The trip from La Coruna down to the Ria Muros felt more like cruising the Channel in February than Spain in August.

A small group of British yachts ventured out of La Coruna on Monday morning into a heavy sea mist (later a real fog) and no wind. Fortunately the latest 4G radars are much better than previous generations and we could easily identify local fishing boats without AIS from a couple of miles away. It’s vital to maintain a good lookout and we always had a couple of pairs of eyes out of the boat and one glued to the radar as we motored along the coast.

About 2 hours into the day the breeze picked up to 12-14kts with occasional gusts around 20kts and the visibility improved to about one mile allowing us to sail quickly down to Muxía in the Ria Camarinas.

We expected to get sheltered from the breeze as we rounded the headland into the Ria but instead we had a massive blast of wind up to 34kts. We bore away slightly onto a broad reach and hit a new top speed for the voyage of 13.4kts boat speed. Within minutes the wind dropped to 10kts, we dropped the sails and went into Muxía marina.

Muxia is a quiet town, the marina even quieter. There is one very helpful member of staff who came to take our lines, she also assigns the berths and also mans the adjacent Shell petrol station!!

We had great meal ashore and the following morning a trip to the marker yielded a great collection of cheeses for the lunch.

Unfortunately Tuesday’s weather was no improvement. Very poor visibility, the wind backed south meaning a beat for the first 10miles and, to our horror, drizzle!

We sailed 30miles down the coast, round Cap Finisterra (we just caught a glimpse of the rocks but couldn’t even see the headland or lighthouse through the low cloud) and then down to the Ria Muros.

We’d decided to anchor overnight and dropped the hook in the first bay (Ensenada San Francisco) very close to a sandy beach and small town. The bay has a number of fish farms to avoid on the entrance but once in we found a sandy patch to anchor in about 6 metres or water. Only one other yacht around, a 42’ Balticat. Anne-Laure and Tara bravely ventured in for a first swim!

A peaceful end to the day was enlivened by watching West Ham beat Wimbledon 3-1 on our iPad, a first win after 3 defeats! We hoped for a similar improvement in the weather in the morning!