Finisterre to Muros

We had a storming trip round Finisterre, Hester was galloping along at a steady 6 to 7 knots, in great following wind. We left Camariñas on Tuesday 6th Aug and had a very nice short day hop of 20 nm down and round the point. We were accompanied by a family of Dolphins, all different sizes of young ones, and a really tiny baby one, they were all playing at the bow as we stomped along.  We rounded the point of Finisterre right under the lighthouse and tacked up to the village of the same name. We anchored there for the night, just tucked round the harbour wall.

Rounding Finisterre

The next day we had a cycle up to the lighthouse and had a look at the town its self, very pleasant. And then we set sail for another anchorage round: Corcubrion about 5 nm. We had a good broad reach, then tacked up the loch to the village and anchorage, followed as we approached the harbour by two of the biggest dolphins I have seen. Corcubrion was a delight, we had an evening walk and glass of wine ashore with finest mists of rain.

Next day (thursday8th Aug)  was bright blue from the off (we had had mixed cloud and sun for last few days.) We sailed our of the mini ria of Corcubrion for the south. We anchored in the bay of the next village round  called Ezaro. We went ashore to get some shopping and  we had a walk up to a waterfall and an old hydro electric power station with museum. Swam back to the boat from the beach, by now it was scorching.

We set sail again in the afternoon for Ria de Muros. We expected to arrive there after 9 pm as we left the anchorage in Ezaro and drifted along at a gentle 4 knots or so, but as we got out from the bay we picked up a bit more wind until we were storming along at our top speeds again. We had some fine navigation work to do as that coast has various rocks strewn down it out from the points and headlands, some of them were washing dramatically in the now huge waves, very exciting sailing in the big following sea. We had unusually decided to tow the dingy behind us for this sail, instead of putting it on deck as we usually do, so it tossed about behind us, surfing on the waves, but luckily it came to no harm.

We rounded Pta Queixal and came into the relative calm of the Ria de Muros, the landscape seemed to change from the rugged headlands and exposed coastline we had just passed. The Ria is fairly open, with little white and orange villages fringing the shore, hills sweeping up in the background, and lots of trees again. We arrived in Muros early evening. We tacked in between the massive mussel pens which are moored in the bay, big old wooden things arranged on a grid pattern. We anchored opposite the town itself , and we have been here ever since! ( more or less, on Monday 12th we sailed up the ria to investigate other anchorages, but it was very strong wind, and although an exhilarating sail, we didn’t fancy the look of the other options so headed back for Muros) .

Muros is a lovely town, we have been really enjoying our anchorage here ( in the bay across from the the town itself). It has been consistently very hot, the anchorage is calm, but occasionally gusty.

   Muros seems like a thriving place, every time we go in to the town it is very busy and lively. There was a Market on Friday 9th, there were stalls selling food, vegetables and clothes all along the front. Cars were parked all over the pier and down the slipway as it was low tide . We are on Spring Tides at the moment, so there is a huge sand flat which is exposed at low tide by our anchorage, In the morning there were lots of people all down on the beach, paddling and wading, guddeling for shellfish in the sand. On Saturday we saw what for, there was a marquee set up in Muros, and they were celabrating the festival of the razor clam! they were cooking them there and serving 1/2 kilo plates and a bottle of white wine for 10 E. On stage there was a traditional band playing some rousing bagpipe and drum music, they looked ( and sounded) fabulous, dressed in heavy black embroidered traditional costume.

Cooking the razor clams

On sunday we were invited round to another boat for lunch, by Nathalie and Florin and their sweet little dog ‘Gin’. Their boat ‘  Roz Avel ‘ is a very handsome KP 44 Cutter. They have just left Brittany and are heading south for the Canaries and on. We saw them anchored in a few previous anchorages up the coast, and we had invited them on board Hestur for a drink and a look about. Florin cooked the most delicious lunch and we spent a very happy afternoon with them.

On Sunday there are no shops open here, and  the fishing fleet stays in harbour, so town is quiet except for the street cafes. This sunday the water was busy though with motorboats, sailers and swimmers, everyone was out and about. The past few days have been incredibly hot, so the only way to cool down is to swim. We have been jumping off the boat lots and swimming laps of her, and swimming to shore. There are lots of old stone slipways and walls beside where we are anchored, and come high tide lots of teenagers and kids come  for jumping in and swimming and the big sand flats have disappeared and left only little beaches at the top of the tide, and a sea of warm water.

Fish in Muros

We are planning to take a bus to Santiago de Compestella, while we are fairly close. We will do that either from this Ria, or the next one south.

We have got lots more to explore in the next few Rias south of here, and the off lying islands, we plan to spend the next couple of weeks in this area and then will hop down the Portuguese coast in fairly big hops as it offers much less shelter so we will probably head off shore some what.

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