Rain Briefly Stops Play

It rained heavily whilst we were in Pobra do Caramiñal. Not enough to dampen the Spanish enthusiasm for the market, which was extremely busy, nor stop the shellfish collectors toiling up to their waists in the bay. It did, however, stop us from moving on. With the visibility down to just a few hundred metres we decided that it was safer to stay an extra night hoping for better weather for our sail onto Ría de Pontevedra.

We have found that we will need to return to the UK for a few days so the delay did give us time to drink gallons of coffee in Wifi equipped cafés so that we could use the internet to research flights back to the UK, hire cars and the connecting trains and buses in Galicia. It seemed slightly surreal booking flights whilst sitting in the corner of a small café, miles from home; the internet certainly gives us a huge amount of flexibility and independence on our travels.

Pobra do Caramiñal

The last port we wanted to visit in Ría de Arousa was Pobra do Caramiñal so, having spent the day in Cambados, during the late afternoon of Monday 27 May we sailed over to the western side of the ría and anchored off the beach for the night.

In the morning we moved into the marina and from there watched the cockleshell harvesting. Here they seemed to prefer to wade out to collect the shellfish; almost as far as we had been anchored off the beach following the wind’s unforecast shift to the north overnight. It left us with uncomfortable little clearance under the keel and forced an early hours re-anchor.

We had intended to do a massive clothes wash whilst we were in Pobra but the weather turned very grey and showery. Note to self; don’t make jokes about the weather gods in the blog! Instead of washing we cooked instead: a Breton Far to go with a mug of tea whilst we are sailing around to the next ría, some spicy humus for sundowners, and the beginnings of a chickpea, pancetta and chorizo sausage casserole based on the Galician dish, cocido.

Breton Far and spicy humus