We awake to a very misty morning and do not see the sun until early afternoon when the road takes us above 500m. At the Puerta del Fuenifria at 800m the mist is still hanging low in the valleys ahead with the hilltops in sunshine.
In the gorse on the slope in front of us there are dartford warblers, robins, wrens and dunnocks ‑ a paler race of the latter here than in Britain. The scene is marred by the Spanish habit of dumping rubbish by the roadside anywhere there is room to stop a car. Many small communities do designate a special area for tipping and large community rubbish bins are usually provided, but it only solves part of the problem. Litter, in particular, does not seem to be considered as something to be put in rubbish bins!
Cabo Silliero
We reach the Atlantic coast again at A Ramellosa in warm sunshine that would not have been out of place in Britain in May. A roost of gulls on the beach consists mainly of black-headed adults (only two first winter birds) and herring gulls with a wide variety of leg colour in the adults. With them are a handful each of turnstone, dunlin, oystercatcher, grey plover and two golden plover. Two green sandpipers peck their way along the edge of a grassy area in front of us.
The coast road around Cabo Silliero has recently been widened and straightened, leaving a number of 'laybys' of the old road, at least one of which is suitable for us to stop for the night. A few kilometres offshore we could see the Islas Cies, a parque natural with the most southerly colony of lesser black‑backed gulls, the largest shag colony in Iberia, and guillemots which are on the verge of extinction. Being on the southern edge of their range, the guillemots were vulnerable anyway, but the problem here is thought to be human ‑ the dumping of oil etc., and competition in fishing areas.
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