Baione to Nigran 7 km
Total distance 156kms
Climb 260m
Total climb 2030m

Yes that is correct, the total distance walked was just 7km today. Don’t quite know why, it was just how Caminoways planned it for us. So everything was done in slow motion. Slow packing our bags, slow breakfast, slow to check out and slow granny step walking – we are a granny and grandad after all.

It was a grey morning and shortly after we started out it started to  drizzle lightly. Just enough to be a nuisance as you had to have your rain jacket on, rain cover on your back-pack and the camera in a dry bag. But it was warm, no wind and humid, so we got a bit hot. It is what in Ireland they would call a `soft day`.

It was an interesting walk out of Baiona along the beach front, crossing the Rio Minor and then going inland along little lanes, through villages, then the suburbia of Nigran before reaching our accommodation. We stopped to look at everything remotely interesting, had a long coffee stop, and still arrived by 12.30pm. Fortunately our room was ready so we didn’t have to wait around.

On our way out this morning we crossed the River Minor which separates Baiona and Nigran. There is a thirteenth century (restored in early twentieth century) Romanesque Bridge of La Ramallosa. The bridge replaced a bridge destroyed in the 10th century and there was possibly a previous bridge along which the Roman Road Via XX ran. The bridge is 90 metres long and has 10 slightly pointed arches that look semi-circular. The bridge has a double system of cutwaters, on one side they protect the piers from the flow of the river, and on the other side to protect from the incoming tide. In the middle of the bridge is a transept, which has at its feet an image of St Telmo, patron saint of navigators and whom history seems to recognise as having ordered the rebuilding of the bridge, and according to legend, having protected it in a storm.

Fertility rites were performed on this bridge, known as “early baptism”. This tradition, linked to bridges of a certain antiquity and with crossings, consisted, although there are many variants, in that when a woman had problems getting pregnant or with a history of miscarriages, she would appear on the bridge shortly before midnight accompanied by at least two people who carried food and drink with them, as if they were going to celebrate a normal baptism. The woman waited, in the center of the bridge, until the first person arrived, and asked him or her to pour water from the river on her belly; After the early baptism, the passage was left free and the celebration of the festival began. At the end they returned to the bridge and threw all the excess into the water as payment for the magical powers of the river. When the child was born, the true baptism was performed in the church, with the person who had performed the early baptism on the bridge attending as godfather or godmother.

The Hotel 7 Uvas (7 grapes) is quite different to all our other accommodation so far. It is quite small, located in the country just outside Nigran, is mostly single story, has a terrace and lovely garden, is quiet and peaceful, has a 100 year old fig tree, a horreo, unusual modern decor and feels luxurious. Each room has a spa bath and waterfall taps. We don’t see these in the 2 and 3 star hotels we usually use.

A horreo is a long, narrow, little building, usually made of granite, up on stilts or columns, gable roofed and often topped with a cross. Their original purpose was to store feed for animals and house farm produce that needed to be stocked or further ripened. They are always elevated to protect the contents from rodents. Ventilation is allowed for by slits in the walls. They are only found in northwest Spain, which is where we are now. We saw dozens of them on the Camino Frances and we are starting to see a lot on this Camino as we move up through Galicia. They are not usually painted purple like the one here at Hotel 7 Uvas.

Dinner was a bit strange as we were the only ones in the dining room. It would have been better if there had been some music on. It was quite classy and a good quantity. Tomato and cheese, beef shank with potato, peas and carrots, caramel ice cream. I apologise for the out of focus photo.