Final Stretch, 20, 21, 22, & 23. A Trip Not Quite Up to Par.

I am so out of it. I am tired. I got my second shot yesterday morning. I was fine all day, with only minor aching in my arm. But then, around evening, I got extremely tired. My body ached. I had a small headache. I took a paracetamol, and I got a bit better. But then, during the night, I was cold, couldn't sleep well because of that, and awoke with a low-grade fever and general achyness. Now, I'm a bit better, with another paracetamol. Hopefully, by tomorrow, I'll be my normal self.

It's been busy for me since I finished classes last Tuesday. The car was in the garage Wednesday and Thursday, having the clutch fixed. Wednesday night, Midsummer, we had our own little bonfire to jump over and keep witches away. Friday, I went on one of my road trips, the first since last June, and yesterday I got my second shot and got zonked out.

My road trip had been up in the air. I had been intending to go down to Porto, where I haven't been in at least two or three years. But, increasing amounts of contagion in Portugal (fine, around Lisbon, but Portugal is a small country), and the necessity still of walking around with masks in the streets, pushed me to consider other places. I though of returning to Puebla de Sanabria, where I had gone last year, and exploring other small towns. I also thought of returning to Asturias, where I hadn't been in a while.

I decided on Asturias. I looked on the map and online, and decided that the area of the Oscos would be a nice place to visit. There were interesting ruins, and museums, such as a bread making museum and a working smithy.

This was one visit that I can't say was a success. It's a shame, because the area is worth exploring, but things were against me. To begin, I didn't stop at a gas station outside Lugo. I had begun to feel the calling of a bathroom, but decided that, surely, there must be more gas stations along the way. This is where I recommend everyone travel with a full tank of gas when travelling among small towns and villages. My car's tank was fine, but mine was filling up fast, and needing to be alleviated. I contemplated pulling over and using a natural bathroom. It would have been a good solution if there were a shoulder to pull over, and adequate cover. There wasn't. I finally got to Fonsagrada and saw a gas station at the entrance to the small town. I pulled in and followed the arrow. But, when I rounded the corner, there was a workman. I went inside and asked if they had a bathroom. Nope, it was out of service due to renovation.

As I drove out of Fonsagrada, looking around, seeing nothing, and continuing forward, I though of Tycho Brahe. Dying from a burst bladder isn't fun. Desperately searching for another gas station, I had to drive various kilometers out of the first town I had planned to stop in, to find the nearest one. Finally, I espied the flat roof of one in Villanueva de Oscos. I drove in, was told where the bathroom was, and finally emptied my tank. It took quite a while, too. Reminder for next time: halfway through the trip to get wherever I'm going, make a bathroom stop.

My travel plans disrupted, I looked around town and saw the ruins of the monastery of Santa María. The place is open, and I just popped in and wandered around. It was originally founded in the twelfth century, though what is left is mostly from the eighteenth century. Since the confiscation of Church properties by Mendizábel, in 1835, it has fallen into ruin. It's large, and impressive, especially the open fire place. 

When I had finished looking around the ruins, even peaking into a room with a wooden door that had no lock, and discovering that the town had stacked old street lights and sacks of sand in it, I looked around town for something to eat. Like when I went to Sanabria last year, I preferred to order a sandwich to eat in the open or in my car. There was a small café and a café restaurant. I tried the restaurant, that looked like it might do hot take-out food. 

There were a couple of women outside at a table, and a couple of older men inside. A waitress was at the doorway. There wasn't much custom, though it was barely one o'clock, and people might eat a little later there. I asked the waitress if they did hot sandwiches to take away. She went inside to ask, and returned a little later, shaking her head. No, because they didn't have fresh bread that day. I accepted her explanation and headed for the car, to travel back toward the first town I had barrelled through. All the while, I was thinking, No fresh bread? Even if they leave it untouched in its basket, every Spaniard I know wants bread with their meal. I have my suspicions of the quality of that restaurant.

I went back to the town I had wanted to stop in, earlier. There was a small bakery and general store that said it had empanadas. That sounded promising. I went in and asked. Sorry, but they had already finished selling them. I looked around the square. There was a restaurant that looked closed. There was another one that looked a bit posh. There was a tiny café with some older men. Nothing looked promising in the hot take away sandwich prospects. I got in the car and continued.

I reached San Martín de Oscos. By now, it was well after two o'clock, and I was stark raving hungry. I stopped in an open space in the middle of town. There were two restaurants, both with "For Sale" signs. There was another that promised home-cooked meals. That was it. I went to the one that was still open and asked. The proprietor went back into the kitchen. When he came back out, he said they had the typical cold sandwiches, of cheese, ham, or sausage. My heart sank. I chose the cheese, thinking it would have the least salt, at least. When the sandwich was brought out, wrapped in foil, and I picked it up, my heart sank further. It consisted of a piece of a hard loaf of bread. When I unwrapped it later and bit into it, my suspicions were confirmed. A hard crust that scratched against my palate made the experience unsublime. The bread tasted good, but it was the kind of bread most suited to sopping up sauce, or with a hot filling, wrapped and let sweat within foil, so that upon unwrapping, the crust is softened. Not with cold cheese. In the end, I ate the cheese and left the bread. Not a memorable lunch.

I searched for the bread museum and found it closed. The working smithy was also closed. I know that the pandemic is not good to establishments like these, but it was a disappointment, nonetheless. My trip was not as interesting as I had expected it to be.

From San Martín, I traveled to Mon, and took a look at the Palacio de Mon, an impressive structure in a tiny village with only one occupied house. For the life of me, though, I don't understand why the main entrance faces the deep woods. The road comes down along the back of the large house, with a tiny lane that leads along a side to a grassy area between the façade and the woods. The house must have been occupied until at least thirty or forty years ago, since it has an old electricity connection, and the roof is whole. I would have loved to have been able to squeeze inside and wander around.

The trip had proved unsatisfactory, so far. Driving along, I noticed a sleepiness invading. I found a meander of a lane down to wooden tables by a river bank, and took it. I parked and pushed down my seat. The only sound was the rushing babbling of the water. Even the wind was still. I let my eyes close for about ten minutes. I really needed that stop. Normally, I push myself to see as much as possible, but not last Friday. After finding the bread museum and the smithy closed, little possibility for lunch, and my earlier blunder of not stopping earlier for a bathroom break, the day was disappointing. 

I continued and went to Grandas de Salime, where there was supposed to be an ethnic museum. Along the way, there was some spectacular scenery, but I couldn't stop to contemplate it. The ditches didn't exist. They were so overgrown with grasses, nettles, and brambles, that I had no way of knowing if there was a shoulder. In most cases, there wasn't because it was a mountain road cut into the hills. 

When I got to Grandas, I found it to be a small town. I followed the signs to the museum, totally expecting it to be closed. Happily, it wasn't. But the only reason it wasn't was because Grandas de Salinas lies on the Primitive Way of Santiago, and since the measures have been lifted on travel, pilgrims have started to appear. It behooved an establishment to open merely to attract those pilgrims. 

The museum consists of different buildings, with different scenes set up in each of them.
The largest, a town house, holds all the town scenes; the tavern/grocery store, the tailor's, the barber's, the postman, the shoe maker, the doctor's, the dentist's, the school. Some of the scenes took me back to the days when I was five and nine years old, and I was here on summer vacation with my parents. There were rolls of toilet paper with a red elephant that boasted 400 sheets, that I remembered with trepidation. It was less toilet paper, more crepe paper, and scratchy as all get-out. The tavern itself reminded me of the general store in my grandmother's village, which must have closed over thirty years ago. On one side was the tavern with the bar, the coffee maker, the alcoholic beverages. On the other the groceries, stationery, basic clothing, and sewing necessities. 

There were other scenes in the other buildings; wood working, smithy, cloth weaving, even scenes from living spaces as they used to be. It was very interesting, and perhaps one of the highlights of the day. There was a couple prowling around, as well, looking at the different scenes, talking to each other about them. From the way they pronounced their language, I though they were speaking a very closed version of Portuguese, especially since they mentioned the word "foc" which is fire in Catalan, and similar to "fuoco" in Italian. But, when they asked the curator about the moving diarama showing how a smithy worked, they understood neither Castilian nor my approximation of Portuguese, and the woman asked, "In English?" Then, I mentioned it showed how they used to beat out the iron, and she understood with an, "Ahhhh!" Perhaps they were Romanian pilgrims. Romanian is a Romance language, too.  

From Grandas, I drove back to the turning off that went to a place called A Paicega. The
turning was onto a narrow lane, that, after a few kilometers, dwindled down to an even narrower road that had ancient macadam in places, but was pure dirt in most, with a ridge of grasses in the middle. Thankfully, it didn't deteriorate further, and ended at the ruins of a town, above the reservoir of Grandas de Salinas, on the river Navia.

A Paicega was an artificial town, built in the 1940's to house approximately two thousand people; families and workers who built the dam and the reservoir between 1945 and 1955, when it was inaugurated. It was a dangerous job; around 300 workers lost their lives working in rudimentary fashion on what was the tallest dam in Spain. The town was a complete town, even with schools and a church. Of course, it was obligatory to go to Mass every Sunday. The Asturianos were famed for their "red" tendencies that had to be beaten out of them by Franco and his fellow criminals. Now, the church is the largest building that is still mostly whole. It is shuttered up, though, its windows and doors filled with bricks and cement. Someone spray-painted a pentacle on the iron door. A nearby building, mostly whole, is also shuttered up, except for one room which looked like a kitchen of some sort, with the remains of a sink, and a cabinet on the wall. On the floor, there are still some old jackets, and a pair of ancient shoes. 

It's a beautiful spot, and very peaceful, now. It's strange to think of all those people there, working hard, running risks, raising children for ten years, and then moving out, going to other large works in other places, all to earn a simple living.

After I left, I started driving back, going first toward the coast, and then turning west. Again, until I reached Boal, there was no place to stop and contemplate the eye-stopping scenery. This trip deserves a better treatment. Maybe, some day I'll return, with better luck.

Life continues.