Hasta luego Espana

Thankfully, the fires in the hills seemed to have dissipated by morning, leaving patches of bare brown on the hilltops.  The rias to our south had been much more badly affected – there was a shocking picture online of the city of Vigo with a complete backdrop of flames. It got so close to the town that people were lining up to form human chains passing buckets of water to save their houses. The next day the southerly wind brought a lingering smell of smoke up to us and the air was a hazy white.

our view of the fires near Pobra do Caraminal

We ended up staying in the ria de Arousa for ten days as first hurricane Ophelia, and then storm Brian passed, each knocking up big swells out to sea. Not much of this swell found its way up the ria to us, but enough to let Dave try out his new invention – a ‘rocker-stopper’. You hang it over the side and metal flaps open and close as the boat rolls, damping down the rolling action. I am pleased to report that it definitely made a difference,

Dave's rocker-stopper about to be lowered in

We carried on with school each morning, and explored in the afternoons. Since we were surrounded by mussel beds, we decided to go and watch the men at work one day. They were feeding medium-sized mussels into a machine, which cleaned them and poured them out into a long, mesh bag with a laddered rope through the middle. This gets tied underneath the mussel raft, the mussels then re-attach themselves onto the rope and grow for the next eight months until they are big enough to harvest for sale. Fascinating stuff, and hard, heavy work, even with all the machinery. The fishermen were happy for us to watch, and gave us a bag of undersized (for them) mussels, which was a welcome feast for Katie and I!

    exploring all the corners of Pobra do Caraminal

fishermen on mussel beds

For a change of scene, we visited Vilagarcia on the opposite side of the ria. This was a much bigger town and we bought a few supplies - a new Spanish flag, a blanking plug for the engine, and a chess set for the kids. We also treated ourselves to lunch out, and couldn’t believe that a pasty and a drink each in a café, along with a couple of free cakes, came to a grand total of 7 euros!!

Back in Pobra do Caraminal, another British yacht came to the anchorage and we soon got friendly with the owners, Ian and Charlotte, who were also waiting for better weather. We shared a couple of evenings and a few beers with them, and the kids got spoiled rotten - with sweets, art supplies and attention from somebody other than us!

Reuben with his new best buddy

Finally, the weather was in our favour and both boats set out to sea, our friends heading north back to the UK, and ourselves south to Bayona. We have stopped here several times and thought we had seen most of the town, with its wonderfully preserved castle and scenic waterfront.

Bayona's well-preserved castle

This time, we spotted a statue on a hilltop and decided to walk up to it. On the way, we saw for ourselves the damage from the recent fires. Right alongside the road, the tree trunks were blackened, many wooden posts holding path-side ropes were burned away, and you could still smell the charred remains of the fire. Only one side of the hill seemed to be affected, and the statue at the top was intact – an impressive stone lady called ‘the Virgin of the Rocks’, holding a ship, that Dave & Reuben paid a euro to climb up to!

fire damage on hillside

Dave & Reuben in the Virgin's ship!

From the top, we could see that fires had ravaged the hillside opposite, and this had almost reached the lines of houses. Again, I wondered who would have lit so many dangerous fires, and why? Amazingly, although 80-plus fires were set in Galicia, only 4 people lost their lives.

Fire damage close to houses in Bayona

On a lighter note, Reuben spotted an amazing insect on the walk up. We at first thought it was a type of big grasshopper, until we noticed that it had skinny back legs, and bigger front legs. He seemed quite placid, and let Reuben put his hand very close, before crawling away over the edge of the pavement. After searching on google, we identified it as a praying mantis. They are quite fearsome predators - there are several youtube clips of them devouring much bigger prey, even a mouse!

Reuben with the praying mantis

  

We spent a couple of days in Bayona, with three other cruisers anchored nearby – two French yachts and a German Australian, all heading south. On their advice, we took the dinghy across the bay and found a hidden lagoon, full of fish and wading birds feeding in the marshes. We had a happy hour rowing around the shallows, and spotting oystercatchers, herons and spoonbills. We walked back along the beach, which started off all clean, white and sandy and turned darker and more seaweedy until it felt like we were squelching through stinky black mud – yuk!

pristine beach by the lagoon 

dodging seaweed at other end of beach!

Today, we crossed the border from Spain to Portugal and hope to continue south quickly while good weather is with us.

Hasta luego Espana!