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Published: October 29th 2018
The extra couple of days in Santiago De Compostela have been fantastic....took a day trip BY BUS...to Finisterre and Muxia on the coast about an hour out. So nice to sit back and relax and take everything in....a fabulous day down on the Atlantic Ocean with lunch stop in Finisterre enjoying some lovely seafood. Visited the only waterfall in Europe that flows into the sea, the largest horreo in the world (the buildings set off the ground to dry out all their grains etc), beautiful to see some sea for a change. Have had some great meals here too, have the best breaky place within 50 metres, bar 10 metres and now know that Spain is the biggest comsumer of gin, tried a couple too and very nice, they ask you when you want them to stop, glug, glug, glug.,...one hotel we were at had 25 different gins on their menu.Visited a few tapas bars I had picked out on trip advisor and they were all fab.....we didn't end up having dinner....we were too full of tapas (free with drinks), from really modern tapas bars to old worldy ones we had a great night walking around the windy tiny streets of
this lovely town. Its been unbelievable keep running into people that we met on the Camino Walk....a couple of German girls who are just lovely...saw them at the Pilgrims Office yesterday and today again at the waterfall stop....they are staying in Finisterre for a couple of days. Wednesday took a 4 hour drive from Santiago de Compostela to Leon with a stopover at Carrefour Hypermarket in Lugo to grab a few things then through lots of mountains to arrive in leon around 3pm, a bit hairy finding our accommodation in the old town through winding one way laneways to our hotel, Hospederia Ministera PAX, a gorgeous hotel housed in an old monastery right in the centre of the old town on one of the many plazas. Probably one the best we have stayed and at $75 a night per room very reasonable. Leon has had gorgeous food and tapas bars...we have been checking out many have loved them all especially Jamon Jamon and el Goucho, you cannot believe what value you get at Jamon Jamon 3 red wines, tapas of salami, chorizo, cheese and jamon with bread for around $6.40...unbelievable! The quality of the meats here too is second to
none.....the couple who run the bar are continuously slicing kilos of meats on their electric slicer. Took a walking tour around Leon today which took around 4 hours doing the old town as well as the new town....were surprised to learn that Leon had a Gaudi building, one of only five outside Catalonia region, probably one of the nicest we have seen, Casa Botines. Have so enjoyed our time in Leon. Friday drove to Haro, which is really the capital of the Rijoa Wine Region, a gorgeous town perched high up on a hill, population 11,000, so big enough to have quite a few restaurants and bars but small enough to easily get around, we seem to always make our bookings in the old town and always a bit hairy getting to our destination.....had to drop off luggage at apartment and then 500 metres or so around the winding lanes to the parking station. We have a lovely apartment....huge....3 bedrooms two bathrooms and huge living area with a very modern kitchen with all the mod cons....nice to do some washing.....the apartment is right in the middle of the old town 50 metres to the central plaza. Quite a few of
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3 courses and wine for 12 euro....mussels for starterthe Haro wineries are within walking distance of the town so spent Saturday on a bit of a walking tour and then Sunday we had prebooked a wine tour with Rijoa Wine Trips which was a great day out...albeit a bit cold....we have been hit with a bit of an artic blast.....5 today and said it felt like 1....but we were very lucky with the weather and it only showered a couple of times. We visited two wineries in the morning and had a superb lunch under an old castle in the village of San Vicente de la Sonsierra.....the cutest little village. On our tour we were joined by two Americans from Wisconsin....they were really nice people to share the day with....we had a traditional lunch all laid out by our guide Lorena who is married and lives in Haro but is Brazilian, it was a lunch of all typical produce of the area, we all thoroughly enjoyed it and the day was gone 5.30pm drop off back at our apartment and then to the square for a couple of beers and a meal. The few days in Haro has been magificent....the countryside is so pretty and being autumn the
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Seafood paella for main leaves are all different shades of autumn.....we visited a few historical sites of the area and it was interesting to learn that Haro supplied France a lot of its wine when the Phyloxera wiped out a lot of french vineyards in the mid 19th century....the train still stands down in the wine area of Haro where they used to ship the wine to France by train. Head to San Sebastian tomorrow via Bilbao to see the Guggenheim.
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