Ride Day 16: Cangas to Viano do Castelo

This ought to be a fun day: we have two ferry crossings over one bay and the over the Minho river that separates Spain from Portugal.

We started the day early from our nice beach hotel in Cangas -- the first ferry departed at 7 a.m. and even though the sun wasn't up, we were on it.  We have a great tail light and a pretty good headlight and there was no traffic out, so we weren't worried.

The ferry was surprisingly crowded at that time on a Friday morning.  Maybe a lot of people who live in the beach town of Cangas ride the ferry over to the bustling metropolis of Vivo for work.  Who knows.

Here's the route for the first part of today's trip.

Except for the vegetation, it looks like Oregon's coast

There were a lot of pilgrims on this camino route, too

We had checked the schedule for the ferry that runs from Augua, Spain across the Minho river into Caminha, Portugal to make sure that it ran often enough but found that due to some unusually low tides the ferry crossings in the middle of the day had been canceled.  Oh Oh.  The last run was at 11:30.  That meant that we had to ride 60 km in 3 hours.  That's not very fast, but with the hills ahead and the fact that we usually get lost, we decided to really push.  If we missed the ferry we would have had to ride 20 km inland to the first bridge, and then 20 km back to where the ferry would land.  We were pretty motivated to be on time.

But we rode really hard and we had a good tail wind so we made it to the ferry with a few minutes to spare and got on board.  Welcome to Portugal!

Getting tickets for the ferry

It turns out that ours was the final sailing for the day

On bord

Looking out to the Atlantic

Almost there

Whoo, we made it!

The ride from the Portugal side of the river to the little community of Viano do Castelo was flat and easy and only about 30 km, so we were there pretty quick.  Viano do Castelo is a small port on the Limia river.  As we approached town we rode into a big fog bank and couldn't see far.  We were thinking that we'd camp on the south side of the river, but hadn't made any decisions.  We got really lost really fast and, per one of our usual tricks, stopped at some random hotel and asked for a city map.  Lorie got the map and asked the guy at the front desk what a room cost.  He laughed and said that the entire city was booked up because tonight and tomorrow night are the biggest Portuguese music festival of the year.  Oh Oh.  She said, "Oh, we're going to camp on the other side of the river."  In response the guy said "The campground closed for the season last weekend."  Oh Oh.

So we just kind of rode through the tiny streets in town without much direction.  After a few turns and seeing the sights we came across a small sign on a wall that offered apartments.  We figured that we might as well ring the bell and see if they had a room.  Right away a woman opened the door and welcomed us and our bike into what looked like a mansion.  We explained that we didn't have a reservation because she was acting as if we were the guests that she was expecting (no English for her, no Portuguese for us),  Finally, a guy walked by to see what was going on.  He asked if we had a reservation and we explained that no, we just dropped in on a chance.  Good luck: someone had just canceled and they had one room.  He explained, almost apologized that it was their economy room, but it was perfect. 

The place is a palace.  No kidding. From the street it looks just like any other facade.  But inside it is a huge house that the dates from the 17th century that the current owner has painstakingly restored. 

The street view

Each room has a remarkable ceiling that has a pattern that is themed on the floral name of the room

Above the main staircase

The formal dining area

The courtyard in back

Our host explained that with payment of our (modest) fee, everything in the place was free (beer, wine, water, coffee) and that we would have breakfast prepared at a time of our choice.  Unreal.  Then, he spent well over an hour with us explaining the history of the building, the city, and telling us what to visit and which venues to go to for the music festival.  Well, most of the music started after 10 p.m. so I'm not sure that we'll see much of it, but the town is beautiful and all dressed up for the festival.

Main street

Republic square

The view from the top, Santa Luchia

Inside Santa Luchia

A cathedral in town

The lineup for the music festival-- all Portuguese artists

Most of the little streets had a theme

Exterior of Santa Luchia

We took showers and rested a bit, then wandered town some more.  We found a cafe that looked appealing and got a nice but reasonably sized dinner with a bottle of local Averinho
wine.

The main stage

The local wine -- it is really good and really inexpensive

Lorie had a plate of chorizo made from local hogs that eat only black acorns

I had a sardine salad -- the seafood is incredibly good and the sardines are crazy tasty

Local sheep cheese with marmalade on top for dessert

The city hall at night

Main street at night

We were tired but wandered down to the very first concert -- the guy from Portugal who won this year's Eurovision festival (kind of like America's Got Talent, or something like that).  It wasn't our kind of music and there were a lot of people around, so we decided that it is best to be boring and get some sleep.

Tomorrow we are heading south to Porto, a big city at the mouth of the Douro river and the home of port wine.

Cheers.