Sailing in Portugal – Sailing with Saphir

Our stay in Lagos was very intense. Not much time to explore the city. Had a walk around in the old town on Wednesday after cleaned up in the boat and between washing machines.

On Thursday we rented a car and drove to IKEA to get new pillows and bed quilts and some more stuff. Of course we had to have Swedish meatballs for lunch. After that we headed towards Tavira to meet our friends that was celebrating their 30th wedding anniversary together with their family and some close friends. Thank you Magnus and Poulina for a great party. It was so great to so see you and our friends again before we are crossing the Atlantic. And Eva Sandgren we are waiting for you to join us.

The day after we went to have lunch near the beach. To get to the restaurant you could walk out on a pathway our take a small train. No time for hanging on the beach sadly, but I got time at the pool before lunch at the house.

Back to the boat for on night and on Saturday morning we drove up to Cascais to celebrate Jörgen 70birthday. It was a great party. Many of their friends from Cascais and sailors. We meet two sailing families that will sail with us on the Arc+and Arc world Ellinora and Blue Sunshine. We are also going to sail with Jörgen and Louise and their kids when we go from Caribbean to Fiji.

We have a new plan on our circumnavigation since we got a place with the first group leaving Caribbean in January. This will give us five more weeks in Fiji. Here you can se the plan

On our way back to the boat we stopped in Albufeira to say hi to Sven-Olof and Bettan and see their new house. The house we passed was covered with seashells.

Monday we spent foodshopping and preparing for our next long leg. This time we will go 640NM approximately 1200km. So it is quite a long distance and the longest we have done so far. In the evening we had a lovely dinner with our friends Anna and Peter from Life@sea. At lunch on Tuesday we left the harbour . Just before Anna and Clyde from Viking Goddess came by to say bye . They are going in to Spain and spend the winter there. Anna and Peter was standing along the side and waved. I delivered cinnamon buns to them since it was kanelbullens day. Thanks for the lovely photos Anna and Peter. Enjoy your stay in Lagos.

The first 12 hours we went by motor to get as far out as possible and hope that no Orcas will come. When we had arrived in Las Palmas we heard about an orca attack outside Lagos. Feel so sad for the sailors and so humble that we have made it safe . We did see a dolphins far away. Not many boats out here just a few tankers. Some off them are really huge

The first days was okay waves and beautiful sunsets. It was so nice to set sail and enjoy the the sea. After the first night we found a squid on the boat. Later we also found one on the back of the boat.

Sleeping on the boat when it is only us we don’t use our ordinary bed instead we sleep on the sofa or on deck. A bit harder on deck since you have to hold on to something

On Thursday night it started to get rougher. The waves was up to 3-4 meters and came from back and side

The first to photos I s taken from the same spot and showed ho high the waves are when they come from the back.

After little bit more than four days we see land and the tip of Grand Canaria. It takes a couple of more hours before we get in to the harbour. Arriving we get welcomed by Sofia and Fredrik that arrived their earlier that day. Since it was late we stayed next to the harbour office for the night and the next morning we got or place. Here will we stay until the start on the 6 of November. Except for one week when we go home to see our children and grandchildren

Hugs Eva

We left Porto early in the morning together with Life@sea and Currier Sur. First it was hard to see but as soon as the sun came up we had clear sight. Then we realised we had a lot others boats after us as well.. And we also saw lots of dolphins. Thank you for boat photos and the film Christophe

Arrived in Figuera da Foz after eight hours on the sea. We took a walk in to town to have something to eat.

Next morning we wave bye to Life@sea and Currier Sur and headed to Nazare. We had a very nice day and got som really nice photos of Saphir from Esther of Sweden. A bit zig zag sailing between the fishing gears.

Nazare is famous for the high waves and is the paradise for surfers. To get them you have to go to the next beach north of the cliff so her in Nazare city the waves are smaller. I went to the beach and the water was great, big waves so didn’t need to go far out in the water to swim. But is was a bit tricky to get in and out of the water and not get caught in a wave. Lots of sand inside the bikini. Edgar didn’t join me but he also went in the water but in a wetsuit. He wanted to check the zinc anodes and at the same time cleaned the side off the boat. We stayed a few nights here. Very nice food and very good services in both of the restaurant we visited. Portugal is growing on us as we say in Sweden.

It is not always easy for us to get a place in a harbour as we are 18m long and most harbour at least so far are made more for up to 14-15m. Of course we can stay in a bay on anchor but our anchor winch is not reliable. We will get a new in Las Palmas.Depending on the weather some harbours fill up quickly. This makes us plan little ahead looking at weather forecast to see when we can go and then prebook. Sometimes we have to changes the dates of our arrival / leaving and so far that has been okay. This time we kept our planning and left Tuesday morning on the 20 sep heading to Cascais. These early mornings are lovely with the sunrise. It is only hard to get out of bed…. Sailing close to the coast is nice when you can see the coastline changes from beaches to big rocks and sometimes caves. The backside is that the fog always comes and we have all the fishing gears to watch out for.

We arrived to Cascais after 8.1/2 hours and an hour later we had our place and all paperwork was done. From not knowing many along our sailing (four actually and they are very new acquaintances ) we have many around us here in Cascais/Lisbon. Edgars former colleague Jörgen with family came sailing in to the harbour. They will also do the ARC. In the afternoon Johan who lives here with his wife Marina came down to have a look on the boat. Sadly Marina was not here. In the evening we had dinner with a friend from our time in Riga.