jaunt up a Hill near Meiras, Valdovino

Near Meiras a few km SW of Valdovino is the big hill that we have been looking at for 18 months but never managed to get up until today, we tried once but ended up on the next one along. The temperature rose to 17 C in early afternoon and with blue skies and no wind we had to get out of the house for a few hours.
The track gets a bit jiggly in places and goes on and on up and up...

... but the view is worth it; that is Valdovino in the distance
Then there are the tunnels woooooo wooooo dark and gloomy but once you get in these ones are clean, dry and quite pleasant, even fairly warm if a bit rubbly in places.
in the tunnels are rooms with no view...
...and rooms with a view
and some seemingly with nautical overtones although I think it might be a blast barrier.
Then fairly suddenly it was time for the sun to set over the hills near Covas then...
...we all went home after a nice few hours distraction on a busy day and with thoughts of a future kayak trip from Valdovino to Covas to keep us company. Its one of those fiddly bits of coast Slartibartfast must have a had a hand in the design, its ideal for kayaking on the right day; a total nightmare on the wrong day....roll on Primavera and a touch of scorchio and tranquilo.

Pantin critters

Quick play on Pantin today warm enough for the boys to play in rock pools while I looked for critters.
Eggs here not sure what kind as yet though there were loads of them in the nooks and crannies - anyone recognise them ?
Percebes or goose barnacles and weird orange stuff hiding on the overhanging roof of a little gully. The salty rubbery things are a delicacy apparantly - I will stick with veg thankyouverymuch.
Green rock v pretty gathered a small bit to see if it is any good for sculpturing.
Not sure if it is amphibole or pyroxene, it could be green tourmaline I need to get a lense on it to check the cleavage angles on the crystals but it does vaguely remind me of the ultrabasic dykes near Achmelvich in Sutherland. It appers to be a a series of narrow boudinaged basic / ultra-basic intrusions.

As Pontes again

Mel and Lorena came with us today rather a later start that we hoped for; must change the glow plugs on the van...nuff said.

Must buy sledges too but boogie boards worked out well enough. The snow had dried and it was very cold so we couldn't make snowballs or snowmen so wallowing about in deep bits became a key activity.Lorena just loved it

Rowan had to be right in it Then it was time for sliding. Callum made his own little track So did Rowan And Mel Sam buy Mel some real proper winter socks before you come back over :-) The generators look quite elegant but close up some of them hum, rumble and squeal, they do a good job although these mountains do feel tame and a bit less wild than the bleak bare tops they once were.

As Pontes snow

There was a scatter of snow again at our house and more to be seen on the hills in the distance so we set off for As Pontes and some higher ground. There was not a lot of traffic around, we did see a big white van stop half way up this one and start to edge his way slowly back down in reverse but no real signs of chaos anywhere. I was wishing I had some BF ATs on the van but we didn't have any problems.

As soon as we stopped the children started a snowball fight.

No sledges in the shops so we used boogie boards - good for sitting on...

and standing on...

Jen managed a few runs too.

Quads were out having fun too, there are hundreds of miles of dirt tracks through the forests and hills, a couple of quads is on the wish list.

Every hilltop is lined with rows and rows of wind powered generators, if you double click on the image you will see what I mean.

A 10 minute snowfall painted lines on the trees then the sun was back out for a while.

As the sun started to drop the temperature dropped too, we watched a few clouds drifting past the rapidly filling opencast site at As Pontes in the distance and said 'good bye - see you tomorrow' to the snowmen.

There is a scatter of snow outside again this morning; judgind by the red sky in the morning there will be more on the way

a morning of marking my students work then we are off out to play again.

A Corunha aquariums

Located near the tower of Hercules is a science museum and a sea life aquarium centre, we decided to visit the aquarium despite seeing some poor reviews online; it turned out to be a great place to spend a few hours. Lots of local fish / critters and a fair few from warmer waters, there is a lot of information to read, and there is an area that is set out like Captn Nemo's Nautilus and outdoor area with seal pools. We were there for three hours and could have stayed for more really but the boys stated to get hungry.

Here is the Nautilus bit not really looking impressive in that photo though

 There was a friendly lobster

I was stung by one of these diving off Mombasa in 1974, not a pleasant experience those feathery bits hide potentially deadly stinging spines.

and another pretty one

and perhaps less pretty but very friendly

hmmm a daft little puffer

Easy to get close up to the friendly seals

unfortunately there is a wet hands area, Rowan ended up with wet arms and tummy as well

some floating jellies

 and a gallery with some impressive photos

most frustrating toy

Official status in our household is that the decepticon transformer Demolisher is the most frustrating toy of Christmas, 'suitable for age 5 up although some adult supervision may be needed for younger children' lol over an hour to get it from one state to the other, partially because our 6 year old had a go himself first. They are actually really well thought out, rather complex and just a little too frustrating for my old head.

here and there

Some recent pics from around and about...

There is a little fort overlooking Cedeira it looks like a few walls and cannons at first glance, we went for a little walk on the headland and were surprised to find it open, once inside it is bigger than it looks and there is a helpful guide with a good smattering of English who told us about the English invasions and Napoleon etc.

 

  

Later the same day I took Kate and Luke kayaking on the lake at Vilaboa. Kate is well practiced but Luke has only done a little and did very well to stay in my unstable sea kayak.

Sam turned up just as we were setting off and joined us, I wasn't on form during the break but couldn't resist a 5 min paddle too. Sam is getting to grips with the sea kayak after a few trips over last year and I managed not to sink the low volume ancient slalom kayak although the whole of the front would submerse unless I kept my weight well back...I really must lose a few kilos.

There are some lovely wet place to visit like this one ...I managed to catch a double sinking action moment.

And some knights battling it out.

We went sailing ice cream tub boats on the river near Barquiera.

It was a short lived sport the river was raging and they were gone in no time. 

Yuletide

Christmas in our corner of Galicia can be disappointing if you like flashy lights and decorations;  there are a few decs here and there but nothing on the scale of the UK even in A Coruna city. Personally the child in me loves the decs and lights but the adult prefers a greener less gaudy Christmas, LEDs must have impacted on the energy consumption but the cost in direct energy used and all the used once then dumped decs just does not go with the Christmas spirit - good will and joy to all mankind might be better achieved if we worked harder to protect the future of our planet rather than lighting it up and making it pretty...however we do have three sets of lights and a tree, balancing that a few of our decorations date back to the late 1800s and a fair few from the mid 1900s so we do try to do our bit and make them last.

25 Dec passes with little fuss although there might be church stuff going on that I am not aware of, the peak as far as children are concerned is 6th Jan - Kings day when the presents are delivered, this is obviously how Papa Noel manages his Christmas rounds so well- splitting deliveries between the 25 Dec and the 6th.

New year is important although a lot of it seems to revolve around eating 12 grapes as the clock strikes - a custom started by an astute grape grower to use up the late harvest seems to have become a national obsession with 12 wishes to be made and bad luck to be had if you get it wrong. I can't be doing with superstitious nonsense especially commerce generated superstition but we had local visitors and I tried to down my grapes, still have not managed to think of 12 wishes though.

We also found out that a fire in the living room is needed - Jose brought some homemade firewater in a plastic bottle, added a lot of sugar, some lemon rind and some coffee beans and did this....

Then this happened...

And occasionally this...

And the living room got hotter and hotter as it burned for 40 mins until most of the alcohol has dissipated. We ended up with the windows wide open at midnight and we all had to be careful where we stood :-)

Weather has been mixed with some downpours, some showers and some sunshine temperatures cool at night, although not frosty, and rising to a comfortable 10 or so, occasionally like yesterday it hits 17.

Autumn colours still glowing on the autochthonous willow and oak, lambs are prancing in the fields and finches / sparrows / robins are feeding their young - Autumn, Winter and Spring all mixed up together.