The passage around to Ria de Muros was a spectacle of granite boulders and islands. Mostly all well-marked but still plenty of traps for young players. This northernmost ria is also the most beautiful and least developed. For those who don’t know, the rias are basically submerged, non-glaciated river valleys, somewhat akin to fiords. Those of you in Australia may be familiar with some of our prominent rias, i.e. Sydney Harbour, Port Hacking and Georges river. For the Kiwis, try Marlborough sounds.
There are several nice anchorages and an excellent marina at Muros town itself. For us the main attraction was the Iron Age Celtic settlement, “Castro de Barona” on the southern shore. It was inhabited from the 1st century BC for about two hundred years and today is remarkably well preserved. We walked into the doorways of small round houses from more than 2000 years ago and tried to imagine what life was like on this tiny promontory, walled off from the land and secured by the sea. The Celts were possibly originally from Austria and spread across much of Europe. They were incorporated into the Roman empire and then eventually confined to the islands of Britain, Ireland, and to Brittany. Their polytheism eventually was metamorphosed to Christianity and today we listen to mournful songs in Gaelic tongues that sound good but we have no idea what they are singing about. (a bit like Fado)
Muros town has been a fishing village for more than 1000 years and the tradition continues today. Mussel farming is huge as well as many other forms of aquatic harvesting. The town church is from the 13th century and the forum was a meeting place for the guilds (or trades). Fortunately the restaurants are more contemporary and the food was outstanding, particularly the “pulpos” or octopus, scallops and of course pimientas de padron from the nearby town of that name. We were able to visit the town of Noia at the head of the ria. The town is possibly named after the great granddaughter of Noah, who is said to have founded the settlement. The ark is incorporated into symbolism on the town crest. There is the fantastic old church of Santa Maria a Nova, with very old and very new graves all around. Supposedly the earth surrounding this church was imported from the Holy Land. We caught the local bus back to Muros but not before being accosted by a local drunk and a Jehovah’s Witness proselitiser whose Iphone evangelical app did not work, forcing her to resort to the carbon-based analogue format (a book). A hire car jaunt took us out to Cabo Finisterre, another limit of the Roman world. The last part goes along the Camino de Santiago (The Way of St James) which finishes at the lighthouse, about 90km from Santiago de Compostela. St James was an apostle who was martyred in Jerusalem in 44 AD by beheading. (Sound familiar?) The trail was originally a pagan path leading to Finisterre long before Christianity subsumed the marketing idea. We saw many hot and tired (and presumably but not visibly enlightened) pilgrims baking in the fierce afternoon sun. The Camino souvenir shop was doing a roaring trade in fridge magnets fashioned after the scallop shell symbol of the walk. The Camino is big business these days with about 250,000 people making the pilgrimage each year.