking forward to catching up with my family and friends, then hopefully we will be heading off for more sun and adventures in Grenada, if we can find an affordable flight, seeing as XL have just ceased trading.

Now where did I stow my fleece?

I shall carry on blogging, though, so don't go away......

Viveiro 10.09.08

Well it feels like I haven’t written on the blog for quite some time. We left Ribadeo on Monday and found, as soon as we left the Ría, that there was very little wind and we motored to Viveiro.

The last week in Ribadeo had been their fiesta time. We walked up the hill to see a band one night with a couple off a boat from Scotland. They’re spending 3 years going round the world in a 44ft yacht, which makes ours look very small. They had two toilets! as well as everything else you could possibly imagine in the electronic gadgetry department and every other department. They didn’t like the band though, as they were expecting something more traditional and Spanish, not the long-haired hippies who looked straight out of the early 70’s with their version of Cream’s Strange Brew. So we went back to their boat to try all the different aged Scottish malt whiskies they’d brought along with them – at least Andy did; I stuck to the vino tinto out of the litre carton at 0.59€. Andy keeps telling me how much money we’re saving by being here. I’m a bit more concerned for our livers.

Other features of the fiesta were more bands of the traditional rock and roll style, fairground rides for children, lots of stalls, mainly manned by South Americans, selling all sorts of stuff no-one needs, and huge figures and people with oversize cartoon heads, dancing around to the music of bagpipes. Also, for the two nights of the weekend, when it was the fiesta of Santa Maria de Campo, I could hear Roman Catholic Church organ music, singing and chanting during the early hours of the morning wafting down from the Plaza Major. It’s no wonder they have to shut everything down for 3 or 4 hours in the middle of the day and take a siesta.

While there, we did a long cycle ride, taking in part of the pilgrimage route which joins the Camino de Santiago de Compostela. This is a tourist route goes from the Pyrenees all the way across northern Spain, to Santiago de Compostela, near La Coruña. It was good to cycle on tarmac lanes with no cars, up through the forests of eucalyptus (an import which seems to have taken over much of the hillside forestry of northern Spain), giving us marvellous views of the Ría.

So we arrived safely in Viveiro, which is quite a way up this Ría and very sheltered from the Atlantic swell. There is an interesting historic old walled town here, completely hidden behind the miles of new apartment blocks. It has old stone gateways and narrow lanes, opening out into the Plazas. We came across an almost exact replica of Lourdes by one of the many old churches. People who wish some ailment or problem to be cured, buy a small plastic limb, or head, or cow, depending on their affliction, and hang it on the wall beneath the effigy of the Virgin Mary. You can also light a votive candle by putting a coin in a slot, and a pretend candle lights up with an electric flickering bulb. It was an insight into the Catholic faith which will stay with me.

I am still adjusting to this life. It sounds from this Blog as if all is sweetness and light, however there is a dark side. I’ve been quite depressed at times from being a perpetual tourist. We’re just passing through and nobody knows us, and we know nobody. I grew up in a holiday place and know what we locals thought about what we called grockles or rubber-necks. We occasionally make contact with other people on boats, then we part and never see them again. Quite often I’m very pleased not to meet them again, as many seasoned yachties seem to be tradition-bound, closed-minded, pedantic bigots, who are only too willing to put us right and tell us how everything they know and do is right and how crap everything else is. Those are just the nice ones! No. I am exaggerating there. We’ve met some very nice people too, but, as I say, they sail onto the next place. The other thing I’m finding difficult is not having enough to do. Well, we always have stuff to do, but it’s the sort of stuff you do on holiday. Everywhere we go we do the same stuff. Find the supermarkets, get a map from the Tourist Information or from the Oficina de Puerto, and explore. We hardly even scratch the surface, though, and we never understand why what’s going on is going on, if you know what I mean. Anyway, I shall wait and see how my attitude changes as we go along. Perhaps I’m expecting too much. I realise that the world has changed. There’s no such thing as a traveller any more, only tourists. Meanwhile, I’m trying to keep positive for Andy’s sake. I suspect it’s me that’s driving him to drink.

We’re now seeking out in earnest somewhere to keep the boat for the winter. We’ve booked flights home from La Coruña now. Viveiro is a possibility, but the journey to the airport is a bit of a faff, so we’re planning to go round the corner into the Ría de Ares to see what that’s like.

The good news is that we went for a swim at the beach yesterday, and the water, although not warm, didn’t actually take your breath away and leave us shivering. It wasn’t bad at all.

Ribadeo

It’s raining. It’s been raining all day and the forecast is for rain tonight, rain tomorrow, rain the next day, and the day after that. So it’s true that the rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain – if the plain is the strip of land between the coast and the mountains where shines a vibrant green, on the days that it isn’t overcast in mist and cloud, that is.

Ribadeo is quite a nice town. A bit bigger than Stroud, maybe, and quite run down around the edges. We noticed in Luarca and here that there are a lot of properties for sale and to rent and shops with closing down sales. The credit crunch seems to be biting here as well as in France and Old Blighty. Most of the building work and growth here is the municipal stuff, funded by EU money: new roads, council buildings, marinas, etc. There are quite a few new marinas along this coast line, but very few yachts to fill them. We like the emptiness of the seas and the laid back feel of the marinas. The few British yachts we meet are long distance - either on their way to the Caribbean or on their way back from Turkey. It’s so very different from the French marinas, where boats were coming in and out every day and the staff packed them in like sardines.

This marina is the most restless place we’ve stayed. There are strange currents flowing down the Ria which stir the boats about on their pontoons. One of our mooring lines frayed right through on our first night. We’ve had to keep tightening the ropes, protecting them with plastic tubing and adding more. We also get the sound of fenders squeaking against the sides all night, which doesn’t aid restful sleep. When we get a favourable wind, we’ll be off to Viviero. At the moment it’s all westerly and wet.

We’re now looking along this coast for somewhere to lay-up the boat for the winter so we can return to UK for a visit, before, hopefully, flying off somewhere hot for the winter. We’ve just heard that Andy’s tenants are moving out at the end of September, so if any of you know of someone looking for a beautiful house to rent, let us know. Also, it may mean we can camp out there on our return. If any of you happen to have a spare car, we’d like to borrow it for November, please.

Thunderbolt and lightning, very very frightening...

“Isn’t it lovely sailing in shorts and teeshirts!” I said to Andy, as we surged along the coast with an easterly wind on our quarter, bathed in sunshine. We left Gijón to enjoy its Fiesta de Sidra* without us, and headed for Luarca, about 40 miles away.
*(Festival of getting completely rat-arsed on local cider, which is poured from a great height into the glass, preferably without looking, in order to make it “fizzy”.)
Two hours later: I watched as spectacular forks of lightning struck where I thought the mountains were, because they had disappeared into mist, and counted the seconds as I listened for the thunder. I began to apply the water- and wind-proof sailing gear. Andy put on his hoody. “That’s not going to do you much good in an aguacero tormentoso,” I said. “What?” he said. “A heavy downpour with thunder. I can see it raining over there.” The forecast had mentioned a possibility of the thundery downpours, but we had been enjoying such lovely settled weather, that we didn’t really take much notice.
We carried on watching the lightning and listening to the rolling thunder as it got nearer. There was just our little boat with its great big tall metal stick surrounded by not very tall sea, with lightning all around us. The skies opened and the rain drops were so big and so numerous that they flattened the waves. We took shelter huddled under the spray-hood.
Andy: “I wonder what you’re supposed to do if your boat gets struck by lightning?”
Liz: “I don’t know. No-one said anything about it on any of the courses we’ve done.”
Andy: “If we survived it, we could just put our fingers in our ears and go la, la, la.”
Liz: “I think we could just panic.”
Andy: “I don’t think that would be very helpful.”
Liz: “Oh, unlike your suggestion, then.”
We thought it prudent to make frequent fixes of position on the chart, in case our instruments got affected. We have known our depth gauge to go haywire under electric storm conditions. But with the coast line we were approaching only a couple of miles away, and us still unable to see it, we thought we might be a bit stuffed if the GPS failed at that point.
As we approached the harbour, the details became more visible through the gloom and, needless to say, we got safely into Luarca. We’re beginning to see why this coastline is so verdant, as we’ve been kept awake by more thunderstorms, but they paled into insignificance in comparison to the heavy metal festival which was playing on the quay last night, including bands like, “Legacy of Brutality” and “Negra Sombra”. We actually did manage to sleep through a lot of it, helped by the fact that the stage was facing away from our boat and about 250yards away.
Luarca is a quaint and unspoiled little town with a thriving fishing harbour. It is built on the sides of a steep gorge with a river running through it. It’s like Chalford by the sea, with derelict little stone cottages with stone tiled roofs with bushes growing out of them and lots of steep steps. There is provision for a few yachts to moor (for free!) but we’ve only seen two others and been on our own here most of the time. It’s so different from the overcrowded marinas we’ve left behind in France. It seems quite old-fashioned here and they don’t seem to have heard of wifi. There is, however, one internet café which we’re going to try this evening and see if we can post this blog and, more importantly, get some weather forecast, otherwise we’re stuck here forever and ever. We don’t seem to be receiving anything on the Navtec or on the VHF here. There is an Oficina de Puerto, but so far the door has always been locked and there is no forecast pinned up. I don’t know how the fishermen manage. The lady in the Tourismo told us that the Cruz Rojo de la Mer (the Red Cross who seem to run the lifeboats) get a weather forecast, but when we asked them yesterday, they only had one for the day before.
We plan to go on to Ribadeo next.