Vilagarcía de Arousa

The 07:43 Renfe from Santiago pulls in bang on time, and within five minutes the platform is empty. Nobody lingers for selfies; they scatter towards the fishing warehouses, the council offices, the school gates. Vilagarcía de Arousa doesn’t do lingering. It’s a town of 38,000 that happens to have a beach at the end of the high street, and the first thing you notice is the smell of diesel mixing with salt—proof the port still earns its keep.

Walk straight ahead from the station, past the cafés dispensing coffee in glasses thick as jam jars, and you hit the Paseo da Alameda. Here the ría—an inland sea rather than a river—opens out like a liquid plaza. Mussel rafts float in neat rows, attended by orange-jacketed crews who manoeuvre with the nonchalance of London cabbies. The promenade is wide enough for runners, prams and the occasional Labrador without anyone having to swerve. Benches face the water as if it were a cinema screen, and locals treat the sunset as the daily matinée.

Working water, not wallpaper

Forget fishing-village clichés. Trawlers tie up beside the Saturday market, unloading boxes of velvet crabs that still click their claws at passers-by. If you want romantic netting, go to Combarro. Vilagarcía’s harbour is a live workplace: hard hats, hydraulic winches, the clang of metal on metal. Visitors are welcome, but only if they stay out of the painted lanes. A small blue sign spells out the fine for wandering into the loading zone—€200, payable on the spot.

That practicality extends to the beaches. Praia de Compostela, ten minutes on foot from the marina, is a city strand rather than a Caribbean dream. The sand is streaked with crushed shell, and June’s algae bloom can leave a green hem at the tide line. Nevertheless, families colonise it after school, using windbreaks that have clearly seen Blackpool as well as Galicia. The water reaches 19 °C in August—brisk, yet warmer than Cornwall. On-shore breezes make it a learner’s spot for windsurfing; two schools operate from white containers at the western end, renting boards for €15 an hour without the hard sell.

Smaller coves lie across the narrow bridge to Carril, five minutes by car or a twenty-minute riverside jog. Carril’s sand is finer, the cafés slightly posher, but you’ll still share the shallows with women in neoprene collecting clams at low tide. They work under strict quotas; the shells they gather are stamped with a code that restaurants display like a badge of honour.

Pazo, peppers and Albariño

Turn inland at the palm-lined roundabout and you reach the Pazo de Rubianes, a manor-cum-monastery whose vineyards once paid rent to Santiago’s cathedral in the form of pepper. The gardens open at 10:00; arrive earlier and you’ll share the lane with delivery vans, not tour buses. Camellias the size of side plates line the drive, and the guide—a woman in an anorak who could double for a no-nonsense head teacher—explains that every plant is catalogued, “like NHS patients but with better outcomes”. The visit lasts forty minutes and costs €6; the wine shop stocks Albariño at supermarket prices, minus the Santiago mark-up.

Back in town, lunch starts at 14:00 sharp. Order a media ración of pulpo and you’ll receive octopus the texture of slow-cooked brisket, dusted with smoked paprika that stains the plate like brick dust. Pair it with a glass of Pazo de Señoráns Albariño—peach on the nose, Atlantic salinity on the finish—and the bill still sneaks under €14. Vegetarians survive on Padrón peppers, blistered in olive oil until they resemble deflated balloons. One in ten carries heat fierce enough to make you reach for the bread; Russian roulette for greedy people.

Trains, tides and Tuesday markets

The railway is the secret weapon. Vigo is 35 minutes south, Santiago 30 minutes north, and the €6 fare beats airport parking anywhere in the UK. Trains run every thirty minutes until 22:30, so you can base yourself here and day-trip to stone-walled Santiago without paying cathedral-city premiums. Buy the ticket on the Renfe app; the station has no staffed counter, just two machines that grudgingly accept foreign cards.

Wednesday fills Praza de Abastos with canvas stalls. Razor-clams—long, thin and faintly obscene—sell for €9 a kilo, cheaper than Tesco mussels. If you’re self-catering, grab a empanada de zamburiñas, a scallop pie that works cold on the beach. Market etiquette: queue from the right, speak in whichever language comes first, and bring your own bag or pay 5 céntimos for plastic that could survive a Force-ten gale.

When things go sideways

August turns the seafront into a car park. Spanish number plates circle like gulls, hunting for spaces that don’t exist until after 20:00 when residents retreat indoors. The town doubles its population for the Festas do Carme mid-July; brass bands march until 03:00, and the smell of frying dough drifts through open hotel windows. Light sleepers should ask for a rear-facing room or book May instead, when the camellias are still out and hotel prices drop by a third.

Rain is rarely dramatic but always possible; October delivers short, sharp showers that send shoppers diving under awnings. Galicians call it orballo—fine drizzle that soaks you faster than a Manchester downpour. Pack a proper raincoat rather than a festival pac-a-mac and you’ll blend in with the locals, who treat umbrellas as optional extras.

Last orders at the lighthouse

Head west along the paseo at dusk and you’ll reach the tiny lighthouse that guards the marina entrance. The beam flicks on automatically, sweeping across the mussel rafts like a prison-yard searchlight. Couples occupy the sea wall, sharing tins of Estrella and crisps that taste of smoked paprika. Nobody talks much; the tide slapping against the breakwater provides the soundtrack. It’s a scene repeated in working ports from Hull to Holyhead, yet the Albariño in your plastic cup and the scent of eucalyptus drifting from the hills remind you you’re nowhere near Britain.

Stay for one more drink or catch the 22:34 home—Vilagarcía leaves the choice open. This is a town that functions first, poses second, and that may be the most refreshing thing of all.