28th Sept. Rio de Oner

We were determined to visit Rio de Oner. It is in the Lonely Planet's guide book of 1000 places to visit before you die! It is described as a charming medieval village that straddles the Spanish / Portuguese border, where time has stood still. We decided to approach it from the Portuguese side as we wanted to explore more of Portugal. The roads were fine until we reached villages, when the road would degenerate in to a maze of very narrow cobbled streets, and no signs! A Casa-Coche nightmare! We drove over a mountain and through pine forests, and then as we descended to the village, the driver suddenly had a thought! Would Cassie fit over the medieval bridge described in the guide book?! And then, the wonderful navigator found said village on the map, and noticed it is shown as a dead end - not continuing into Spain! Duh!
So we decided to park up and walk through the village. The cobbled streets were so narrow with overhanging low eaves we were dubious as to whether we could squeeze Cassie through. The biggest shock however was the squalor. The buildings were literally falling down, but people were still living in them. And the Spanish side was worse than the Portuguese side.

 The guide book described various shops, bakers, butchers etc. However there were no shops, just a few bars. It was like a European shanty town, we felt very uncomfortable walking around, like we were voyeurs on people's misfortune. The only place that was absolutely immaculate was the graveyard - with fresh flowers on every grave, and the church played a beautiful bells recording every hour.
The other thing that really disturbed us was as we were passing one of the Spanish houses, we heard a right rucus from an upstairs room. It sounded like an old woman pleading and sobbing and either she or someone else was being beaten. Neighbours must have heard it, but they did nothing, and I am ashamed to say, neither did we.
There was a large camper van parked next to ours driven by a french couple - so we decided to ask them if they had driven through the village. They assured us it would be fine, then admitted that they had come the same way as us. So we decided to play safe and retrace our steps!

Eventually we crossed into Spain and found a campsite next to the delightful village of Puebla de Sanabria. The site advertised free wi-fi, but you had to stand in the shower block to get it! So I had a very strange skype date with Cam while washing the dishes!