Amongst the male middle aged sailing fraternity we have noticed a penchant for beards, pony tails and paunches. I suppose it is like going to New Zealand and getting tattooed like a Maori - seemed a good idea at the time. Can’t say that I aspire to all three but am working on something I hope will go down badly with my children…………

We thought that Spanish bureaucracy would frustrate our desire to anchor at the Islas Cies which are part of the Atlantic National Park and highly recommended. However, late one evening the email containing the navigation permit came through and it was no problem booking an anchor permit for the following day - despite predictions that it would be booked up for weeks ahead. So we had a gentle genoa reach across from Baiona and dropped anchor in the usual low cloud and drizzle. It was quite busy when we arrived but after the rain set in harder all the other boats and the day trippers left and there we were completely alone! I can’t say it lived up to the Guardian report of being the best beach in the world but even in the drizzle it was really lovely.

We had anchored in sand so the holding was good and we felt confident enough to go ashore and walk up to the lighthouse 3km away. We had some magical views back down to the boat and in the murk the green islands and white beaches did look tropical. We also had the added sophistication of a trip line attached to the front of the anchor and to a float to show the position of the anchor at the surface. The trip line can be used to pull the anchor from a different angle if it gets hooked on something like a cable but it is also strangely reassuring to see the float indicating the anchor position in front of the boat.

The sail from Cies down to Viana do Castella was against the wind all the way on a grey murky day with the coast shrouded in cloud most of the time. It was one of those days when the boat seemed to be going well but some tacks took us through more than 90 degrees and progress in the desired direction seemed painfully slow. By 2100 we were toying with the idea of sailing overnight towards Porto and bemoaning the fact that we could have stayed an extra day in Spain and waited for the forecast northerly wind. Anyway we telephoned ahead to the marina in Viana and were greatly cheered to hear a friendly welcome in good English and to know that berthing at 2300 would be no problem. The wind veered enough for us to sail a direct course and even the cloud started to lift. Entering a port is often more fun and sometimes easier at night when following the various lights and buoys and Viana was no exception. There was even a funfair and brightly lit ferris wheel in the line of the leading light to test our powers of chart reading! We arrived at the marina dead on 2300, they opened the swing bridge to let us in from the river and there we were in the town. Berthing was stern to the jetty with the bow attached to a line from the sea bed - standard practice in the Mediterranean but not encountered by us so far on this trip. It proved not to be a problem and after a chat with our American neighbour retired to our bunks.

The following morning I got up bright and early and headed to the marina office at 0900. They thought it amusing to have forgotten to remind us when we arrived that Portugal is an hour behind Spain. Still, we had an unexpected additional hour to make the most of.

On Tuesday we got up bright and early and were gliding out of the marina at 0730. The town was bathed in the warm glow of the early sun as we left and set off into a forecast 15kts of northerly wind, rising to 25 its in the afternoon. For most of the morning we in fact only had around 13kts of breeze and were gently cruising along at around 4kts under just the genoa. Anticipating stronger wind we had kept the mainsail safely covered on the boom. However, it occurred to us conservative cruisers that over longer passages it will be important to get the most speed out of the boat that we reasonably can. This means getting arse into gear and rigging a preventer on the boom (line from the front of the boat to the end of the boom to stop the boom crashing from side to side with the swell or even an inadvertent gybe when running fully downwind), a pole to hold out the genoa if sheeting it on the opposite to the mainsail (see previous blog) and, heaven forbid, even braving the cruising chute in more than 5kts of breeze! As a first step we rigged the preventer and then found that on a fully downwind course the genoa would fill nicely “goose winged” without the pole. Our speed immediately rose to 5.5kts plus. Even then we had two reefs in the main. This was partly in anticipation that we might have stronger wind in the afternoon and partly because the genoa gets blanketed behind the full mainsail on a downwind course and reefing the mainsail seems to allow more air into the genoa when sheeted on the same side. 

As we arrived at the River Douro we had 22+kts of wind and rising so we got there just in time. We are in a brand new state of the art marina at Gaia that post dates both our cruising guide and 2013 Almanac (shock horror, yes I know not the 2015 Almanac but two years old doesn’t seem too bad to us). We are an hours riverside walk from the centre of Porto and, for those aviation enthusiasts out there, right under the flight path into Porto airport.