We phoned the recommended refrigeration engineer on Friday morning whilst we were at anchor in Alvor. He said he could look at the problem in Lagos at 4.00pm that afternoon. This created a navigation challenge as we would have to exit the tricky Alvor channels on a falling tide to reach the rendezvous. You always tackle difficult entry/exits on a rising tide so that if you ground you will float off and not get stuck for 4/5 hours! With our previous track over the ground showing on the chart-plotter and good daylight it was doable and we carefully worked our way back up the channels at mid-tide. We anchored in the lagoon for an hour or so and then motored across to Lagos for the meeting. Paul Kent came on board when we moored at the marina reception and quickly diagnosed no refrigerant gas in our main fridge system which he was able to sort out from a portable tank. We had a long conversation about the issues with the fridges and keel cooler plates and agreed the work he would do for us next Wednesday. He also recommended someone to come and check over our electrical system to try and understand why we are getting such heavy erosion of the keel plates.
As Lagos Marina is very expensive and somewhat wind-less (no cooling breeze) we then left again and motored back to Portimao anchorage (free and good breezes!)

We dropped anchor at around 7.30pm and then dinghied into Ferragudo (the small town opposite Portimao) and ate at the fish restaurant on the quayside. It’s a really nice spot, the fish are fresh and you can sit and look out over the boats in the small harbour as you eat and the sun descends below the horizon. We chose what was described as Sea Bass which was very tasty but we weren’t sure if it was the same fish with this name in the UK.

Saturday was very hot, our £10 Lidl external temperature gauge said it was 39 degrees, and there was no wind. We did very little during the day, waiting until 5.30pm to tackle the 20 minute walk to Lidls (well, Carolyn had to have her fix as it’s been a while since our last visit to a Lidls in Portugal) by the time we got back pulling the trolley with water/beer etc and then loading it all into the dinghy, we were both melting.
John in ‘Sanuye’ is anchored just across from us so we invited him to share ‘boat pizza’, a few bottles of red and conversation which stretched in to the small hours. Amongst other topics his experiences as Finance Director of a Textile Mill in Lancashire as the industry collapsed under competition from China and India were enlightening.

Our plan is now to explore the options for lifting Splice out of the water here in Portimao whilst we return to England. We have booked flights back on 15th July so we will reserve a lift over the next two days. On Wednesday hopefully the technicians can help us sort our immediate problems and we will then explore another area to the east of us until it’s time to return to UK to help Chris’s Mum move into her new apartment. From the research we have done it’s actually cheaper to leave the boat out of the water than to keep her in marina during the high season here. Given we have to lift her to solve the keel cooler problem that works for us!

Photo: Sunset over the beach at Ferragudo. Our dinghy in the fore-ground.