Llastres

We left Ribadesella quite early in the morning, because of the necessary high tide, with our goal to get to Gijón. This would be about 30 nm further west. The wind forecast was very favorable: 10-15 knots east north east. Unfortunately, that was just a forecast. The wind along this northern Spanish coast seems to be even more stubborn than the two of us combined.

Again, once we left the harbor we were met by barely any wind. The wind that did delight us with its presence came from a westerly direction. And of course in this gorgeous green part of Spain there were plenty of rainy showers. But. we had prepared a plan B in case we would be faced with another windless day as we didn't feel like motoring again for hours: Llastres. Since we left so early and it was only a short motor trip, we already arrived around 09:30 in Llastres.

Llastres is a gorgeous little fishing (used to be mainly sardines) town, but bursting with Spanish tourists as we found out later in the day. When we arrived Cuzu, el marinero, or in other words El jefe of the port, very unclear eventually guided us to the visitor pontoon. It did take me getting off board and walking to him and attempting to ask in Spanish where it was he wanted us to dock. Since his whistling and waving wasn't as clear. Cuzu turned out to be a lovely elderly man, although he didn't feel like getting us diesel after our arrival. So we had to wait till mañana mañana.

On the dock a handful of men were very busy unloading a massive fishing net from a truck. From the moment they had laid it out on the ground up until we left, and they might even still be going, they seem to be repairing the net. Whether this was for commercial use or if they could use it for themselves, we never found out.

After spending some down time, while we waited for the rain showers to stop we wandered around Llastres. Turns out the staircases the fishermen built and used in the 17th century to get from the town all the way down to their boats, are still there. We took them and some other roads all the way up to the lookout point (lots of Spanish tourists) where we were rewarded with a stunning view over the town and of course our Nimrod in the harbor!

After a not so peaceful night because of the amount of swell in the harbor we decided to leave the next morning to continue our journey to Gijón. It seems to have been a much better night for the local fishermen, as it felt like all of them had gathered right in front of the Nimrod to try their luck.Read more