Heading south (Costa da Morte)

Engines serviced, VHF antenna fixed (thanks to Tad’s foray up the mast – again!), provisioned, watered, fed and rested, the weather was favourable for us to continue southwards.  We bade farewell to A Coruña in the early hours of the morning as the sun was making its appearance in the East, and headed for Camariñas in the Ria de Camariñas. The Rias of northwestern Spain are lovely inlets along the coast, generally surrounded by quite high hills and so are quite protected from the elements.  They are usually populated with fishing villages of varying sizes and often have a few beaches.  Unfortunately the weather was never warm enough for us to be curious about checking out the beaches, although there were always plenty of locals both on the sand and in the water!

We had read (and heard) that Camariñas was a charming place to stop, and our Aussie friends, Jeff and Sandra were to join us there.  Amazingly we had a fast trip down there mostly due to the fact that we motor-sailed almost the whole way as there was very little wind.  The swell started off quite high but within a couple of hours had slackened off and we had a very pleasant trip. 

The coastline is dotted with wind farms with some really large wind generators turning.  We hadn’t thought there would be enough wind to make them turn, but clearly it’s a windy area and they have enough to feed the grid.

We were anchored by 4pm and by 6pm were in town to watch the Aussies play the Netherlands in the World Cup football match.  Needless to say we were the only Aussies in the café, but the locals were also cheering for Australia as Spain had been beaten by the Netherlands and the Spanish wanted us to win to help them in their ranking.

Beers in hand we cheered the Socceroos with an “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!” each time they scored, but the outcome was not in our favour.  We weaved our way back to the dinghies and back to our respective boats for a quick dinner and then to bed as we were planning on another early start the next day.

Our next port of call was another Ria further south and our challenge on this passage would be Cape Finisterre (literally ‘the end of the earth’ so named by the Romans as they perceived it to be at that time) – this notorious area of the coast has been the scene of a number of sailing tragedies and the weather is subject to sudden changes in this area.

Amazingly we had absolutely calm seas, very little wind and a great deal of fog!  So much so that at one point we were navigating solely with radar and the GPS chart (nicknamed “Ray” for Raymarine). Just as we came past Cape Finisterre the fog cleared enough for us to be able to glimpse the forbidding cliffs and rocks.  We were very pleased to have modern navigation equipment and calm seas for this passage.

We reached Muros in the early afternoon and had time to anchor and get cleaned up before heading into town for a stroll and a look around.  We tried to moor our dinghy at the local marina but were turned away.  The only other option was to tie up to one of the sea walls, and as it was low tide the only way to reach the top was climbing a very rusty and seaweedy ladder!

While Muros was nice enough, it didn’t have the cosy feel of the smaller fishing towns and after a wander along the quay and a bite to eat we headed back to Bisou for an early night in anticipation of another early morning the next day.

The next day was damp and dark and I thought to myself that I was glad I was not a fisherman having to do this on a daily basis!  We weighed anchor and headed out of the Ria before dawn and had a good deal of cloud cover until quite far out to sea.  Another calm day with very little wind and next to no swell meant that our passage was by motor once again – we did try the genoa and the genaker at various times during the day but they just flapped in the breeze!

We had a little hitchhiker join us at midday – we think he might have come from one of the fishing boats we passed as he was a land bird and much too small to have flown out to sea about 6 nautical miles.  We nicknamed him “Chirpy” as he hopped around the boat chirping away (probably looking for his family).  Ever so often he would foray away from the boat for a few minutes (probably looking to see if he could get home) and then return.  Eventually, as we neared land again, he took off never to return.  He did leave us a few ‘calling cards’, around the boat, however!

The winds picked up just as we were entering the Ria for Baiona – fortunately for us we were somewhat sheltered as the winds were coming from the southwest and would have made our passage uncomfortable.  We had read in the pilot guide that we might either anchor (our preference) or pick up a mooring in Baiona.  The winds were such, however, that anchoring in the area was not feasible, and after trying to hail the marina on VHF radio for some time we simply picked up a mooring.

This was not as easy as it might have been, mostly because the moorings had no lines on them – as the bow of Bisou is some 2m from the water line and without a line it makes for a difficult attachment process.  Add to this a strong (20 knot) crosswind, and a long day at sea and you have a rather high stress factor.  Eventually we managed to get ourselves tied in and I went ashore in the dinghy to register.

Baiona is a lovely town with two marinas but if you arrive anywhere in Spain during the ‘siesta’ time (between 12:30 and 4pm or thereabouts) you are unlikely to get much attention.  After some discussion with the marina employees that I was able to find, it transpired that the moorings were no longer being used as they had not been serviced in some years and we would have to take a berth in the marina.  The attendant would show us where we could ‘park’ Bisou.

One thing I have neglected to mention in this blog is that we have been reading various sailing stories published by cruisers who have essentially cruised the same pathway that we are now doing.  One of the books, by Sandra Clayton, “Dolphins Under My Bed”, talks about dealing with marinas using ‘lazy lines’ – never having experienced this method of tying up, we were somewhat anxious about our first encounter (Sandra’s book mentions all kinds of awful situations she and her husband were exposed to with these mooring lines) and did not expect it to be so soon.  With the winds increasing and the day pressing on, we were keen to get berthed and be able to relax just a little.  So, we accepted the berth and kept our fingers crossed that the marina attendant would assist us as promised.

My rope-throwing skills have improved and Tad is more confident at the wheel of Bisou, so with teeth gritted we headed for the pontoon.  Everything went smoothly and other than some green slime and other detritus off the ‘lazy lines’ we were berthed!  I think I must have held my breath for about the 4-5 minutes that it took to get tied in as I ended up with a massive headache once we were in.  Tad was keen to get Bisou soaped down as she had endured massive amounts of construction dust in A Coruña and now was splashed with slime and muck from the bottom of Baiona harbour.  I left him to it and began to prepare dinner.

We fell into bed that night, weary, but happy to be safely berthed in a marina as the wind continued to blow that night and left exploring Baiona until the next day.

                                                         Safely anchored at Camarinas

                          Watching World Cup football (Australia vs Netherlands) with Jeff and Sandra
                                                     O'Connor from sister vessel "Nawii"

                                                       No further explanation needed!

                                                       Dawn departure from Camarinas

Arriving in Muros

Muros Port

"Chirpy" our intrepid hitchhiker