2011 - Day 17 - Sea and smoke - Part 1 Sea

After a broken nights sleep (on Thursday I started to go down with another cold and cough). We had a leisurely start going down for breakfast of coffee and toast before packing and heading off. The bar owner offered to look after our rucksack but we were happy after 15 days of carrying it to continue. He was most amused that Lesley had the rucksack and I only had a small string bag.

We went to the main square and into the tourist information (which was now open) and got a map of the town (and congratulated on our Spanish) and discovered that both of us had been wrong yesterday about the angle we should have taken to get to the beach area. We also discovered that Cafe Meio was the only available accommodation in that part of town, so had struck it lucky. We head for the coast and followed the sea front around past sailing schools, the harbour masters control tower, a big sports and water sports centre, and a couple of small sandy beaches. We then came to a headland adorned with giant sculptures, a stone henge, a menhir park, and a whole variety of other things, before coming to the big A Corunna lighthouse.

As we walked we saw many people out for a walk, run or even a bike ride, eventually we came to a beautiful sandy beach, and as the sun was out we decided to stop for a while and have a paddle. Boots off, I unzipped the bottom of my walking trousers and waded in, the water was only up to my ankles so I decided to go in just a little bit further.

Suddenly a big wave came in and my shorts and bum bag were soaked. Fortunately being a hot sunny day I dried out quite quickly while I sat down and brought my blog up to date.

After a nice relax by the sea we headed off along the sea front, passing a sculpture of a couple of surfers, (I often wonder why, in Europe they have such interesting public art and sculptures,

even in the smallest villages whilst in Britain except for in our largest cities, we have very little public art.) and looked out for somewhere to eat.

After a pleasant lunch we consulted our map and found the quickest way to get to the station for the 3:45 train. The route was far more direct than the one we took yesterday, and as a result we even had time to pop into a supermarket to buy some Pimenton (much loved by Rick Stein) and some other supplies to take home. Soon we were back on the station and settled into our seats on the train, for our return to Santiago.

A Corunna used to be the starting point for many English pilgrims to Santiago in the Medieval period, unlike in Santander two years ago A Corunna no longer has any markings for the route to Santiago, as we travelled back we thought how a track parallel to the railway line would make an ideal pilgrim route from A Corunna to Santiago.

We eventually got back to Santiago and headed back to our pension, when we arrived were greeted by the owner’s wife like long lost friends. After checking here diary a couple of times, she selected a bunch of keys and took us up to our room, it was one floor higher than our previous room and had an even better view of the Cathedral,

she joked with us that the next time we stayed we would be on the third floor which had the best view of them all.