Povoa was a nice marina. On Sunday morning we bumped into Captain Slarty of YBW liveaboard forum fame. Joe and his better half had just arrived in Povoa after 2 years in La Coruna. It was a shame we were just leaving as I was keen to get some advice on a SSB radio problem. Joe was planning to stay overwinter. Seems like he has been excluded from the forum for some indiscretion.
The girls went off to get some shopping and I went off to pay for the nights stop and to get the boat ready. We left around mid-day and after a two hour motor got into Leixoes. There was no wind as usual with nice blue sky (there – I did organize it for Sue). We did get the main up but only to assist the engine. We did get our first two real problems (apart from the leaking tap and the deflating dingy)….. Amongst our problems were such diverse elements as… (quoting Monty Python and the Spanish Inquisition……no one expects…..)… where was I? Oh yes, two problems. Firstly, the Raymarine plotter decided to switch itself off and then back on every 5 or 6 minutes. Very disconcerting when trying to enter the harbour. Secondly, the lazy jacks on one side of the main broke as we were packing the sail coming into the harbour. We got in fine and spent half an hour hoisting Pam up in the bosun’s chair to retrieve the lazy jack rope and sorting that out. The plotter took a bit longer. A couple of hours of checking wires failed to find any loose connections which seemed to be the obvious solution.
We all retired to the club bar for refreshments and to lubricate the brain cells. Back on the boat we sorted the plotter problem by re-installing the software and then finding (Pam’s idea) that it was the AIS signal that was causing the plotter to reboot itself every six and a half minutes. Turning off the AIS NMEA signal cured the problem. Next step is to find out why – I’ll leave that for another day.
Leixeos wasn’t too bad. Less than 20 Euros a night. Showers Ok. Lots of room. Rick and Connie in Calaloo were already in there. Diesel was expensive at 1.50 Euro a litre. Nowhere near as dirty as some of the descriptions make out. Monday morning we left at 7am for the 12 hour sail down to Figaro da Fos. This was a 60+ mile passage with a difficult entry to get in to Fig da Fos if the weather was bad. Typically there was no wind and the sky was blue again. In fact it was flat calm apart from the residual swell. Six boats left Leixoes around the same time, all motoring. Sue was skippering this trip (to get a qualifying passage for her Yachtmaster) – and a good job she did too.
The picture above was Via Vitae, a German boat overtaking us – obviously revving his engine too hard. By mid day the wind started to build and we were able to sail. We edged up on Via Vitae and overtook him with the wind on the beam.
This was the definitive moment as we passed them.
The wind died right at the end of the sail and we motored into the marina just ahead of VV (and ahead of the other 4 boats – We won!!!). There was a variation on procedure at marinas here as we had to berth on the reception pontoon, go ashore to fill in the forms and then move the boat to the berth. We then helped tie up Thomas and his friend off Via Vitae (the boat not them silly) and told them the beers were on them as we had won the race (jokingly). Ten minutes later they turned up with a six pack. Great craic. They had been trimming the sails as much as we had so knew they were racing. We did get a few good pictures of their boat which we can pass on. The two of them were on their way down to the ARC.
Figaro da Fos seems a nice place but is more pricey than the previous ones (30 Euros per night). No wifi again but easy berths to get into.
The plan tomorrow is to sail down to Nazare which is around 35 miles so we won’t be up at the crack of dawn as today.
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