The finale to our rally was a wonderful dinner held at the Club Nautico Portosin,  a elegant dining room on the 2nd floor overlooking the harbour. The enormous langoustines were followed by roast loin of pork and finally a selection of desserts and of course more wine and food than we could possible consume. The evening was completed with speeches of thanks to Alfredo and his family who have been wonderful hosts, and our Spanish rally amigos who played the piano.

The next day we took the local buses, always a bit nerve racking when you don’t speak the language, to Santiago De Compostela, about an hour and a half away from Portosin. You would never have guessed where the bus stop was in Portosin, there was nothing to denote a stop. Fortunately we were advised before hand! The buses also have the destinations in both directions displayed so you are still not sure whether you will get to your chosen place, and if it says it will leave from platform 9 its just as likely to be the one at the opposite end of the bus station in our change over points at Noya and Santiago. Well despite the stressy bits we got to the city and back! 

Compostela is an experience, a medieval heart par excellence, pilgrims with their sticks, finally arriving at the cathedral, often having travelled on foot for many days. There is an office where you can have your pilgrimage officially recognised and the queue was enormous. The cathedral was both huge and awesome. During the services they have a large silver incense burner which they swing in a large arc in front of the altar and this is quite a spectacle. Unfortunately because of the public holiday bus timetable we couldn’t get there early enough to see a service, no matter.

We walked the tourist route around the centre, taking in several more churches and the sites of the city, although  We also said goodbye to Derek with grateful thanks for all his help, getting us so far and all the patient IT help! 

We had a housekeeping day today giving the boat a good clean before setting off for rias southwards tomorrow, hopefully the winds will be less than today and in a better direction.

I hope you enjoy the photos attached.

Fishing port of Portosin

Mussel colonies, looking like rock tattoos

Derek and Alan rally dinner

Alan and I, and yes girls I am wearing my ‘I love sailing” badge!

In front of the cathedral Santiago de Compostela

These were opposite the cathedral I’ll leave you to draw your conclusions!

Cathedral entrance

High altar cathedral Santiago De Compostela, fore ground silver incense burner mentioned above.

Which way up does the map go?

Galician bagpipes, this time played wonderfully, I take back previous comments!

For those of you thinking I’d left off much mention of food I leave you with these 2 images! The top one is breast shaped cheese, quite hard and available in a smoked version!

Pilgrims tarts!

Enjoy, all our best Lynne and Alan