Day 2 in Sanxenxo.

Really, I suppose, this should be called day 3 since we arrived mid-afternoon on Friday but it still feels like day 2 so that’s what it will be called. 

The chess player fought manfully yesterday and lost what he considered to be a won game. These things happen. Maybe today will be better. 

Afterwards we went out for a drink and a snack at the Castelao, a cafetería just up the road from our hotel. The meals at the hotel are far too copious for us to consider full board but we wanted a little something. An ensalada mixta and a bit of tortilla would fit the bill, we thought. When the ensalada arrived it was, of course, sufficient for four people. We actually knew this in advance and had tried to persuade them to give us a smaller serving. All to no avail. “Viene en un bol”, said the young lady – it comes in a bowl. But why can’t they just put a little less in the bowl? The price is very reasonable so they wouldn’t need to feel they were cheating anyone. And besides, Spaniards are not renowned for eating lots of salad so why do they need to serve such generous portions? One of life’s mysteries! They make a good salad, however, and their tortilla is excellent. 

This morning I had no strange encounters during my run. All to the good. I prefer my morning runs simple and straightforward. 

Some time after breakfast and after checking the papers online and the usual sort of morning stuff, we walked round the coast to nearby Portonovo. The beach at Sanxenxo was already starting to fill up and we came across more people making their way down laden with folding chairs and cool-bags full of provisions. The Spaniards take their beach-days seriously. 

Most of the walk to Portonovo is along a boardwalk through dunes planted with wild flowers and various kinds of grass, presumably to prevent the dunes from blowing away. And the wind was fairly strong this morning: real hold-on-to-your-hat weather. 
 
Portonovo has some nice little beaches of its own, perhaps a bit more downmarket than Sanxenxo’s Silgar but worth visiting. After all, though, in the end a beach is just a beach. 

There are also some interesting bits of statuary. 

I am waiting to see whether bonfires will be lit on the beaches here for the feast of San Juan. They make a big thing of the bonfires on La Coruña’s Riazor beach so it will be interesting to see what Sanxenxo does. This year San Juan, 24th June, falls on a Monday and has been chosen as a día festivo - more or less a bank holiday. Some of these are fixed throughout Spain but others, like San Juan are optional. Galicia has decided to make it an official holiday. 

 I know this because I overheard an argument in a cafe on Wednesday and decided to check up on it. There was also some hilarity about celebrations in Santiago de Compostela. Apparently it’s highly amusing that Santiago (Saint James) should be celebrating San Juan (Saint John). 

You maybe need to be Galician to get the joke.