Rinlo Round 2

 As promised, in good company we returned to A Mariña, to the tiny town of Rinlo's campground. We first went to a cemetery built by indianos (you know, the returned emigrants who made bank in the Caribbean and South America). Unfortunately, we could only sneak a peek from the outside as it was locked. At least the façade was in good shape and recently painted. 

Our friends arrived in mid afternoon, and after settling in, we all went to soak up the sun at the beach. The way down to this specific beach was a bit tricky to find. There was a staircase that looked promising but only led to rocks. The real staircase seemed to dead-end at another rock wall. But wait! There was a small tunnel leading into the wide, firm beach. Very cool! Once we got our towels set down, the two foreigners of the group decided to run to the sea. It was a long ways into the water with low tide. Soon after splashing into the water we heard whistles. The lifeguard waved us over. Now that my attention was caught, I noticed a tiny sign indicating people not to swim to the left of it. Right where we were. Oops. Guiri alert! I didn't last long anyways as the water was a bit cold for me.

Once the beach started getting too chilly/windy, we returned to Rinlo for a drink and dinner. The following morning we had a bit more beach time before lunch. Lunch of course was the famed arroz caldoso. The rice was great, but the service not so much. Honestly, since the whole town with its total of three restaurants is so well-known for the rice, people are going to come no matter what. It seems that they take advantage of the fact and aren't concerned about customer service. Maybe the fame went to their heads...

Arroz caldoso for five

Saturday night the campground had an outdoor concert. The place was packed, although with people mostly masked and practicing social distancing. You could tell people had come from all around the area, because while there are normally three or four cars parked outside the entrance, an impromptu ¨parking lot¨ in an adjacent cornfield was formed by a dozen cars. And to my delight, the music playing was traditional Galician music! A foliada, sans dancers. Since nobody else was dancing (I think in theory you can't dance with non-cohabitants these days), that meant I had nobody to compete with. Rather, there was no one to churn out some difficult steps that I would find impossible to replicate. Had to jump on that opportunity! Far away from the crowd, of course. I'm sad to report, however, that less than two years after abandoning Galician dance class, I could hardly remember how to dance the xota. Moi mal! Regardless, I did gleefully dance a few muiñeiras. My partner did his best to copy me with spunk. I swear, at one point one of the musicians yelled ¨eses bailadores!¨ Nobody else was dancing. That's us! A shoutout!

Rinlo at a distance, by Chris

On Sunday the men woke up early to go fishing. The regular fisherman acted as a father figure, reminding them how to fish since it had been years. Then we did a repeat of what we had done the last time we camped at Rinlo, essentially.  Drive to Illa Pancha. Walk to Ribadeo. Have lunch in the center. Walk back to Illa Pancha. Head home.