At anchor in Portimão

Escape on CAPE
David, Sarah and Bryn Smith
Tue 2 Oct 2007 08:41

Portimão

We explored further up the river when we first got here, going as far up the river as we could constrained by a 2m draft and (roughly, ‘cos David can’t quite remember) 20 m air draft-sized boat, stopping (you will all be relieved to hear) before we hit the old road bridge. So we tied up alongside the public marina near the bridge in the old part of Portimão (we would have liked to have stayed here rather than the big marina near the anchorage), but as we could only stay for a maximum of 3 days, we went back down the river to anchor. Still, every cloud has a large vodka and coke (plus ice and lemon if you have a fridge), and if we’d stayed there, we wouldn’t have found…

 

‘The Velcro Anchorage

‘The Velcro Anchorage

 

I think the anchorage in Portimão should be re-named ‘The Velcro Anchorage’, as it will be very hard for us to tear ourselves away from it (oh, give me a break!). It is well protected from the weather and has a stunning beach very close to hand. We spent a lot of time lazing on the beach and swimming off it, while the children built sandcastles and made friends with a little French girl, Aline (from RAPA NUI, a boat we first saw in Baiona).

 

‘Our’ beach.

Magic mushrooms growing on the beach?

 

When we weren’t lazing around topping up the tan, we adults just read, took the occasional walk up and down the beach and persuaded ourselves we needed a beer and ice-cream to keep cool.

 

We took Aline out with us for a day at the beach. Later she came back aboard CAPE to play, soon to be joined by her Dad (Nicholas) and Mum (Valerie) and her younger brother (Mylar), who originally came for a drink but – as is often the case with boaty people – then stayed for supper as well. We joined them the next evening on board RAPA NUI, for sun-downers and supper. We had a great night which didn’t look like ending until we remembered that CAPE was now in the marina 500 m away across the other side of the busy river.

 

Marina de Portimão

We are now installed in the marina as I have to work for a few days, and we need to top up on water and charge up the batteries to full capacity. While the marina is efficient and friendly, the new town of Praia de Rocha is very much Blackpool-on-the-Algarve, with Irish, English and Welsh Pubs, English breakfasts, UK papers and lots of very strange, English-speaking, blue- or boiled-lobster-coloured people.

 

Saturday was clean-the-boat day. Bethany, Bryn and David cleaned the outside – which entailed removing the spinnaker poles, Jack (safety) lines, and everything else on the deck. It’s amazing just how big the deck is with the stuff taken off. While David and the kids washed 10 days’ worth of sand off the decks and the beach toys and sprayed each other, I finished one set of work and sorted out the washing.

 

On Friday the boys sloped off to watch the England v. Tonga game. On Saturday, it was Wales v. Fiji. David is still in shock at Wales getting beaten by Fiji and therefore getting knocked out of the World Cup. He had to lie down in a darkened cabin for a while to recover. Apart from the black armbands, you will be relieved to hear that life on board is now carrying on as usual.

 

Loaves and fishes

On a more positive note, I must report some success on the brick – sorry – bread-baking front. Mandie gave me a bread recipe that relies on beer rather than yeast to make it rise, so it can be made in half the time of traditional bread, and – despite anything I do to it – actually rises. So far I have had four successful attempts (including banana bread and cinnamon and sultana bread), even David hasn’t complained, so I don’t think it is a fluke. No, you can't taste the beer. So the CAPE cookbook (you remember – '101 things to do with a dead mullet') will have to have a section entitled ‘101 things to accompany your dead mullet’. I have to say, however, that we haven’t eaten mullet since we left the clean river berths we had in Wales and Ireland. In Spain and Portugal, the mullet have dreadful habits (hanging around sewer outlets for a start)…

 

Warm, cinnamon-scented beer bread, studded with plump raisins, spread with salty Welsh butter…(Jamie Oliver, eat your heart out)!

 

For those of you are challenged in the bread-making department, I have divulged the secret here…(I’m sure Yacht Prospero would be delighted).

 

Beer Bread (courtesy of Yacht PROSPERO)

3 cups self-raising flour (or 3 cups plain flour, 3 teaspoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon salt)

3 dessertspoons sugar

1 egg (optional, but better with)

1 33 cl can/bottle beer (any sort as long as it has yeast in it, e.g. lager, Guinness)

 

1.      Sift flour, stir in sugar and egg.

2.      Add beer, mixing well to allow air into mix.

3.      Turn into a greased 1 lb loaf tin (with liner or greaseproof paper cut to fit).

4.      Bake on middle shelf of oven at medium heat for about 40 mins or until a toothpick comes out clean.

5.      Turn out of tin and allow to cool for at least 15 mins before cutting with a serrated knife.

 

Variations

Apple bread

Add 1 peeled, grated apple, a little extra sugar, 2 teaspoons each nutmeg and cinnamon. Cook for 10 mins longer.

 

Wholemeal bread

Decrease white flour to 2 cups and add ¾ cup of wholemeal flour and ½ cup bran flakes. You can just add ½ cup bran to the original recipe without cutting down the white flour for a bran loaf.

 

Herb bread

Add 1 teaspoon caraway seeds, ½ teaspoon nutmeg and powdered sage to the original recipe. Other additions could include curry powder, basil, oregano, depending what you want to eat the bread with.

 

Onion bread

Add ½ cup very finely copped onion to original recipe.

 

Yacht CAPE variations

Cinnamon sultana bread

Add 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon, handful of sultanas/raisins and 3 dessertspoonfuls of extra sugar to the original recipe. Cook for 10 mins longer.

 

Banana bread (Mick, this one’s for you)

Add 2 mashed, ripe bananas, 2 teaspoons mixed spice and 3 dessertspoonfuls of extra sugar to the original recipe. Cook for 10 mins longer.

 

The CAPE market research department would appreciate any feedback.

 

In the testing department, the lentil curry wasn’t quite as well received. The children had read somewhere that if they held their noses, they wouldn’t be able to taste whatever it was they were eating, but this little trick didn't appear to work for lentil curry. Bryn decided that even BBQ’d limpets were better than this!

 

Bryn and Bethany test driving the lentil curry – we haven’t told them it’s sushi next week.

 

Final of the P1 Powerboat Championships

Our week in the marina coincided with the P1 Powerboat Championship rounds 11 and 12 – this is the boating world’s equivalent of the F1 Grand Prix – lots of highly polished, very fast boats with big, noisy engines, a mini boat show, a helicopter display team, Thundercat displays, and beach party/disco with top DJs (gosh, that’s a long sentence!).

 

Quote from Captain Lilo, “That is a stunningly good-looking RHIB”. At this point you are supposed to say “How many horses does that little beauty pack?” or “A fine pair of sponsons” or something equally masculine…

 

There are fast boats and there are F fast boats!

 

The downside of all this water-bourne testosterone was the fact that we were on a pontoon opposite the ‘wet pits’ and were, therefore, subjected to the continuous revving of engines and the constant wash of safety and support boats entering and leaving. The upside (there was an upside?) was that Bryn and David had unlimited access to the ‘VIP and Restricted Areas’ by just rowing over to take photos, wander around and peruse what was on show (David, you were supposed to be looking at the boats!). The finale was a really superb firework display.

 

Maths for boat kids: 7 boats at £250K per boat, plus fuel (£1K per race) plus an estimate for support crew and transport.

 

Still on the other racing front, we were delighted to hear that the Aberystwyth Boat Club had – at last – got around to holding a yacht race (we have noted that it was held 6 months after we left – cowards!!). This, we are told, went ahead as scheduled (in spite of a dodgy forecast, hangovers and some people not taking it at all seriously and some people taking it too seriously) and actually produced a clear winner – well done to Jackie and Stu' on MYMAX for taking first place!

 

Just for the record, it does rain in Portugal

Just for the record and to make you all feel better at home, we would like you know that yesterday and today it rained. Not just a light drizzle but full-blown driving rain and 20+ knots of wind that Aberystwyth would have been proud of.

 

The rain in Portugal fell mainly on the P1 Powerboat Championships.

 

Still at least the rain here is warm and we know that when it stops it will all be dry as a bone in 30 minutes. The 2nd leg of the offshore powerboat race was actually cancelled due to high winds and poor visibility.

 

When it is raining, there is a limit to how much reading one little girl can do, and how much drawing one little boy can do, before they get TOO bored.

 

So we (OK, I) decided that a very British family walk along the beach in the rain and wind was in order.

 

Praia de Rocha in the rain (similar to Aberystwyth in the rain).

 

We arrived home 2 balls (one a bit squishy) and 3 spades (one a bit mangled) better off. On the way back, we just happened to ‘stumble’ across Taffy’s Bar, which just happened – funnily enough – to be showing Ireland v. Argentina! How do you spell ‘coincidence’?

 

The ‘world-famous’ Taffy’s Bar…(note the air-conditioning units for the removal of hot air). Just where do you go after this?