As the Galician saying goes "A San Andrés
de Teixido vai de morto o que non foi de vivo" (‘If you don’t go to San
Andrés de Teixido when you’re alive, you’ll go there when you’re dead’). So
to get there we suggest a route through the Rías Altas (High Estuaries),
leaving La Coruña before passing through the ancient city of Betanzos, which,
with its bridge and medieval towers, is very much in the mould of Pontedeume.
The road then crosses the
Ría de Ferrol and leads on to the sweeping sands of Valdoviño and the nature
reserves at A Frouxeira.
Cedeira, with its small but
attractive ría (estuary), lies at the foot of the hills of the Serra
Capelada, where the sanctuary of San Andrés de Teixido can be found. The
sierra (mountain range) comes to an abrupt end at the cliff at Vixía de
Herbeira, the highest in Europe, with a 612 metre drop to the sea.
Cariño and Santa Marta de Ortigueira, two pretty villages which lie on
either side of a delightful ría, are the hors d’oeuvres to the Ría de O
Barqueiro, which ends at Estaca de Bares, the northernmost point on the
Iberian peninsula.
Viveiro sits on the Lugo
coast and welcomes the visitor with its beaches, medieval quarter and nature
reserves. The road continues to Cervo, where the original Sargadelos
ceramics factory was built and on to Foz, which is worth stopping in to
visit the Romanesque cathedral of San Martiño de Mondoñedo. A succession of
beaches follow until you come to the Catedrales beach in Ribadeo.
