Onward from Leixoes

So - back in Leixoes - good to get a phone call from Pete Barc, who we had met at Heather's wedding and who lives near Leixeoes. He has captained cargo ships, dredgers and a variety of other ships and owned several, and travelled to innumerable ports in Europe and beyond. We  spent a couple of days with Pete and his wife, Maria - lovely people who were planning to buy a  Fisher 30 motor sailing boat in Carentan, France and bring it back to Portugal.

But - time waits for no man or woman - and it was time to move on. We had learnt the lessons of the lobster pots and planned to day sail to Sines, from whence we would sail to Madeira. The wind as ever was very light and we were keen to be out of potland by dark so the engine got a lot of use. Others we spoke to have had the same experience. Our first stop was Figueras de Foz. We saw little of it as we arrived one evening and left the next morning but the price was astronomical for Portugal and the showers were so far away that we didn't make the long walk.

The next day we set off for Peniche, about 55 miles away. Watching for the pots all day proves extremely tiring, particularly as some are badly marked and some buoys come in pairs marking nets rather than pots. When we reached the pretty fishing port of Peniche, we decided to stay for 2 nights.

We bumped into Samir and his wife, Leslie, who we had met briefly in Leixoes. Mark asked him if his flag was Lebanese and we talked a little about Lebanon and Palestine. It turned out that Samir's family are Palestinians from Bethlehem, though he was born in Lebanon. We discovered that we share views on the travesty that is Israel and we went out for a very enjoyable late night drink with them.

Another interesting aspect of our stay in Peniche was our visit to the fort, which was used as a prison under Salhazar's dictatorship. It is now a museum dedicated to those who were detained there. I wish we could have read Portuguese as there were numerous letters to and from prisoners - with the censored parts etc.and lots of written explanations but all we could understand were the images - impressive enough in themselves.

There were boots and shoes planted with flowers, each one named for a former prisoner. There was also an amazing sculpture in their memory.

From Peniche we travelled to Cascais, where we anchored for the night and remained on the boat. 

And so on to Sines, our final port of call on mainland Europe, where we will await a favourable 4/5 day weather forecast. 

The electronic instruments had been staging a mini rebellion  since we left Leixoes, with the GPS failing to receive any signal, the AIS not transmitting and only receiving the most basic information from other vessels and sometimes receiving nothing and the alternator not charging the domestic battery. Hence Sines would also be the place to get a GPS arial sent to from the UK and to try and resolve the other problems as well as being close to the fishing village we stayed in 33 years ago and wished to revisit.

My family and other animals

So it's August and I am in Hornchurch with my family and I haven't brought a coat!!! No seriously, it's mainly sunny - though not as sunny as Portugal.

Heather is looking well and we are all eagerly awaiting the birth of baby Freya, who, we are told by doctors, will be a big baby,

Predictably, despite several attempts at induction (only the final one successful) she is also  a week late. Weighing in at 10ibs 3oz Freya Alice Barc arrived in the world in the late evening of August 15th.

Naturally , coming from such good stock, she is extremely beautiful (not to mention very long limbed) and will obviously be highly intelligent too!

Good news from the eldest granddaughter is that she has successfully completed her apprenticeship and is now a qualified, employed and well paid insurance underwriter - who still owes her grandfather and I a drink.

Grandson Jack, despite a total lack of any form of commitment has managed to obtain some GCSEs and is lucky enough to have been accepted as an apprentice in what used to be called fitting and turning in my day and is now called something completely different. He is not on any of the photos due to be elsewhere most of the time,

Anyway it's good bye to the family and  to the good friends who visited us while we were there and back to Portugal to continue the story ............

Lobster Pots and batteries in the night

SO off we set for Portugal - light winds and a pleasant journey, mainly motor sailing in light winds. We passed a few fishing boats and some gangs of swimming crabs, Dolphins joined us on and off and all was well.

At around midnight I began to notice a strange smell which I assumed at first was from the shore. However, we passed down and the smell did not abate so I informed Scruffbag when he took over the watch. He checked the engine and all  seemed well so we decided it must be exhaust fumes as the night was so still. As we reached Portugal, I had become aware of the increasing number of lobster pots in amazing depths of water (70 metres plus). They appeared randomly and were hard to spot in the night. Scruffbag noticed the same on his watch and we narrowly missed several of them. I took over again at 3a.m. and Scruffbag has barely gone below when "wham" we caught one. I switched the engine to neutral immediately and Scruffbag rushed up on deck armed with a boat hook. He was feeling increasingly unwell with what later turned out to be a severe bout of tonsilitis but still managed  to unhook the offending lobster pot from the rudder. After that we both stayed up on watch with  Scruffbag on the fordeck, manfully standing braving the swell to search for pots. I did go forward to relieve him for a short spell but have to admit that the spells were indeed short as it was very unpleasant.

Meanwhile the smell continued and towards dawn the fog descended.It was then that we found the cause. Scruffbag notice the engine starter battery voltage was 15.8. It had been slowly frying as we went along. He turned off the engine then tried to restart using the domestic battery. The operation failed. No engine, no wind and fog. Luckily we were close to our destination. We "sailed" along making very little way, but at least the dolphins returned to give us some heart.

Eventually we radioed the port of Leixoes and explained our predicament and they said we could sail in slowly after the next cargo ship had entered. Unfortunately this was not to be. The entrance involved tacking and what little wind there was dropped entirely so we were forced to head for a nearby beach and drop anchor. We were able to arrange a tow to the marina at a cost of 200 euros but this took some time a several boats ,when, asked, had refused to come out in the fog.

Still all's well that ends well - if somewhat expensively. The marina is great and the staff directed us to a local guy who repaired  both our alternators and serviced the two spares. I consulted Doctor Google and diagnosed Mark;s tonsilitis and fed him the antibiotics we carry. He was really ill and abed for 5 days but thankfully made a full recovery.






We spent a happy  few weeks in Leixoes with a couple of visits to Porto, a beautiful city 20 minutes away by metro or by bus

We also met up with  an old friend ,Paul Charlesworth, who we have  not seen for at least 10 years and who is now living in near Porto. We had an enjoyable day out and a  great meal in  Porto plus an expensive drink and snack at a very upmarket beachfront bar,

As this marina is the cheapest in Portugal, we decided to leave Erica here as we returned to the UK for the arrival of our latest grandchild. I flew out at the end of July and Scruffbag followed a week later - saying goodbye to the heat of Portugal for six weeks in good old Blighty