After my disappointment in Porto my faith was restored here, The “Old Town” is lovely, The narrow street are bustling with locals, The bars and cafes were all doing good trade and the staff were very friendly. Lonely Planet’s guide states that it is best to visit when the street are wet with rain, well I must have seen it at its ultimate best. Fortunately the unusual covered walkways along the narrow streets gave some shelter during the heaviest down pours. The reason I came here was to see 2 particular buildings, the first being the Cathedral where the tomb of St James is located in the crypt. The other thing in this Cathedral is the world’s largest censer. It is known as The Botafumeiro (Roughly “The Smoke Spitter”), this censer weighs in at 62kgs and is swung by a team of 8 men on festival days and every day in Holy years (?) I had hoped that as we were coming up to Easter the censer would be swung, alas not today, so I have to be happy with a video (search Botafumeiro on You Tube). The other building or rather buildings, I wanted to see, are the buildings of the City of Culture for Galicia, designed by the American architect, Peter Eisman. Love it or hate it (as most of the locals seem to) it is here and is a tremendous edifice that stands out from the landscape. With just 3 of the planned buildings built, the project has so far cost €400million and at present the other buildings have no funding or planned completion date! Personally I think they look good! I shall have to return.
