Nazare
Stargazer of Southampton
Susie and Adam (both think they are skipper)
Thu 9 Sep 2010 13:29
|
09:09.10,
39.35.01N 09:04.49W We set off in the afternoon from Povoa De Varzim
planning to travel 15 miles down the coast to the next port Leixoes where we
planned to stay the night before heading to Figuera Da Foz in the morning -
we had a nice sail down, but once we got to about a mile from Leixoes, we
decided against going in - basically you can anchor in a commercial port next to
a load of oil terminals - not too lovely. .. the evening was nice and the
winds were gentle so we decided to carry on through the night and either arrive
in Fig Da Foz in the early morning, or press on to Nazare which we hoped to
reach by early afternoon.
I made a truly awful chilli for dinner out of
strange Portuguese soya protein and the fish got to eat about half of it.
The wind died as night fell so we ended up having to motor through the
night. One thing that had really put us off night sailing in portugal was
the number of what we thought were lobster pot markers - run over one of these
and you risk getting it tangled around the prop and all sorts of bad things
happen. However - we ended up considering the chances of running over
one - although there are a lot of them out here - you have to be unlucky to run
right over one in all that sea. We went 10 miles offshore in the hope that
deeper water would mean there weren't any of these things to slalom around,
however - we still saw them! - it was only talking to people in Nazare that we
found out that most of these things are not actually lobster pots but they mark
fishing nets strung deep under the water - hence they do set them up in deep
water.
Lots of Dolphins spotted an hour after dawn in the
morning - not sure what type - but they were small and agile - groups of them
jumping out of the waves, probably around 50 in one pod altogether.
Our next wildlife spot was not quite as exciting -
looking through the binocs we saw what we could only imagine was an unidentified
sea monster (or maybe a capsized boat) - it was in fact a huge dead whale
floating at the surface. .. alive would have been better. . . .. anyway -
I am writing this blog update 48 hours after arriving at Nazare. Today
whilst walking on the breakwater at Nazare we looked out to sea and spotted the
dead beastie again happily floating along - it had got here without the aid of
sails or motor. They took a boat out and went and dragged it into the
harbour where it was lifted out with the boat hoist and taken away to be
disposed of - I suppose that a huge dead lump of whale is actually a hazard to
small boats - wouldn't want to hit it on a jet ski anyway! We did go
and have a look at the whale lifting operation - it was pretty big, not sure
what kind of whale but a local biologist lady thought it was a minke
whale. It would be better to see one alive, I think it would smell better
too.
|