Flip-Flopping the Ria’s

After departing Coruna we made 7.5 knots under sail – for an hour! After tacking ever slower a few hours later the wind tailed off to another 4 knot headwind so we made for Corme. Anchoring in Corme is like anchoring on a roundabout within a harbour with the centre completely full of marine farms. There is about 100m of useable sea between the fish farms and the beaches or rocks so it’s a case of picking out a spot deep enough within the doughnut ring to anchor. We arrived in darness and left in fog so have no idea what Corme is like. Corme is only sheltered from the north winds and the forecast showed strong south westerlies in 2 days time. We therefore made our way to Ria Camarinas, said to be the prettiest Ria, plus it has better shelter from the north and south provided you switch north/south within the Ria itself. Arriving in Camarinas after yet more motoring through beam on swell we all thought it quite a place. Forests, rocks, small churches on points and colourful buildings. Great afternoon at anchor in the north bight of the Ria and as darkness fell watched Spanish TV which for some reason broadcasts some good films in English. Next morning scheduled to explore on land but woke to find it blowing 27 knots from the south, as expected, but leaving us exposed. The whole anchorage cleared out within 30 minutes and we all went to the south side of the Ria and anchored off Muxia, a small fishing town. The village looked ripe for exploring but just one problem. Although we were now sheltered again the Force 7 breeze would in the event of an engine failure on a tender take you roughly to Canada. So nobody with inflatable tenders left their boats for 2 days! Today the wind dropped and has veered north again so we upped anchor and returned to our former place off Camarinas. We have now been ashore for the first time in 5 days to get provisions to head toward Portugal.