The Voyage South, 2005:
Northern France, Spain and Portugal.

We hope you haven’t given up on us? Communication has proved to be quite testing en-route. We left the UK believing that wi-fi would be widespread, and after training our parents in the 'art of email' and telling all our friends and family that email would be our main source of communication, sadly this was so difficult that we ended up reverting back to mobile phone text messaging while still in French waters.

In-fact, surprisingly, France was the worst and most behind with its technology. We found very few cyber-cafes and they were expensive. Things improved the further South we came. Both Spain and Portugal have good cyber-cafes (cheaper in Spain) but it's not always easy writing letters or seeing to your on-line banking in a public place, sat shoulder to shoulder, wedged between spotty teenagers shooting the hell out of each other on the latest network game! That's when we invested in a memory stick!

Having pulled into 32 ports throughout three countries, only one of them has had a working wi-fi service. This was at Sines, Portugal, our last but one stop of the season. It was a very fast connection and totally free - the marina only cost €13pn! So, we really don’t understand what everyone else is playing at!?

So yes, having sailed over 1500nM, we are in Lagos, Portugal, on the sunny Algarve and we are staying in the Marina here for the next five months. The marina is lovely - well sheltered, secure, good and clean facilities with electricity included in the price, but more importantly, very close to the centre of town. Now that we live life without wheels (or should we say 'powered' wheels) this becomes an important factor when choosing a place to over-winter. We remember how difficult our last week in Plymouth Yacht Haven was without the Smart Car, being some way from a decent supermarket!

We first arrived on the Algarve after safely rounding our last notorious headland of the year, Cape St Vincent, on the 3rd September. The climate and sea state were so different after we rounded the Cape, that we wondered if our navigation had gone completely astray and we were making landfall in Africa! We’d read many books which told of the Atlantic swell totally disappearing once round the Cape and the much improved climate, but having endured the West Coast for some 3 months we couldn‘t possibly see how it would all disappear just by turning a corner. But it is like another country - absolutely unbelievable!

Although we did have glorious, sunny days on the West coast, with clear blue skies, there usually remained a chilling edge to the wind. In our experience, on most days by lunchtime, there would be a gale blowing, so we were certainly getting our monies worth out of the fleeces!
 

 
We left Sines at dusk, planning to sail down the coast overnight and arriving at the Cape by dawn (the calmest time), dressed in full oilskins, woolly hats and gloves - it was cold and very damp. Dawn at the Cape was spectacular and beautiful; the heat in such a young sun was unbelievable, you could smell the heat, feel it in your nostrils. We were stripping down to shorts at 8am and by 10am everything that had been soaked through from the night sail was bone dry!

At €36pn, even though September was Mid Season Rates, Lagos Marina was still too expensive for us to stay any length of time, but we did decide to check in for a night or two, so we could rest after our night sail, try out the marina, provision, but most of all have a reunion party with some dear friends of ours from Plymouth. Phyl and Larry left the UK at the end of May 2005 and sailed their yacht, 'Annie-Ellen', to Lagos with the Portugal Rally. They had been on the Algarve since 22nd June, taking just 3 weeks to get here - we took 4 months! Two completely different experiences ending in the same result, we’d all got here safely, had a lot of fun and had a lot of catching up to do!

As you can imagine, after 4 months apart, it was impossible to catch up in a couple of nights, though we partied hard and had a bloody good try, barely coming up for air. We stocked up on provisions and sailed 'Hitrapia' & 'Annie-Ellen' just 7 nautical miles east to the next port, Portimao. After Biscay, coming down the west coast of Portugal, we’d done some pretty large hops, a couple of overnighters of 100-120nM - so it seemed really odd putting to sea to sail just 7nM! We joked about noting our longest and shortest passage of the season. There is a marina at Portimao, but more appealing to us at the time, was the large, fairly well sheltered anchorage just outside the marina, lying off a couple of pretty beaches. Just what we needed and of course, all for free!

After 4 months of constant travelling, we were absolutely knackered and desperately wanted to just stop for a while. It’s difficult to explain, but the last month especially had been a real effort, we were quite exhausted after 3 months. We often wondered why cruisers stopped at all in the winter, why they didn’t sail all year round - weather permitting - know we know, it’s bloody exhausting! We know, you’re thinking, what a hard life, poor you! But, having experienced 3 countries, 3 cultures, partly learning 3 languages, having to find your feet and get your bearings at every new port just to be able to buy bread, before you even start on the sightseeing, it really takes it’s toll - we needed a break. So, we dropped the hook and didn’t move for almost a week. Well Hitrapia didn’t - we dinghied ashore a few times to the village or a beach bar occasionally. It was heaven switching off, not having to think about the next leg of the journey, checking the weather forecast or reading up on the next port entrance and studying the pilotage.

Next Page > Brittany.