Saturday 12th April
An early start, up at 6:30am as it was just coming light, to get the tides right for entry to the Guadiana. We left just before low water at Culatra and the currents in the river entrance were pretty benign.

The day was overcast and a bit chilly; we even had to resort to woolly hats! The winds were supposed to be from the west but stayed from the north (F3) for much of the trip which was too close to our heading for us to bother with any sail. With the tide having turned and now flooding eastwards we expected some positive tide with us but had from 0.5kt to 1kt against us for much of the way, added to the wind almost on the nose and progress wasn't very fast. We had to push the engine up to 2200 revs to keep our speed over 5kts to reach the river before high water.

We arrived at the Guadiana entrance an hour and a half before high water and at the shallowest point across the bar at the Guadiana entrance we had at least 2.5m of water under us. The problem with depth was actually in the entrance to the marina at Ayamonte. Despite being only an hour off high water we had only 0.8m under the keel. Perhaps that is why there aren't many boats in with lots of empty berths.

Check in was quick and easy with a couple of forms to fill in and some photocopies taken by the marina staff. A quick walk around the town and then out for beers and tapas with friends from Lagos (Pimentao, Ice Maiden and Constantia).

Proper size beer glasses unlike those in Galicia

We're going to get the solar panel arch semi-made here and then head up the river Guadiana where Colin will finish it off.

We've just measured the mast height off the water and even with some generous rounding up and including the aerials we're only 19m high, less that we expected. Even at high water the bridge between Spain and Portugal has 20.5m clearance so we should be good as we will wait till nearer low water before we head under.