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In Which I Issue An Open Invitation

September 26, 2007 by Mike

A Coruna

Route: O Barquiero - A Coruna

A day in Three Parts.

Part One: Loving The Galician Coast
I need volunteers.

I've found a place to live. Not just a little white-walled house by the sea, with space to hang the hammock and somewhere to park the bike. This is a whole village of little houses. There's space for you, too.

This is Porto de Bares -- about six kilometres up a (new, shiny, windy) road from O Barquiero, which lonesome, quiet little place which looks positively cosmopolitan by comparison. I love the relaxed atmosphere ("There's bugger all to do", as Keith pointed out, but all the same it has a shop, a bank and a bar. Porto de Bares has nothing -- at the moment -- and that's where YOU come in.

There are probably 50 houses in the village. Not all of them are supercute, and plenty need some work doing. Most are ready to move in, if you promise not to complain about the wallpaper (where there actually is a wall). Look upon it as a *project*. There's no rush. It looks to me like as many as half of the homes are already empty, and that the average age of the people left in the other houses is pushing 80. This is the story of many rural communities in Spain, at least those far from the Costas and the hot hot south. But Bares is beautiful. It nestles on rocks at the foot of the eucalyptus forest. It has a timesless air to it, probably because nobody who lives there has anything to do.

So we need a butcher (who stocks vegetarian food too), a baker, a candlestick maker. Some web designers, of course, and a techie or two to organise broadband access. Someone to clean the pool, stock the library, service my motorbike, (and yrs), a hairdresser, someone who sells good olive oil and decent shoes and cheap house red, a personal trainer or two, a fisherman (in case anybody actually likes eating fish -- there's no accounting for taste).. which reminds me -- an accountant to do everyone's tax returns, but please be an interesting accountant.. and we'll certainly need [FILL IN YR OWN OCCUPATION HERE].

In short, a new village crammed full of interesting, young(ish) people looking to make something more of life than drudgery, 9-to-5, mortgages, reality TV. (I know we'll end up funding the whole thing with a TV series, but please don't let Davina McCall or Ant & Dec present it.) Be ready to learn Spanish -- and Galician -- and want to be part of the wider community. Be ready to enjoy empty beaches, canoeing in the river, sailing on the high sea, fresh food, walks in the forested hills. It's a eucalyptus forest, I am reliably informed. Eucalyptii (?) smell divine. Don't be a Tory. Don't expect The Beach or Lord Of The Flies. Don't listen to house music at full volume at three in the morning (unless it's a party and we're all invited.) No loud dogs, please. Apart from that, you're all invited.

Two possible problems:
1. I couldn't help noticing, despite the glorious sunshine, that none of the houses have open balconies. Everything is enclosed behind large glass windows. As if it rains here a lot or something. Hmmmm.

2. The local estate agent is in a small town several miles away. (Which should be a good thing, right? No estate agents living in the village?) But their address is on Avenida General Franco. How... daft. I didn't notice any Hitlerstrasses in Germany. There was a Kark Marx Allee in Kaliningrad, but that's a comic-book dictatorship anyway. This is modern, democratic western Europe. I haven't seen an Avenida General franco since the last time I was in Paraguay (he place-dropped), where I mused on the likelihood that that was the only one in the world. Sadly, not. Franco was born in Galicia. His name, strangely, lives on.

Part Two: Buying A Tent
I'm not pretending for a second that I can make this headline interesting to anyone but me. But here goes.

I've been frustrated at not being able to park the hammock in too many campsite. No trees. The tipping point was probably at Pechon, a couple of days ago, when I gave up the best view in the world for a grubby little pension in a grubby grey town. Keith, yesterday, was looking forward to getting back into his tent after a night of "luxury". I got very excited, schoolboy excited, at the thought of getting a tent of my own.

Coming in to A Coruna, I stopped at Carrefour (huge supermarket that sells everything) and Lidl (huge supermarket that sells anything it can source on the cheap) and a couple of sports shop. But no tents. I finally tracked down the tent department at El Corte Ingles (huge department store that sells three kinds of everything. Luckily one of these is an ultra light, very compact, one person tent for €39. And it's called the ProBike.) Deal.

Part Three: More Bloomin' Football
A friend writes: "Ahh, so it's all planned, you mean, but you just pretend it isn't?"

Errr, no.

The plan, for what it's worth, is that it's all unplanned. No guidebooks, no scheduling, no deadlines, no idea. No watch. What happens, happens. What I see, I try to enjoy and understand. What I miss, I don't know that I've missed. No headquarters manned round-the-clock in New York and London, no satellite phones, no GPS, no support team in support vehicles brimming with supplies, spare parts and bundles of dollar bills; no cameraman, doctor, producer or mechanic: no Ewan or Charlie.

A case in point: having bought the tent I'm *so* excited at the prospect of camping. I'm like a kid on Christmas Day. And... opposite the tent shop is the Riazor - home stadium of Deportivo La Coruna. A football club, m'lud. They're playing at home tonight. Kick off in less than two hours. The stadium overlooks the Atlantic. This is top-flight football. Depor used to be good. There are hostels and cheap hotels on the other side of the road.

They're calling to me: "Check in, Mike.. so easy.. use me.. u-u-u-u-use me, M-M-M-M-M-Mike.. c-l-e-e-e-e-e--n s-s-s-sheets... w-w-w-w-warm r-r-r-r-room.. and the f-f-f-f-football, M-M-M-Mike."

(By which time I've checked in, had a shower, changed, wandered back to the ground, bought a ticket and am sitting with a glass of house red in one hand and a tortilla in the other.)

The home fans in the Marathon Stand make plenty of noise and wave their flags.. but by the final whistle all they can do is whistle, cat-call, and sigh. Depo have lost 2-0 to Recreativo Huelva. The crowd are more interesting than the game. There are many anti-Nazi and anti-racist slogans - on flags, banners, t-shirts and badges. Pictures of Che Guevara in Depor colours. "Hasta la vitoria siempre." Seems the home team are a bunch of Trots (which makes me a Depor fan.)

Recreativo play in black and red: Anarcho-Syndicalist colours. In a stunning reversal of historical truths, one that brings into question the whole Marxist dialectic, the anarchists beat the communists through better team-work.

And finally, because I haven't written enough today already.. in the bar beneath my pension I meet Victor. He's the hardest working barman I've ever seen (not just because I'm thirsty) but in-between running around he introduces me to his life: born in London and lived there 'til he was 11, he went to the Spanish school in Portobello Road that was a minute's walk from my old flat. A long time ago, we must have passed each other a hundred times on Portobello, on Cambridge Gardens, catching the the 52 to the West End.

"Yeah, innit," he agrees - perfect London-ese. "I've still got six brothers in London. And my mother."

And yet he hasn't been back to London for over ten years. Quite enough to make me stop and think about how lucky I am to be making this trip. I hope Victor feels like moving to Bares.. to run the bar. I hope he doesn't mind if some of us don't work quite as hard as he does. His mum's invited too.

Beside the Seaside

In Which I Issue An Open Invitation

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