43:06.43N 9:12.92W

Good news on the engineering front. I had been fretting about the alternator belt on the engine as I couldn’t recall it ever having been changed. So yesterday I bit the bullet and removed the belt cover to find a thick coating of black dust. A quick online check to see how to change the belt revealed anguished complaints of hours of difficulty and fiddling so I heroically ignored all that and set to. Lo and behold it was a relatively simple task but the really good part is that my new filter wrench was the perfect tool for holding the pulley wheel while I undid the retaining bolts to remove it and the worn belt. So we have a nice new belt, clean engine and a spare with rather worn teeth.

Annie will bring you up to date with the wonderful tapas we have been eating while I must extol the virtues of our folding bicycles (Windward from Force 4 chandlery). They are rather like childrens' scooters with the addition of pedals and a saddle. Nevertheless they have proved up to the task and took us around the coastal path, back into town and to the supermarket - which was still closed so we headed back to the boat empty handed and prepared for another genoa sail across the Ria to Muxia (pronounced Mooshia, this being Galicia, of course). A faultless exit from the berth, genoa unfurled and barely time to coil the lines before entering Muxia harbour. Our arrival in the 20kts plus breeze was rather less faultless and a boatful of Dutch mariners ensured we tied up alongside the finger pontoon rather than wrapped around the end of it.

Muxia mariana is rather sad. A product of the enormous building boom in Spain before the crash it boasts endless empty berths, a huge car park and hardstanding and a post crash portakabin amenity block. The town seemed a bit dismal from the outside but turns out to be better heeled and more prosperous than Camarinas. A sensational tapas supper.