A Bola

The road climbs so steeply out of Celanova that second gear begins to feel optimistic. At 700 metres, the chestnut trees thin out, granite walls replace painted concrete, and the first stone hórreo appears—still loaded with last winter’s firewood, its mouse-proof legs slick with moss. This is A Bola, a parish-scatter of hamlets stretched across the high ridge between the Arnoia and Barbaña valleys, and it makes no attempt to court passing traffic. The village sign is half-sized; the bakery has no sign at all.

A landscape measured in ox-power

Administrative maps call A Bola a municipality of 1,200 souls. Reality is more like forty-odd settlements linked by stone-walled lanes just wide enough for a tractor and a wary cow. Distances are judged by how long it takes to walk to the mill, not in kilometres. From the centre at Vilariño the land folds south-west into the valley of the Arnoia; north-east it rises again to the 900-metre contour where Galicia meets the Portuguese uplands. That extra altitude knocks three degrees off the valley temperatures and adds three weeks to the ripening of potatoes—reason enough for the terraced plots that still surround every house.

The granite here is not backdrop; it is building material, field boundary, bread oven and fountain trough. In the hamlet of A Xesteira a single slab, split by frost, serves as both bridge and bench. No one has bothered to carve a date; the stone is older than the path. Walkers used to the manicured routes of the Picos or Snowdonia should expect something rougher. The PR-G 167 way-marked loop that links A Bola with neighbouring Cartelle is only 11 km, but after rain the red-and-white stripes can be underwater where the track becomes a stream. Boots with a proper tread are non-negotiable; the village pharmacist does a brisk trade in Compeed every October.

What passes for a centre

Vilariño’s only bar opens at seven for the lorry drivers who haul timber down to the paper mill at Pontevedra. By nine the place smells of strong coffee and diesel; by three it is shut. Order a coffee—70 céntimos if you stand at the counter—and you will be asked whether you want the “curto” or the “longo”. The short version is espresso; the longo is an Americano the size of a teacup, Galician style. Food runs to tortilla or, if you phone the day before, caldo gallego thick enough to stand a spoon in. Vegetarians should not hope for menu innovation: the greens come in the soup, the potatoes come fried, and that is the end of the matter.

There is no tourist office. The parish church of San Xoán, locked except for Sunday mass, keeps its key with the woman in the house opposite whose gate has a brass eagle. Inside, the Romanesque nave was extended in 1789; the Baroque retablo is 19th-century pine painted to look like marble. The guidebook writers call the mixture “eclectic”; the locals call it “what we could afford when the roof fell in”. If you want to look inside, knock before ten or after six—lunch is sacred and the key-holder does not appreciate interruption.

Forests that pay in mushrooms and chestnuts

Altitude turns A Bola into a different world according to the season. April brings orchids to the roadside banks; May carpets the oak slopes with foxgloves taller than a walking pole. October is wild-mushroom month: boletes, parasols and the prized níscalos that fetch €18 a kilo on the Ourense market. Picking is regulated—two kilos per person, knife blade no longer than 10 cm, no rakes—but the real restriction is social: every copse belongs to someone, and “no se toca” signs appear overnight. Visitors who wander off the track with a plastic bag are likely to meet a politely unsmiling farmer on a quad bike. The safest option is to tag along with the mycological society from Ourense, which runs Saturday forays and splits the haul back at the sports hall.

Chestnut season overlaps, and every farmyard fills with the hiss of peelers. The nuts travel downhill to a cooperative dryer in Celanova, then on to UK supermarkets where they reappear as “Spanish organic” at £6 for 400 g. In A Bola they cost €1.50 a kilo from the back door of the house with the green shutters—cash only, no receipt, bring your own bag.

Getting up, getting stuck, getting down

Public transport is honest about its limitations. Monday to Friday one bus leaves Ourense at 07:55, reaches Vilariño at 09:10 and returns at 14:00. That is the timetable. Saturday has a single return run; Sunday has none. A taxi from Celanova, 18 km away, costs €28 and must be booked the evening before—mobile signal drops to one bar on the final climb. Drivers coming from the UK should note that the last 6 km of the A-342 are single-track with passing places; in November fog you will meet milk tankers using the full width. Winter tyres are not compulsory in Spain, but here they should be. When snow arrives the Guardia Civil close the road at the 700-metre mark; locals park below and continue on foot, towing groceries on plastic sledges.

Accommodation is thin. The Casa Rural O Vieiro has three rooms in a converted barn, beams blackened by a century of oak smoke, heating by pellet stove. Prices hover around €70 for two, breakfast of bread, chorizo and strong coffee included. The owners live in Vigo and leave the key in a coded box; they will text you the Wi-Fi password, but download maps before you arrive because the router is solar-powered and clouds matter. Campers sometimes wild-camp below the wind turbines on the ridge—technically illegal, tolerated if you leave no trace and depart at dawn.

When to cut your losses

A Bola repays patience and punishes check-list tourism. If the day turns wet and the wind drives rain horizontally across the plateau, there really is nothing to do except sit in the bar and listen to Galician radio debate the price of milk. Art galleries, gift shops, evening entertainment: none exist. The village offers instead a crash course in how Europe’s rural interior actually functions—small, weather-dependent, fiercely pragmatic. Come with waterproofs, an OS-style map (the ICC 1:25,000 “Celanoia” sheet is sold in the Ourense bookshop), and the habit of greeting everyone you meet. The reply may be a stream of Galician, but the nod that accompanies it translates easily: you are recognised, briefly, as part of the day’s small change of passers-by.

Drive away in late afternoon and the ridge soon drops behind. Ten minutes downhill the air warms, eucalyptus replaces chestnut, and the motorway roar rises from the valley. Up there the granite walls stay grey, the cows move from field to byre, and the mushrooms push up unseen. A Bola will not try to keep you; it has timber to stack and chestnuts to peel before night falls and the temperature slips back towards zero.