Time travel without moving

The festival continued all weekend and we enjoyed some of the many events Inbetween working on the many little jobs that had acrued on Dark Tarn. I was extremely impressed that the whole town remained in fancy ( or period ) dress for the whole three days of the fiesta. Even away from the main seafront of Sada out towards the marina in Fontan, we were surprised to see a group of vintage bicycles speed past along the cycle way, everyone dressed in period costume as we sat outside a cafe  enjoying mini croissants as a tapas with our coffee.

Lynne has a particular fondness for dressing up and to be honest clothes in general, so she found the  whole experience of people watching fascinating. The picture below shows the rear of the Terrace and the marquee to the left. I have no idea who these ladies are but they look splendid!

Most of the events seemed to be quite gentle and low key. For two days there was a dog obedience competition on the front. We actually became quite regular visitors, the little dogs in particular were brilliant haring around the course like demented things! Very entertaining.

We did a fair bit of swimming in the hotter parts of the day Inbetween searching for ice cream. We also spent some time wandering around a street market. Even our new local was joining in the dressing up, our bar person Barbara was dressed up in the evening.

As the weekend drew to a close we tidied and and filled Dark Tarns water and diesel tanks in preparation for launching Monday.

We planned to travel just over 40 miles down the coast past A Coruña, This bit of coast is known as The Costa da morte, or The coast of Death. Our target was The small fishing village of Corme. Really the first available safe anchorage after Coruña. Most of The jobs list had been completed apart from going up the mast, to be honest the four tree trunks holding us up didn't inspire confidence when the wind got up! However we had polished the folding propellor and replaced the crumbling shaft anode. Varnished, filled and painted, both top sides enamel and bottom anti-fouling.

All in all we were looking pretty ship shape.

And hopefully a little faster without the drag of the weed. We had a meal out in the local cafe recommended by our friend Antón and a last few drinks in the Canalla bar. Hopefully we shall return some day. The weekend had been a lovely and gentle celebration of people just dressing up and having a good time, listening to jazz, it had been a real pleasure to be allowed to share it.

Sada and the Feira Modernista

We began the work on the boat straight away using up all our stocks of two part epoxy filler. It was a bit of a shock to discover how much it cost in the chandlers, €80 for a large tin, eek! Anti-fouling paint however was over 200€ for two and a half litres, which is frankly ridiculous, luckily we had 5 litres stashed in the bilge and we managed to keep our purchasing requirement down to buy just 750 ml for a still exorbitant 49€. Never let it be said that we had spoiled the ship for a haporth o tar......

We had found that the usual pattern for the weather was that it began a little cloudy in the mornings, the cloud would burn off by 11, the sun would come out and it would be getting very hot by the afternoon. This pattern dictated our day, painting could be done early morning or late evening. This left afternoons free for exploration or siesta.

The anti fouling went fairly well after the epoxy filler had been sanded back, there were a few patches where blisters had gone right through to bare steel but these were mainly on the bottom plates and the keel which are 6mm and 10 mm thick respectively, so I wasn't too worried. We will need to think about sand blasting the hull back to bare metal in the next couple of years.

Lynne had also made a start on the small amount of varnish work on the boat, this meant dismantling the tiller and sanding back the companionway door.

Of course after lunch we had decided it was simply too hot to work and took ourselves off into town.

It is just a short walk from the boatyard and marina to the seafront of Sada, this consists of a rather pleasant park with shady trees and palms running back from the beaches. There is a footpath and cycle way runs around the full length of the bay. It is surprisingly shallow so swimming is at high tide only.

We discovered a marvellous building, it's called " The Terrace "

It used to be a tram station in A Coruña but was now in Sada as a feature on the beachfront. It's a wonderful example of Galician Art Nouveau. It is a little faded and peeling but to my mind that just adds to its charm. It's a cafe and jazz venue. So obviously we had to try a coffee on the shady balcony.

A perfect place to escape from boat maintenance and heat.

By a strange coincidence the ground floor has the same pattern of floor tiles as our kitchen at home.

After a couple of days work the boat was coming together and we had managed most of the jobs we had avoided by gallivanting around the Caribean for the winter

That evening we wandered along towards the fish dock and enjoyed a few beers in a fabulous bar that is a kind of Ripleys " believe it or not" or a cabinet of curiosities.

wherever you look there are odd collections or objects, mainly with a nautical theme. Like the beer pump for example that appears to have been made from an outboard engine leg.

Of course the staff are great too, the photo above shows one " photo bombing" me.

It certainly the only bar we have ever been in that has a fishing boats wheelhouse as a feature. They play good music too so if you are ever in the area it's called El Canalla. Recommended.

We also dined out and had cuttlefish for the first time, a sort of small squid, Lynne was disconcerted to discover they fried them with the little tentacles on. However after trying one of mine the nice waitress brought her a plate so she could help me finish the very generous portions. Lovely with chips.

We decided that we would take it easy and arrange to be launched again, " splashed " on Monday, which would leave us free to enjoy the weekend. As it happened there was a festival on starting Friday evening it was the Feira Modernista, which roughly translates as modern fair. What it actually is is a celebration of history and particularly art nouveau, and the 1920s. Many people take the opportunity 

To dress up in period costume, even the children get into the spirit of the event. The carrousel was very popular, even in collar and bow tie! Some of the girls dressed in fringed flapper dresses and feather boas looked great.

We have an itinerary of events in Galician which is close enough to Spanish for us to get a reasonable idea of what's scheduled.

We walked over to the seafront where a funfair had set up but was some way from the main events further down the extensive seafront.

 In the photo below the marina is above and to the right of Lynnes head.

There was a large marquee which was scheduled to feature music and stage acts over the weekend and many stalls selling memorabilia and items reflecting the 20s.

It was all very sophisticated and genteel. It was constantly surprising to me that so many people were in period costume, Lynne pointed out that it was an annual event, it was obvious the locals enjoyed it immensely and worked on their costumes, lots of feather boas and pearls! Gentlemen seemed to go for the Robert Redford in " the Sting" look.

As the band set up in the large marquee we decided that the best place to listen to them would be the Terrace next door, my favourite building in Sada.  

We watched a couple of numbers then walked the very short distance to " the Terrrace "

We managed to get a table on the balcony overlooking the marquee and carrousel, perfect to watch everything occurring in the park, and of course listen to the music.

As it was nightime the building was ablaze with light and showed the wooden window frames and stained glass much better than during the day when your eye was distracted by the peeling paintwork!

I noticed that the upstairs was open so went up to have a look. Surprisingly there was no-one at all there, apart from the staff behind the bar.

I just think it's brilliant!

The 20s theme continued and many ladies were doing the posing by the automobile thing.

The band were very acceptable doing a kind of barber shop quartet come skiffle vibe and we thoroughly enjoyed the first evening of the festival. I got the distinct impression this was not a tourist event it was set up for and by locals. With the jobs on the boat largely finished we were looking forward to a lot of swimming and enjoying the odd time travel to 1925. Lynne mentioned that we had done medieval, Viking and roaring twenties in one week! Sada was proving to be not just a good place to get work done on the boat but a very interesting place in its own right. One of the unexpected consequences of travel that constantly surprise us.

If only we had a dressing up box on board..... ................

Sada

After the holiday weekend we had arranged with Antón to get the boat lifted out at the marina at Sada, which is in the first Ria north of A Coruña. The Ría de Betanzos. 9 am saw us ' springing off ' Dark Tarn against a stiffening breeze from The N.W. I must admit I was glad The French yacht opposite us who were also getting ready to leave were watching as it was flawless.......

We motored into the wind for 5 miles to the entrance to the Ria, waves were quite big and occasional waves would break over the bows. We chugged up the Ria past isolated islands and fish farms as the wind rose to force 5. We entered the marina and Antón got on the radio from the bank to tell us there would be a slight delay so we quickly berthed against a hammerhead, again flawless!

After 5 minutes or so Antón again got on the VHF and told us that we needed to enter the lifting dock backwards! Dark Tarn like most boats with a big mast up the front doesn't handle well astern particularly with the wind " blowing us on " it was a little fraught but again all done without too much fuss.

A wee bit of a tight squeeze.

As the boat came up on the slings the bottom seemed fairly clean apart from some light fouling, no barnacles and just a few small crustaceans round the rudder. 

This lack of barnacles may have something to do with the fact that they eat gooseneck barnacles in this part of Spain, I must admit they don't look too appetising, but I am assured they are delicious.

Of course it could just be our anti-fouling paint and the good job we had made of putting it on in Conway, which seems a long time ago now............

The yard guys drove our precious home to the scrub off section where they proceeded to power wash the hull.

As we had anti fouled the hull last May in Conway, leaning against the harbour wall we had been unable to  paint the bottom of the keel. One of the guys scraped the bottom with a big metal scraper the rest of the hull needed just a quick wash off.

After we had retired to a local cafe for coffee and had been pleasantly surprised at the price we watched as the yard men chocked Dark Tarn up on what effectively were four tree trunks. I hooked up the electricity and examined the hull . It became evident that we would need to spend a little time on maintainance as several areas of the epoxy undercoat had.blistered and were exposing bare steel. I used the angle grinder to clean them up and we then gave them a coat of metallic primer. Most of the sacrificial anodes on the hull were still serviceable but the shaft anode was on its last legs, luckily when the well stocked chandlery opened at 5 o'clock they had one the perfect size, so I bought two!

I polished the prop and then had a shower while Lynne made tea. That evening we walked out onto the breakwater to have a better look at our temporary home.

Dark Tarn is in the yard with the floodlights.

We will stay here and complete a refit trying to get through the list of jobs, hopefully in less than a week.

That night we were getting used to being land creatures again, the wind died down and in a strange way I was quite looking forward to being a " yardie" for a while.........

Santiago de Compostella

So this was it, the end of the Camino, the finale of the way. True to form we would walk non of it, we sailed the majority of the northern way and we would link A Coruña to Santiago by train.

Spanish trains have improved no end from my last experience of them, all credit to RENFE, they are now on time, clean, new, and they can exceed walking pace. For a small amount of euros we had booked a ticket ( this includes a seat number, so you have a guaranteed seat, British rail and French railways take note ) a forty minute ride through the Spanish countryside and we arrived at Santiago de Compostela. I had expected a crowd on the train but I was wrong. Regardless of the fact that it was July the 25th and the feast of St James, the train was less than half full.

We had no idea where to go but luckily found a map showing an outline of the old town. We walked in the general direction following along with a group obviously going to see the festivities.

Soon we cam upon the outskirts of the old town and a lottery seller gave us directions to the Tourist information, and armed with our all important map we headed towards the Cathedral via a cafe for a small coffee. We are becoming very predictable!

We arrived at one of the side doors to the Cathedral and were a little disappointed to see the size of the queue, it stretched back into the square and then we were dismayed to discover wound back several streets to re-emerge at the bottom of the steps, the end of the queue was in sight of the beginning but separated by 6 or 7 hundred metres. A truly massive queue of people waiting to celebrate mass, of which there were several through out the day.

We wandered into the square of the dead and noticed a much smaller queue of people at a side door, this was the entrance to the tomb and sepulchre of St James. 

The entrance was firmly locked and apparently was only opened once a year and only when St James Day fell on a Sunday. However there was also a rumour that Pope Francis had declared that it could be opened as it was the year of Misericord. All a little sketchy I have to admit but gradually more and more people were joining the smaller queue for the great bronze door.

After an hour of waiting in the broiling sun the miracle happened and the great bronze door was opened and the gates thrown back to allow entry. We had no idea what to expect but shuffled along into the great sepulchre itself. This is a fantastic gold, metal and guilt construction of enormous proportions and difficult to appreciate at first it was so multi fasceted and baroque, wherever you looked there was yet more detail or yet another splendid aspect, quite breathtaking.

Unfortunately photography wasn't allowed, we walked into the very body of the wonderfully ornate gilded sepulchre, climbed steps up behind the alter and got to give the embrace to St James as we looked out on the Cathedral from behind the bronze statue onto a full church congregation enjoying mass. I'll be honest and admit to giving the statue a heartfelt pat on the back rather than a full hug. Very moving and not a little scary with such a large audience. After the statue the steps led down to a crypt that contained the holy remains. Lynne and I lingered a moment as we were so to speak at the very epicentre, the spiritual heart of the Cathedral, and the ultimate goal of those who embark on the way. I for one felt I could empathise with those pilgrims leaving offerings as although we had not walked the way our journey here had not been without a degree of suffering! We were not allowed at this point into the body of the Cathedral but were led out back into the square through yet another side door.

This led directly back to the square which had filled up with people celebrating Galicia day.

There were bands, bagpipes, and banners. All very colourful and interesting. Lynne and I after our pilgrims sufferage queueing in the sun were in need of food and so walked back into the old town and were lucky enough to find a restaurant with a free table. An excellent lunch was had with outstanding service. Lynne had salmon.

Refreshed now in body as well as spirit we walked back towards the Cathedral through the many winding streets of the old town. A feature of St James Day and I must admit to having no idea why it should be is the parade of the giant people.

I have no clue as to why this happens but it does make for a colourful spectacle!

We enjoyed watching some local groups performing traditional drum and bagpipe music back in the square of the dead. Lynne then noticed that there was no enormous queue outside the Cathedral door and so we wandered over to see if we could enter and look around. Wonder of wonders, apart from a bag inspection we made it inside easily. Of course there would not be a mass so we would not get to see the great botafumiero being swung by eight priests but we would at least see the Cathedral.

We were lucky to have happened on the time between masses and were able to view the body of this magnificent Cathedral.

The Sepulcre and it's astonishing gold gilded carvings was the most obvious attraction for the eye, but after looking a while my gaze was drawn to the painted roof and pillars.

Beneath which hangs the famous 'botafumiero'.

The organ pipes are quite exceptionally grand as well.

We had been incredibly lucky, we had been in the Sepulcre, walked through the great bronze doors that never open ( thanks to Pope Francis ) and seen the Cathedral on what must be the busiest days of the year, miraculously avoiding queues. As we now had time to linger we availed ourselves of some wandering time and looked into most of the side chapels.

 one in particular stood out because of its frescos.

It was adjacent to the Sepulcre and may have had something to do with it, certainly the shell motif was very evident.

Soon we wandered back into the old town and it's typical warren of small streets. We headed for the park where we were hoping to find a shady tree.

This was becoming a priority as it was getting seriously hot, traditionally we are told St James Day is the hottest day of the year and I can well believe it!

The views back towards the old city are stunning and will be much improved without the scaffolding.

There were other characters to discover in the park, of course a bronze statue on a bronze bench can get very hot, which is why Lynne is on tippy toes!

Another unusual sight was this cafe which had been built without disturbing the trees on the site.

The trees just grew through the building, brilliant!

The fun fair and balloon sellers were doing a good trade as we walked back towards the city.

It was getting near to the time of our train but we still had time for a coffee so decided to go back to the main square in front of the cathedral and try the cafe in the Catholic Hotel.

This occupied one flank of the square and is a very imposing building in itself as well as a superb place to stay.

 It's possible to enjoy a drink in the hotels cool courtyard inside but we decided to try the small side terrace so we could watch the world go by. There are also some lovely views back towards the park and the hills beyond.

The heat was still quite oppressive and the stone flags were getting decidedly hot underfoot. However our luck continued as we found the last shady table.

By now it was early evening and after a coffee and a bit of people watching we walked back down the hill to catch our train which was gloriously air-conditioned. It was a non stop 25 minute ride back into A Coruña.

We broke our journey back in The old quarter and discovered a bar Selling Newcastle  Brown Ale On draft.

Perfect end to a really nice day..........

It had been a memorable experience, if I were to visit again I would consider staying a few days, the fireworks the night before St James Day are spectacular I am told and Lynne would very much have liked to attend a mass, I think I would too, just to see that enormous botafumiero in action!