Spain and Portugal for Visitors

Galicia's limits are the Atlantic to the west and north-west, the Cantabrian Sea to the north, Asturias and Old Castile to the east and Portugal and the Duero to the south. Inland, it is more hilly than mountainous, though the terrain is sufficiently impassable to have maintained Galicia in a certain isolation from the rest of Spain. This interior part of the region corresponds to the provinces of Lugo in the north (though Lugo does have a stretch of coast, the Costa Lucense) and Ourense in the south. It is sparsely populated, and the population it does have is highly dispersed - of Spain's 63,000 centres of population, over half are in Galicia. It is a poor area, the main activity being agriculture based on smallholdings which have often become reduced to ridiculous sizes by generation after generation of divisions between inheriting siblings. The main geographical feature of the coastal provinces of A or La Coruña and Pontevedra is the many fjord-like rías, glaciar-formed estuaries which have been drowned by a higher sea level after the ice age. The Rías Baixas, roughly the coast of Pontevedra, are particularly dramatic, but the Rías Altas, in the west-facing coast of A Coruña, become the ominously named Costa da Morte, Death Coast, as the coastline turns the corner and looks north. These provinces, especially Pontevedra, are more populated and wealthier than the inland provinces to their east. Fishing is the most important activity, at least traditionally - Vigo is the largest fishing port in Europe, and indeed in the world except for Japan. Tourism is also important, particularly but not only gastronomy-based domestic tourism.
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