Day 14 – to Gavieira

There’s a few days of rain forecast, with temperatures gradually getting warmer, though not today. Not a lot higher up, and it had originally fallen as snow.

The tops of the mountains, less than 1200 metres, were just about at cloud level, so peaking in and out at us.

No hurry as I hoped the pitter-patter on the van roof may ease, and I finished a good novel, a reissue of a 1966 crime novel, but so subtly done. A Helping Hand by Celia Dale, which shows what can be done in the genre, without bodies piling up, and without bloody violence. Just the savagery of mundane everyday life. Certainly recommended.

These are Garrano ponies, the Gerês wild horses..

In the end I did the circuit I had planned to do if it had been fine, a circuit of Franqueira mountain. The rain was only light, and though around 5C, it’s no hinderance if you keep moving.

There was some spectacular scenery with a certain atmosphere to it, shrouded in cloud as it was.

Early in the afternoon I shifted 15 kilometres or so south, to Gavieira, sat in a steep-sided valley. I was settled in a quite bit of farmland just before the Sale Saracens kick off, and a good job too, it was a great game to watch.

In the early evening the rain subsided, though I believe it will be back tomorrow. It left for a valley of lifting mist as we took a wander just as darkness came.

And we had visitors, the cattle with the huge undulating horns that roam so freely, and the farm dog below. All very friendly.