Monday Sept 19 was our first full day as part of Howard’s group of 21 people plus Antonio our guide, Ramon our driver, and Howard. We stayed in the NH Collection Santiago de Compostela Hotel only one night, the only part of Howard’s trip where we were not in a hotel at least two nights and two times for three nights which significantly reduced the unpacking and packing. Antonio’s routine at the end of each day was the same, with some changes to the specific times based on our schedule. Only one morning was fairly early, the most common was “Wake Up call at 8:00, Breakfast is served starting at 7:00, Bags outside your room at 8:45, be in the Bus at 9:30.” We did not have to get our bags down to the bus any time and when we arrived at each hotel our bags were brought to our room. All the gratuities for that were included in the package price that we had paid Howard.
We spent Monday morning in Santiago getting a guided tour through the Cathedral with a local guide. Antonio had head sets for each of us linked to the guide’s set so only we could hear what she said and we could be a ways away from the group to take a picture and still hear her. This picture is our group with her outside the Cathedral. Having explored it on our own the prior afternoon, with some information Beth had pulled from some guide books, we had a good foundation and enjoyed the guide drilling down to the next level and talking about the town around the Cathedral. Being able to ask her questions made it much more enjoyable than the self-guided audio tours that are becoming increasingly popular. We enjoyed a glass of wine with Howard after that tour and then boarded our bus for our first group luncheon.
The afternoon of that first day was supposed to be our first vineyard tour at Pazo de Villarei in Rias Baixas, a producer of great Albariño. A week before the trip started Howard got a call from the vineyard that they had experienced a severe drought and had a very early limited harvest and could not accommodate our group this year. Howard was able to quickly arrange a wonderful luncheon for us in the town of Vigo which sits on a bay just off the ocean, at the Calle de las Ostras restaurant. We started with a freshly shucked oyster for each of us that was briny and delicious. Then the platter of food shown in the picture showed up and there was one of these platter for every two people! It included: Strong Crab, 2 blue crabs like we get in the Chesapeake, scallops, langoustine, at least a dozen shrimp, mussels, razon clams, a fish filet (sorry, I forget what fish it was), and a bowl with long thin black shells. Those were barnacles where you broke open the shell and sucked out the strip of barnacle. I tried one and can check off barnacle as tried it and don’t need to do it again. Beth declined to try one. There was a very nice bottle of white wine on each table of 6 people and when it got low, another one appeared. Our table enjoyed three bottles of the Beiramino from Ribeiro which is made from two grapes we were not familiar with. Palomino and Treixadura. It was a lovely crip white wine but I do not believe it is exported to the US. The price for this meal, wine, tax and tip included, was only €30! I think it would 3X that to get anything close to the quantity and quality of very fresh seafood that we had. I would not expect that the big platter of food for two people is on their standard menu if you walk into the restaurant. I believe it is something that Howard put together with the restaurant owner as a package deal. One of the people on our trip could not eat gluten and I was impressed by every restaurant we went to, and all the vineyards that had food for us while we tasted, being very solicitous in making accommodations for her.
This was our introduction to having our full meal of the day starting sometime between 2:00 and 3:00 each day and running for at least an hour. As noted in the prior post. After a lunch like this you did not even think about food until 8:00 at the earliest and just something light with some wine was plenty.
After that wonderful luncheon we were driven to the lovely old Parador Baiona which is situated on its own peninsula just outside of town. We really loved this hotel and the vistas from the grounds were fantastic as you can see in the picture. Because this Parador was originally a medieval fortress, it is surrounded by walls and this picture is the gate that the bus has to go through to get into and out of the hotel. The first time Howard brought a group to this hotel the bus could not get through this gate and everyone had to walk up the long driveway to the hotel and a cart took multiple trips to get all the bags up to the hotel. The Parador excavated the ground to lower the roadway so busses can now get through and up to the hotel. But we learned just how great a driver Ramon is when we left the next morning and watched all the back and forth turns he had to make to align the bus to get out of that gate.
This part of the post has been edited to move some things that were part of our activity the next day and were included by mistake. My apology for that mistake.
Dinner was on our own that evening but after that lunch, we decided to skip dinner and sit out on the patio of the hotel and enjoyed a little more wine while we got to know a couple of people on the trip.
It was a very good first full day.
Bill's Thoughts on Wine, Travel, and Food 