Where were we the last time?? Cascais? I think so, bloody hell, where does the time go, I am in Sydney now, just about to go back to work to get more money to throw into the big black hole in the ocean that is the boat 😊.

So, what have I been up too? From Cascais, we headed down the coast to Praia Ribeiro do Cavalo, which is a beach just along the coast from a town called Sesimbra.


Praia Ribeiro do Cavalo

Super steep cliffs to come down if you're coming from the land side, but it's still chockers with folks (and boats) during the day, but empty at night. The Nortada ("north wind") is a summer wind along the west coast of the Iberian Peninsula from northerly directions, which occurs mainly between June and September, it goes from "nae wind" overnight and early morning, to "blowin an absolute hoolie" late morning to late evening, makes things a little interesting at times.


Sesimbra

Pushed along the coast a wee bit to Sesimbra next, sneaky wee overnight stop only.


Sines

Next, it was south again to the town of Sines, super sheltered and famous for being the birthplace of Dom Vasco Da Gama, who, for those of you who never paid attention during history classes at school, was a Portuguese explorer and nobleman who was the first European to reach India by sea.


The Man.

Impressive bloke, he was the first to link Europe and Asia by an ocean route, connecting the Atlantic and the Indian oceans.


Great anchorage too, very sheltered, nice town, well worth a visit.


Under the guns at Sines.

Next it was off south again and around Cape St Vincent or Cabo de São Vicente to give its Portuguese name, then heading east to Sagres.


Cabo de São Vicente (when it is'nae foggy).

Cabo de São Vicente is the south westernmost point of Portugal and of mainland Europe.

Cape St Vincent is also famous-ish for being the site of a naval battle back in Nelsons day, when the Royal Navy gave a far larger Spanish fleet a bit of a hiding.


The Spanish getting their arses handed to them by the Royal Navy.

I was pretty excited to sail round here although I had sailed past it before on the way to the Azores a few years ago, but I was disappointed, great sailing for most of the day then the wind died on its arse and the fog rolled in, which is not unusual at this time of year, the wind came back with a vengeance close to the cape and I flew round the corner blind, which is a wee bit concerning as you can hear the big Atlantic swell crashing into the cliffs but you cant see anything, I may or may not have been shitting myself just a wee bit 😉, the fog lifted just in time for me arriving off Mareta beach in Sagres.


Mareta beach at Sagres, wis'nae like this when I was there!

I wanted to hang out here for a bit as there is a famous beer in Portugal named "Sagres" so I thought it must be made here, found out it was made in Lisbon?! It was cold, windy and foggy (the town, not the beer) so I pulled the anchor up the next day and buggered off to Portimão.


Portimão.

What a difference a few nautical miles make, its really just up the coast, but it was pure roastin, nae wind or fog, you could look behind you and see the wall of fog sitting like a huge grey wall at Sagres which was bizarre, I have seen this before when I worked offshore in the North Sea, never a good thing as it meant the helicopter wasn't coming to take you home to the pub! Never good news 😊


Spent a lot of time here in the past, so it was nice to be back, very busy in this anchorage as usual.


Can you spot me?

The boat (and me) were heading for Lagos and back to the yard at Sopromar for the winter, so I headed back in that direction and ducked into the estuary at Alvor, the anchorage at the village is mental busy so I anchored just inside the breakwater and used the dinghy to go to town to save annoying the local fishermen, they must get pissed off with all the daft yachties blocking the channel.


Alvor


Alvor estuary.


Nice place to hang out to finish the summer sailing, but it was time to head to Lagos and get the boat out of the water.


Lagos


Out she comes.

If you have read this for a while, you'll be familiar with this yard as I have spent a lot of time here so a good and secure place to leave the girl whilst I shoot off to work, and, as usual there are repairs to make so she is in the right place.


Off she goes to her winter hideout.

So the plans have changed, again! The original plan when I left New Zealand was to sail to Scotland and leave the boat there, I then decided as the summer weather there is often "pure pish" that I would sail back to Australia, which is still the plan, however, for a myriad of reasons, I'll be taking the boat back into the Mediterranean next year, I missed so many places there when I was on my way through as I was trying to get home for my 50th birthday, before Covid (remember that?!)

So I'll point the boat east again for now and we'll head back down under in a few years, plans subject to change as always.

Whits yer Hurry.

Part three of this years sailing drivel, when I left you before I was in Muros in the Spanish Ria's, from there I sailed south to the Ria de Vigo, anchoring firstly off the beach at Praia de Barra.


Ria de Viga.


Anchored off Praia de Barra.

Turns out, there are three beaches in this bay, and as I was to find out, different rules for clothing in each one, on the right hand side, you must wear clothing covering your bits, on the middle beach this rule is optional, and on the left beach, the one I was anchored off of, no bits are covered, I never realised this till the next morning, I paddled in early doors when the beach was empty and went for a run, but realised soon enough when I got back mind you!


On the beach.

That night and Irish boat came in and anchored to close in front of me and was right on top of my anchor, the old and very rotund bloke skippering the boat was, of course, in the buff, it was super windy so my worry was that he would drag on my boat or snag my anchor, I asked him very nicely to move which fair play, he did, then reminded him to be careful when weighing his anchor not to get his tackle caught up in the anchor tackle, I thought this was dead funny, him, not so much I think. 😊


Anchored off the beach at Limens.

Next stop was the next bay along and a village called Limens as this was a walkable distance to a supermarket to stock up the fridge.

More anchor nonsense was to ensue here, two wee sailboats anchored right in front of me, but I just let them crack on as they were already on the beers when they sailed in and jumped in a dinghy straight away and went into the beech bar to carry on with the fun, In the west of Spain and Portugal in summertime, the northly winds blow strong almost every day, they are called the "Portuguese trade winds" and usually kick in about lunchtime and will blow strongly until the late evening so you need to make sure your anchor is set correctly, although not everyone does.

Anyway, I was lying in the cockpit reading when one of the boats drifted right past me, it was too late to try and grab it but the boy at the bar had obviously seen it and was frantically paddling out, he had the wind behind him and caught up with it way out at the edge of the bay, by which time his mates boat was also dragging his anchor, this one I managed to grab on the way past, thank goodness it was wee and light.


I've caught more yachts than fish!

After all this excitement, I moved up to the top of the Ria, which is just like a big lake, very quiet up here, not many boats at anchor, very quiet.


Ria de Vigo from the east.


The top of the Ria, from a lookout point I ran up to, it was steep, I thought I was going to have a wee stroke.

Vigo was next, and the Marina Punta Lagoa there I was going to leave the boat for a week and go and visit one of my brothers in Gaucin, Andalucía in the south of Spain.


The marina at Vigo.

I got the train down, the train system here is worlds apart from Scotland, they are cheap (ish) super comfy and fast.
I had a stop in Ronda on the way there, I used to visit here when I worked in Gibraltar in a past life, it's a stunning place.


Ronda, pretty nice eh.....


Ronda again, lots of hills to run up here too.

Then it was off to Gaucin, a wee whitewashed village in the Andalusian mountains, stunning place, wee windy streets, it was the fair that weekend so there was music, dancing, free paella, late nights and maybe just a few alcoholic beverages. Great times.


Gaucin.


Gaucin, I took this running around the village at sunrise trying to clear a fuzzy head, must have been dodgy wine?


More morning running views.


Vigo.

Juked back to Vigo on the train after the weekend and headed down to Baiona for a quick visit and an overnight stop as it is a good jump of point for the sail to Portugal.


Baiona


Sunrise leaving Spain.

First stop in Portugal was the Marina at Povoa de Varzim, this is a good place to leave the boat to visit Porto as its only an hour away on the metro train and more importantly, its cheap as chips.


The marina at Povoa de Varzim.


Povoa de Varzim, wee streets, long beaches, noisy church bells.

Porto, wow! let me tell you, is the dogs bollocks! Its friendly, is blow your socks of beautiful, and if you like Port? Well, enough said.


Porto.

So, as a bit of useless information that you don't need to know but I'm going to tell you anyway, way back when, when the English were at was with the French, they couldn't get their wine from there so went searching in Portugal instead, it was fortified, which means it was mixed with brandy so it would survive the journey onboard ships back to England, you notice that heaps of the port lodges have English, or in the case of Grahams, started by Scottish brothers who liked to drink(who would have thought), Scottish names.


Grahams Port Lodge.

I went to Churchills (no relation to the man, I asked of course) the only British owned Port lodge left, and started by the grandson of one of the aforementioned Graham brothers, I had a wee tour of the place and then got down to the serious stuff of tasting, which was immense, but be warned, this is not like visiting a whisky distillery in Scotland and having one wee nip at the end, the fill you full of the stuff, get everything you need to do for the day sorted out before you go tasting as you'll get nothing done after, except perhaps a wee nap!


Lunch of dreams.


Barrels of goodness.


Churchills Port Lodge.

So now I write this anchored in the bay at Cascais which is at the mouth of the River Tagus, Lisbon, I came in here last night after an overnight sail down from Povoa de Varzim, It was going to be an overnight stop as I have been here and Lisbon a few times before, but it was blowing a hoolie this morning so I binned the sailing for the day.


Cascais.

Tomorrow I'll head south, no more overnighters needed, just day hopping down and round the corner to the Algarve and start thinking about wrapping up for the year, the boat is booked to come out of the water in Lagos in mid-September, then I'll be heading back off down under a few weeks after to start earning beer tokens for next year's sailing sojourn.
So that gives me four more weeks of sailing and generally laying around on my fat arse reading books in the sun, so I'd better get to it eh.........

I mentioned in the last blog post that I would write again from the balmy anchorages of the South West of Ireland, visit those places I did, balmy it most certainly was not, like most of the Islands of Britain and Ireland, the summer has yet to turn up, and to be fair, most of Northern Europe is having the same weather so I am not alone in spending days at a time in the pishing rain with a few lovely days thrown in, and again, as a child brought up on the west coast of Scotland, this kind of summer weather is nothing new.

So, I am writing from somewhere balmy, but not the Southwest coast of Ireland.


Angus the shiny new Autopilot.

Anyway, enough of the whinging, shiny new autopilot turned up was installed successfully so away we sailed south to Arklow, last time I was here I anchored in an old quarry, this time I went up the river and went alongside on the pontoons there so I could visit the town, nice wee place, drank some of the black beer, and very nice it was too.


Up the river in Arklow.


Arklow River.

Next, we were off to Cork, had an overnight stop at Dunmore East but never went ashore, got in late and was leaving early doors, got to Cork late so I went up the East passage and anchored the boat at the back of Great Island which is the Island that Cobh is on, what a beautiful place, you would never think you were so close to the city.


Anchored behind Great Island, Cork.

Went across to Monkstown the next day, there's a wee marina there, most visiting yachts go to Crosshaven where all the yacht clubs are, but this place was closer to Cork city and as it turns out, the friendliest most helpful marina that I have visited yet.


Cork Harbour Marina, Monkstown.

Cork is a lovely city, very friendly, went to visit the old prison there which has been refurbished to what it would have been back in the day, interesting stuff, nae television and duvets in your cell back then.


Cork City Goal.

Also visited the military museum at Michael Collins Barracks, another super interesting place, I got a guided tour from Seamus who's the man in charge there, he was telling me when the British handed the barracks to the Irish Free State forces after the Irish War of Independence, they stuffed all the chimney places with ammunition so it would go off when the free state forces tried to light the fires!


Michael Collins Barracks.

I might have managed to do a bit of tasting of the three different stouts you can get in Ireland, Guiness of course, but also Murphy's and Beamish, you know, just for informational purposes!

Visited the Titanic and the heritage exhibition in Cobh, the tickets give you a random passenger from the titanic, and at the end you get to find out whether they survived or not, would you believe it, both of mine drowned!


First lucky passenger.......drowned!


Second lucky passenger, also drowned! Just as well I'm not superstitious eh!

Had some decent weather in Cork which was great, sailed out of the harbour and straight into the middle of the "around Ireland yacht race" fleet, tried racing them, got smashed! I was trying to get down to Glandore, but I had the wind on the nose and was tacking the boat all day so went into Oyster Haven for the night.


Anchored at Oyster Haven.

Got down to Glandore the next day, done some more stout tasting, clear winner coming out here for me 😊


Glandore taste test.

Next was Baltimore harbour, the winds were strong from the west, so I anchored in the lee of Sherkin Island, which turned out to be a great idea, beautiful wee Island, with a pub......of course.


The entrance to Baltimore harbour with Sherkin Island in the background.


Anchored at Sherkin Island.

After a couple of nights it was a big day up to another Island and my favourite place in Ireland so far, Bere Island in Bantry Bay, arrived in the wee marina there in the teeming rain, so I had to go to the only pub on the island to dry out 😊 the barman was an exiled Scotsman from Edinburgh, who had retired here as his wife was from the Island, I could retire here in a heartbeat, its amazing, you should go.


Lawrence Cove Marina, Bere Island.


Bere Island.


Bere Island.

From Bere Island it was Northwest to Dingle, which was to be my final stop in Ireland, the main reason for the visit here was a bit of a pilgrimage to visit Annascaul, birthplace of Tom Crean, who was an Antarctic explorer back in the day who had been on the expedition south when Captain Scott popped his Clogs, he was also with Shackleton when HMS Endurance got trapped in the ice and was one of the crew in the open boat voyage from Elephant Island to South Georgia. In his retirement from the Navy he opened a pub called, funnily enough, "The South Pole Inn" which is still there and still serving pints of the black stuff for me to taste, including one named after the man himself.


Your man Tom Crean.

There is a book about him called Unsung Hero, you should read it.




The South Pole Inn, tasty pints to be had here.


Monument to Mr Crean, Annascaul.

Dingle itself is lovely, certainly very twee, but friendly, has the cheapest marina in Ireland, and is jammed full of American tourists who are more than willing to explain to you just how Irish they are.


Dingle.


Dingle Marina.

I was waiting here for a weather window to cross the Bay of Biscay to Galicia in Northern Spain, as the summer weather so far has been so changeable, we were never going to get the perfect window so I picked the first half decent one and shot off South, turns out the weather forecast was bollocks 😊 but it wasn't so bad, I actually had a lovely sunny day to leave Ireland, then the next few days were a mixed bag of fast and furious interspersed with heavy rain and light winds, Biscay is famous for its weather so all in all I had a decent passage, the last twenty four hours is pretty interesting as you have all the commercial traffic heading to and from the English Channel to the traffic separation scheme at Finisterre, so no sleeping going on there. I arrived in A Coruna after five days/four nights at sea, and wait for it, yep, in the rain! Man, you could'nae write this.


Sunset after leaving Dingle.


A Coruna.


Tower de Hercules, the lighthouse as you come into A Coruna, build by the Romans 2000 years ago, still works, I believe its had a refurbishment or two since then though.

Spent the first night at anchor and woke up to a beautiful sunny morning and went across to the marina Coruna to give the boat a wee bit of love and store up for the next part of the journey south.


The marina at A Coruna.

Also took the train to Santiago De Compostela, which is the old capital city of Galicia and famous for being the place that a lot of religious Pilgrims finish their walks on the Camino's (way of St James) which are trails from all over Europe. Visited the Cathedral and watched the Pilgrims coming in, lots of limping and knee braces in evidence.


Fancy church, Santiago de Compostela.

From A Coruna, I worked my to sail round Cape Finisterre, which is also Famous for high winds and rough seas, so when the conditions are right, all these yachts appear and head for the Cape, I went round on a beautiful day surrounded by Dolphins.


Cape Finisterre.

I ran up to the lighthouse the next morning, passing quiet a few pilgrims, this is also part of the Camino, this is where the hard-core pilgrims finish their walks at the cape after visiting Santiago de Compostela. Back in the day, the Romans thought this was the end of the world.


Anchored on the beach at Finisterre.


Finisterre from above.


Ran past this sign on the way up the hill, couldn't quite work out whether the P was for picnic or poo:-)

So now I am exploring the Spanish Ria's, I write this tucked up at anchor off a town called Muros, expecting strong winds from the North today so I'll stay here tonight and catch the coat tails of those winds south tomorrow, the Portuguese trade winds or the prevailing winds through the summer are from the north, so it should be mostly downhill sailing from here till I get down to the bottom of Portugal, fingers crossed it'll be balmy weather, board shorts and bare feet for the rest of the summer.

We shall see eh!?


Anchored off the beach at Praia de Sardiniero.


Anchored off Muros.


Muros from above.