028 - A Guarda - Spain/Galicia

We move away from the city of Tui (027), and we go west, where the river Minho meets the Atlantic Ocean. This place is so beautiful, a truly great location with a breathtaking view… so much so that I am shocked authorities don’t ask any money from tourists who come to visit! (at least not in 2017/18).  Let's discover!

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028.1 Three articles ago, we were looking at the same river, Minho, from the banks of Portugal towards Spain. Now we are in Spain and we look towards Portugal. The big house agglomeration that we see to the right side is Caminha. I don’t think we can see Vila Nova de Cerveira (025) from here, but it should be on the far left of this image. On the right side is the Ocean.


Photos on this article are made on two days, in different years. 

First time we came here I lost those photos, and the second time we came very close to sunset, in june of 2017. We thought it will be awesome, but we did not imagine just how beautiful it will be. The images are real, no A.I. tinkering (none of that on this website) and so when you look at the pictures, some of the magic of the place, a little piece of it, is right were, in this article. There are no heavy edits (not on this website) so when there is a clear line of different colours/nuances, that is because the sunlight is blocked by something that is casting an interesting shadow.

The third time we came it was on a misty day (that is usual phenomenon in the Atlantic Galicia) so now you know why the pictures are so different

028.2 This is the mountain Santa Trega, and on it lies our main attraction.

028.3 I took this image because I loved how the old stone and stairs look, plus the mist that is bellow the top of the mountain. Now when I look at it, I see a version of Zelda, Tears of the Kingdom, in real life. This is a Nintendo game, about an adventure that happens (part of it) on floating sky-islands. It is a huge game that lets you enjoy beautiful sounds, music, plus explore, collect, do puzzles, help others, prove you are a hero to a Princess.

028.4 These circular walls, are actually dated to be from the year 100 BC, and are “castro-roman” settlements. Each big group of circular houses is inside a liniar wall.

028.5 They sit at around 340 meters above the sea level and they belong to the same population who founded the city of Tui (Tude know back then)(article 027).

028.6 Even if it is of Roman origin, the houses respect the Castro architecture (round house, with round fence, as seen in this reconstruction, that can be found on site). This type of construction can be found in Galicia and Asturias (more on that in future articles).


028.7 What I found amazing is that the houses are very, very close to each other. Nobody had something like a small garden just in front of the house, or maybe some flowers. Pretty sure they were not throwing their … fluids outside of the window.

028.8 And not just River Minho is visible from here, also the Atlantic Ocean and the gorgeous June sunset. The summer in these parts is really beautiful and… even after a stressful day, this view can still make me stop from my thinking and just make me admire the colours, the peace, the beauty and feel blessed. I do miss Galicia the most of any place I visited and is mostly for this view.

028.9 Me and my wife would drive/bike south of Baiona (more on that later) and then hike a bit and watch the sunset twice (when on car, we would watch at sea level, then go up the mountain and watch it again. In fact, same effect can be achieved if one sits flat on the sand and watches the sun disappear, then jumps up on two feet and look again.)

028.10 Oh and the mountains are also beautiful and not that hard to climb and enjoy. These people who used to live here, had a great view. I wonder if they were afraid of the forests burning in summer time. Or they knew that they are protected by the magical celtic glyphs (more on those later, but yes, in this region, and all the way north to Pontevedra, petroglyphs can be found, just like that, in the wild. Some alone, others grouped more togetheter, like in Baiona - article 033).

028.11 The sun has set and the sky is more beautiful than words can explain.

028.12 A Guarda is an awesome place to visit during the summer and is completely free. You can park pretty close, or a bit more far so you give your legs a bit of summer exercise (maybe catch some butterflies).

028.13 The town of A Guarda is charming, like most of Galicia.

028.14 The only bad thing about this place is that it cannot be reached by train or airplane. This is the reason why it got just 4 stars.

We brought family, friends and even told strangers that they must visit A Guarda while they wait in Vigo for their ship to go back on the sea. People of all ages climb the stairs to the Castro and they all stop to look at the view. This is one of those places where people take out their phones, and after a few pictures (and posts) they just calm and let the view take them far, far away.

We loved A Guarda and it is a great place to start El Camino (to Santiago de Compostela) or any experience here in Spain/Galicia.

Join us on the next adventure and thank you very much for visiting www.europeoncamera.com

Thank you,

MiDe

Source for the legend:
https://blog.turismo.gal/experiences-en/magic-and-legends-of-galicia/