Trip to Galicia - Cantas Vacas Tes

After scanning the Internet over and over again we found flights to Carmen’s native Galicia for only Eur.20! We booked them and a week later we were on the plane northbound. The flight was in the early morning and when we left home we were only one missed bus away from missing our plane! Luckily all our connections fitted and we made it just on time. The flight itself was only about 50 minutes and we touched down in Santiago de Compestella on Friday morning (the 3rd). It was freezing and coming from sunny and warm Madrid this was rather a shock. When leaving Madrid it had been raining again and the forecasts were not good for the weekend. Galicia can be cold and wet but at least there were no clouds.

On arriving in Santiago we took the bus south to Pontevedra. Although I was fighting with my sleepy eyes we could see all the damage that has been done to Galicia by a combination of pyromaniacs and heavy rain. Black trees washed away from the mountain lining the streets. It is sad to see such a beautiful area affected by the stupidity of man. Pontevedra looked more or less the same as my previous visits. Pontevedra is a nice medium sized town and is the home town of Carmen’s family. We met with Carmen’s dad (Manuel) on the central square, close to where he works and later with Carmen’s mum (Obdulia) who was having coffee with her workmates (she is a high school teacher of natural science and physics). There was a an ‘end of the week’ feeling for everybody. When the parents finished their works we had lunch and prepared for ‘the big move’.

Carmen’s family has a great beach house which is used nearly every weekend in the summer and increasingly in the winter. Luckily the weather had turned and we had great sunshine. On the way to La Lanzada we stopped in the village (a pueblo) of Meis. This is where Manuel’s family originates from. It is a typical village and gives you a good idea of how life would have been in Galicia a century ago. We dropped in for tea and had nice (Spanish) talks with Carmen’s grandmother (Carmen) and her aunt (Carmen…the female line of Carmen’s family at least doesn’t spring any surprises!!) I had brought some Dutch cookies as present and they were well received. After leaving Meis we arrived in the beach house were we relaxed for the evening.

On Saturday we woke up, had a nice breakfast on the terrace overlooking the beach, see and sunshine. We went to the port village of Sanxenxo and when we returned Alberto, the boyfriend of Irene (Carmen’s sister) had arrived for lunch and we had some delicious fish (to be followed by meat, potatoes and lentils…we were well taken care of, as always). Saturday night was the big night. There was a birthday party of two of Carmen’s friends in a penthouse flat on the centre square of Pontevedra, it was simply amazing. The party was going well with nice music, nice people (I knew quite a lot of them as I had met the friends on my previous vistis..the nice thing was that I could now really communicate and get to know them) and great food/drinks. Then, all of a sudden, someone decided to show their wedding video on a big screen and sadly the party tied the knot just like the couple on the TV screen. But we had a great time anyway. I impressed with my knowledge of the Galician language. I can now ask the question ‘Cantas vaca tes?’ which means as much as ‘How many cows do you have?’.

The following day we had some more relaxing to do, we went to the beach, had some drinks watching Celta de Vigo play Real Madrid (Celta won 2-1!!) in a trendy bar. After the match we sadly had to say goodbye to the family and head home to Madrid by bus. It was a night bus and took about 7 hours. On our return I had to go straight to Spanish class and work. But it was all worth it..what a great trip!