Yesterday I forgot to say a proper goodbye to Portugal and its friendly people. We were very happy while we stayed there, ate well, and had wonderful stays. Now I know a bit of the north portion of the country, and from past trips I l know the southern half, so the next time I should concentrate on the stretch between the Taugus (e.g., Lisbon) and the Duero (e.g., Porto) rivers. I am sad this time I didn't get to eat a nice plate of grilled sardines, but there are only so many delicious things you can eat in three or four days.
Our lodgings at La Guardia were a notch below our inflated standards, as we stayed at a hotel. Oh well, cannot win them all, but I will say that the staff was very friendly and they gave us a good breakfast.
It is a gloriously sunny day and we are looking to an easy ride, mostly along the coast. The high tide was on retreat, slowly unveiling the wide wave-cut platform with its many granite boulders and clefts. I have not mentioned it before, but we have been seeing this muscovite granite for a couple of days now, and my fellow peregrinos have been delighted at the glitter of the soil that clings to our tires. The thing with granite is that when the trail takes you through unimproved stretches you can find some very bumpy road that can only be negotiated on foot. It was a glorious coastal ride, however.
We stopped at a couple of chapels along the way, but the place that clings to my mind is the old Cestertian monastery of Santa Maria de Oia, close to Pedornes. It is a big imposing building, designed with a half-mind that it could act as a fortress, but is now closed and apparently in disrepair. The church is stern and a bit dark, but imposing in its proportions. One could almost hear the echoes of past Gregorian chants, and feel the cold air that accompanies the passage of a ghostly procession of monks. Brr!
To dispel the sense of the passing of time we made a bee line for the local bar, which unfortunately was a very small affair without much to offer in the way of tapas. Fortunately, however, the weather in Galicia is not conducive to the growing of grapevines so they don't make any pretenses of having a house wine. Rather, they have excellent bottles of Rioja wine and, one glass at a time, we soon took care of a new bottle.
The next leg was along the coastal highway, high above the shore itself, with great views and easier going, so we made good time to Oia (the town, not the monastery), where we stopped for lunch. Not a very well chosen site because it was a fine but expensive restaurant, but we had a great appetizer of pulpos a la Gallega, Tita had some huge langostinos, Raimund had hongos al ajillo, Chrissy had almejas a la marinera, and I finally had my grilled sardines. Very yummy!
An easy ride through mostly urban Baiona and Nigrán finally brought us to Vigo, which is one of the most important ports of Galicia and a big modern city. Navigating through it was a bit challenging, but Raimund found the bicycle path that liberated us from traffic and took us half way to our destination, the Hotel Del Mar. Alas, we seem to have reached bottom, with all four of us in a room without windows. Chrissy said she had to go down to get some air, and when I got down 5 minutes later she was sitting on the porch café, minding her own business and lost in the depths of her cell phone. I though she needed some alone time, so I respectfully went out the other door to go see the harbor, a short block from our quiet hotel.
The place was crawling
with people! Apparently there is some sort of gastronomic fair going on, with
games for the kids, lots of food booths, music, and flying flags. I had a
delightful time walking through the crowd and when eventually back at the hotel
found my fellow peregrinos calmly shooting the breeze in what
was otherwise a dead water. "Come on, let's go, there is a fun festival in
the other block!" Looking around at the quiet street and tall buildings
around us, they made sympathetic noises and ordered another round of drinks.
Ay, ay, ay. But eventually those drinks were consumed (while I engaged in
lively conversation with a couple of Gallegos sitting at the next table) and we
ponderously made the short walk. In astonishment to the explosion of life, Chrissy
turned to me reproachfully and said "Why didn't you tell us this was going
on?" Sometimes I feel like a prophet speaking in the desert.
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