A day in Baiona

A quiet day in Baiona, a town with a history of 2000 years. Our hotel, Pension El Mosquito, does not have a restaurant so for breakfast we were sent 50 metres along the road to the Hotel Anunciada, which does have a restaurant. When we arrived it was packed with pilgrims. For only the second time it was not a buffet breakfast. You found a seat and were brought your breakfast on a tray: juice, coffee, toast, butter, jam, a roll filled with ham and an apple. Toast is Spanish style, basically a halved roll put through a toaster. This was the least impressive breakfast so far.

The light was very strange this morning. A combination of smoke from the wild fires and a foggy morning. Sunrise here is not till 8.21 which to us is surprisingly late, but it is in a different time zone to what we became used to in Portugal. Portugal is in the Western Time Zone which is GMT+0, Spain on the other hand is GMT+1 in the Central European Time Zone. They become GMT+1 and GMT +2, respectively in summer time.

In the harbour there is a replica of the Pinta, one of the two caravels which Christopher Columbus used on his first voyage to the New World in 1492. The other ships were the Nina and the carrack Santa Maria. Pinta was captained by Capt. Martin Alonzo Pinzon. On the return journey from the Americas the Pinta became separated from the Nina and was the first of the expedition to reach Spain on February 28 1493, here at Baiona. The Santa Maria did not return from America, and Christopher Columbus was on the Nina. Feb 28 is now a public holiday and there is a fiesta recreating a medieval market and the arrival of the boat with the news of the discovery of the Americas.

There is also a more modern memorial to the arrival of the Scarlet Knight in the Port of Baiona in 2009. The Scarlet Knight was the first submersible, unmanned robot glider to cross the Atlantic, having travelled 7,300 miles in 221 days from New Jersey, USA.

At our hotel we picked up a brochure with three self-guided walks, the Old Quarter Route, the Monterreal Route and the Pinzon Route. All very close by, so we had a leisurely walk around these areas. The Old Quarter Route takes you round the narrow cobblestone streets and alleys, with small shrines, chapels, manor houses, and lots of small hotels, bars and cafes. The Monterreal Route takes you through the fortress located on the Mount Boi peninsular. It has been a walled enclosure for over 2000 years. There is also a luxury hotel, Parador, on the peninsular. The Pinzon Route takes in places associated with the return of the caravel Pinta from The Americas.

Most of the fellow walkers we have got to know did not have a rest day, so they have moved on. Unless they have a rest day somewhere we will probably not see them again. But the good news is we will meet a whole new lot of people tomorrow.