Saturday 15th August Caraminal Ria de Arousa

Still here. A nice town, and they have a "Feira do Marisco" this weekend (a seafood festival) so we thought we would stay at least for Friday night.

Friday woke up to be surrounded by about 30 cockling boats (couple of photos put up in this Ria's album. These are small, colourful boats, their owners use very long handled (30ft) poles with baskets on the end to scrape away at the seabed.

Sent Richard up the mast in the morning, (he's heavy to winch up!) and forgot to take a picture. He and Roger had tuned the rig back in Muros, but we decided the intermediates needed tightening as well. They had gone slack after their efforts, so he went up to do that and re-tape the bottlescrews. Swimming in the afternoon, then on to the the Fiesta in the evening. Iot's a hard life... - feeling guilty!

They introduced the opening of the fiesta with "bombas" - huge explosions. You hear them every day, cracking out like thunder in the hillsides. The Spanish love their pyrotechnics and we finally asked someone their significance. He shrugged and said, no reason really, they just announce things, or alert people to events, or just because they want to hear the noise. A bit like native Indian smoke signals?

We had pulpos and vieria (octopus and scallop) - I say scallop as it turned out to be just that - one! The octopus is a favourite around here, we were less enthusiastic, the meat is fine, but there is a thin layer of fatty something just under the skin which wasn't affected by the boiling! I prefer my octopus skinned and fried I think. An experience though and enjoyed the event!

Taking advantage of the good connection this morning, then off, we think to Pedras Negras (Black Rocks), on the way to the Ria do Pontevedra.
Love to all, esp Lucas, Claire & Marcus - hope the jaundice clears asap.