A guide by VANYA
The Rías Baixas are located in the southwest of Galicia (Spain). They are surounded by the sea, and they have rías (inlets) that provide to this area the finest seafood in the world. Its gastronomy is based on good quality seafood (clams, mussels, cockles, oysters, crabs, spider crabs, barnacles, lobster and cephalopod molluscs), on traditional recipes such as filloas (similar to omelettes), fish, several kinds of cheeses (tetilla, requesón...), a tasteful white wine (albariño) and so on.
The rías are full of mussel platforms that visitors can see travelling along the rías. In this area the fishing industry is so high that the Vigo's port is the second biggest port in the world.
The Rías Baixas gastronomy is so important that during the year the different municipalities celebrate events in honour to seafood or other traditional products.
You can find futher information in the website www.riasbaixas.com
It is located in a beautiful corner of the Old Town and close to the Marina. It is a former fortress and prison and provides visitors with an insight into the region's Prehistoric, Roman and Iron Age Periods.
Paseo del Parrote s/n; 2 euros; July-August: 10am-9pm; Sundays and public holidays: 10am-3pm
Next time you get that flight with Ryanair to Santiago de Compostela. Leave the city behind you and visit the countryside. I would recommend the area known as the Ribeira Sacra (holy river banks). Great wines, food and a very peaceful countryside, which looks and feel ancient. They say there are Celtic connections between Galicia and Ireland.
A stay at Casa Santo Estevo is a great central location for this visit. Located near to the Rio Mino it is easy to travel to Lugo, Ourense, Monforte de Lemos plus the Ribeira Sacra. The house is run by expats, from the U.K. and The Netherlands, so language will not be so much of a problem!
The food is out of this world, mainly local receipts but with some from other parts of the world too. Look at the website for the house. Not only is there information about the property but the area around too. I had a great time there letting time wash past me.
It is a little known area of Galicia. Some great young wines are grown there. Loads of old historical monuments ranging from the Celtic through to the middle ages. Land is similar in feel as Ireland.
A much praised (in the guides) Galician restaurant with a Michelin star. Deperately snooty. Desperately contrived. We should have been suspicious because we walked in and got a table without a reservation. Both other tables were visitors like us. Neither the food nor the service lived up to the star rating (not our first visit to a starred place.) Tasteless Croquetas de Mariscos (we had better in a small bar in Padron the following day for a fraction of the cost.) Pointless sugar flourishes, adding nothing. Appalling unhelpful and begrudging service of courses in the wrong order. Freezing cold cheese platter - explained to us by the chef herself "the Spanish don't eat cheese so we have to keep it in the fridge..." What???? Chef (in civvies) and waiter (with blocked nose - hay fever or a cold?) pacing the floor impatiently throughout the meal - not helpfully, but as if desperate for us to be out of the way - and this was before we had indicated we were not entirely delighted. If you have money to spend on good food, go somewhere else.
Rosalía de Castro, 24 - 15706 Tel.no.: 981 594 100
I was worried that a previous reader had said 'Do not go to this restaurant'. I disregarded that tip and went anyway. It was expensive - our set menu was €62 - but every course was superb, apart from the gazpacho, which was merely excellent. This was precision cooking at a very high level.
Some high points: prawn in a cheese soup as an amuse gueule, clam with an albariño and onion sauce, coffee with an amazingly light almond biscuit. A reasonably-priced wine list, featuring local Galician wines - though we chose a rather expensive, but superb, Albariño. In brief, an outstanding restaurant in a region of good food.
Avenida Rosalía de Castro 24, Santiago de Compostela
I stumbled across A Casa Da Eira B&B on the net while planning our trip to northern Spain in spring 2006. We contacted the owners via email, and had a prompt response (no language problems, Susanne, the owner, speaks English, German, French, Spanish and Gallego – the local language).
After a long drive we found A Casa da Eira: a wonderful old farmhouse that has been completely renovated. It has great common areas and a nice backyard to RELAX. Susanne and her husband were wonderful hosts - breakfast each morning was delicious and included freshly squeezed orange juice and local produce. They also went through a lot of trouble to help us book things and provide us with maps and relevant information about the area. The website gives a good idea about what can be done, whether you're after a quiet relaxing trip, a cultural heritage trip, an outdoors adventure trip with hiking and horse riding, or the local crafts and food. It really was a wonderful 4 days.
The main tourist area is the Ribeira Sacra (which means more or less "the holy riverbanks" due to the numerous monastries to be found there) and the River Sil Canyon.
A Casa da Eira
www.acasadaeira.com/ingles/
nearest airports (lowcost): Vigo, Santiago de Compostela
Want to see at google earth?:maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&z=14&ll=42.386064,-7.63979&spn=0.029669,0.05785&om=1
The southwest coast of Galicia has hundreds of beaches. From long and sandy beaches to smaller scale. What they have in common is the amazing landscape of the rías (inlets).
Going by car you can see how the rías go along the coast until they open to the infinite sea, there are also some small islands where many green forests grow.
At the end of the Ría de Vigo we can see Cíes Islands and at the end of the Ría de Pontevedra we can see Ons Island. They have beaches dressed with white sand and clear waters, placed behind green forest hills. That is a mixture of forest and sandy beaches.
Pazos are typical Galician manor houses from the 16th or 18th centuries. They are buildings built to order by bourgeois Galician people. In these pazos, you can travel along history and recall the dresses, traditions and furnishings of the Modern Ages.
Some of the pazos are private property, so they are closed to the public. Likewise, the visitor can only enjoy the outside pazo.
Others are open to the public, and some of these are available for accommodation. One example of a pazo restored as a hotel is the Pazo da Buzaca, in Moraña. It is a wonderful manor house composed of three buildings. It has rooms decorated in different styles, a dining room with fireplace and a library. It is a luxury building for lovers of history and nature.
Others, as the Pazo de Lourizán hold different exhibitions. In a few words, pazos are regal buildings.
For futher information: www.pazosdegalicia.com/index.html
www.riasbaixas.org/web2005/
In other articles i have talked about lamprey and seafood, but apart from these kinds of fishes in the Rías Baixas there are also molluscs and common fishes. How you can see, we have a wide range of fishes and various gastronomy.
Among the mollucs, calamari and octopus outsantd. There is a speciality of octopus called "pulpo á feira", and should you know everybody who comes here to taste it, eventually they like it. The recipe is based on boiling the octopucs and then it is served in a wood dish salted with red peper.
Calamari is also very tasteful in this area. It is served in many diferent ways i am not going to enumerate them here. But if you come to Spain, overall to the south or to the north, try in the restaurants a "tapa" of calamari. I'm sure you could not stop eating it.
Finallly, i have to talk about common fishes as sardines, turbots, sea bass or monkfish. All this fishes live in the sea with the exception of the sardine. Some of them are more delicious than others but anyway not everybody likes the same, so one of them you would like.
Furthur information about Rías Baixas in the website www.riasbaixas.org
Galicia is quite simply one of most picturesque areas of Spain I have visited
After residing for so many years in the dryer, hotter south, one really notices the change in climate, vegetation, atmosphere and old-worldy charm so similar to the villages of Ireland or a small hamlet in Britain.
Galicia has really everything to offer: it is clean and green; it offers a pleasant climate throughout spring and summer; the coastline is dotted with picturesque villages and small quaint harbours; most of Spain's best beaches are to be found in this area; and lush meadows and orchards are abound.
Driving around the countryside and coastline is a real pleasure, with fantastic views from almost every corner of the province, and of course a word on Galicia would not be complete without mentioning the incredible selection of super fresh seafood and fine wines on offer in almost every cafeteria, restaurant
and tapas bar in Galicia.
One of the prettiest towns in Galicia would have to be O Grove.
O Grove is one of Galicia's many charming fishing villages, and due to its situation on the eastern side of the headland which faces the mainland it is protected from the tidal force of the Atlantic Ocean.
It has a gentle personal charm endearing to all visitors, there are a good smattering of restaurants to suit all prices, and most of them with one thing in common: seafood. It's everywhere, and so fresh it basically walks onto the plate by itself.
As you walk along the beaches in the area as the tide recedes, you will come across cockles, clams, shrimps and small crabs laying in clean golden sands of the Rios.
Be careful though not to get the urge to fill up a bag to take away, as that is not allowed. This true treasure of the sea is jealously guarded by the ladies who work in the local cooperatives making their living cultivating this local delicacy.
One strange occurrence was that the locals understood my Spanish, Andalucian twang included, which is not always the case in other parts of Spain.
I would highly recommend a trip out into the Rios on one of the many comfortable glass-bottom boats that take sightseers out to the mussel and oyster platforms. Included in the trip is a plate of freshly harvested and cooked mussels washed down with a cold glass of Ribero (local young white wine) ... Delicious.
Situated in the middle of the Rias Baixas region, some 25km west of Galicia's capital Pontevedra.
Search Been there
