Hotel Colon Tuy Pontevedra

... our beloved Vinho Verde (Euro 1.39 a bottle) Mmmmm.... It was off to bed, to awake to another wet day. Discussions over breakfast (boiled eggs perfectly done if you please) (Lymºs writing this by the way....Iºm just typing...) led to us both deciding it was time to break camp and head to the Algarve with all haste, we were beginning to believe that the sun was an urban myth...

Vigo was our last port of call on our cruise and I had given this place little thought and done no research, so it came as quite a pleasant surprise. Its a big place and quite spectacular when viewed from the height of the ship.. We didn't get chance to look ...

Today I´m headed for Vigo on the Northwest coast. Madrid has been good although tiring. It rained yesterday so I spent the afternoon at the Prado Museum. After that I walked forever, took a few pictures and ate some ice cream. If you´re ever in Madrid I recomend the Museo del Jamon, ham and cheese sandwich + beer = 2euros.

We arrived in the Marina Davila Sport near Vigo early in the Morning from A Coruña. There are many Oyster and Mussel beds in the region and it is well known for its cuisine.

The marina is just about as unattractive as a marina could possibly be. It is located at the very tip of the commercial port with no trees or grass to be found. Then, to leave the Marina, you must travel through all the commercial warehouses and wind around the bay ...

Today our port of call was Vigo, Spain. It is in the Galicia region (northwest) and it is quite beautiful. It rains there a lot, but we had a beautiful sunny day. We had hired a guide to show us the area. The highlight of the day for me was going to a castle. It was amazing… both the building and the ...

... to pass and eat lunch in car. We waited. And waited. Then started reading while we waiting. Four hours later we were still reading and waiting so we opened some of the cider we got the day before. Kevin went up to the campsite's store and grabbed some sleeping mats so we had some cushion below us while we slept. We then moved the tent to ensure it wasn't going to be in a big puddle as it continued to rain. Later during the rain, it was dinnertime so we went to the ...

... t find the campsite on the Garmin, so we entered in the GPS coordinates provided in the campsite book.  The route took us through the Spain plains (the only part that was sunny, funnily enough) and then we passed through the old passport control area* into the National reserve Peneda-Gerês, which had quite a few streams and waterfalls that were really gorgeous so we were highly looking forward to a hike the next day.

 After we exited the park, Garmin took us to some ...

We have spent several months now driving round the coast of the Iberian Peninsula and one thing we have not seen much of is a decent river. We have crossed countless dried up riverbeds, we have seen a few large but not particularly attractive estuaries, such as at Huelva, and we have seen the river Guadalquivir in Cordoba and in Seville, which was, as most city rivers, attractive only as a result of man's interference ...

... south with Snow! The weather held out so we found a campsite to freshen up. So mostly this week we have been heading west trying to escape the rain which seems to follow us and visiting lots of towns along the way which all have there own very distinct identity. The next town, Vincent we visited was fiercely pro Basque. loads of ETA protest graffiti and banners, it was a nice town though and we luckily stumbled upon a spring parade. Then on to Burgos which seems ...

... it will be the same all along the coast. Plus it was very, very wet this morning when we were thinking about packing up. The wifi is free here so I'm sat in the bar doing mail, blog etc (you would be amazed how long this all takes by the way) and generally catching up. Dave has his little phrase book and is catching up on his Spanish. We will soon be checking out the laundry facilities. Tomorrow we will be heading south nudging closer to Portugal. Laters PS we've done just over 1000 kms