38:26.393N 009:06.117W
SV Eleonora
Michael A. Andronov
Tue 21 Aug 2018 20:30
UTC 1959 We are still in front of Sesimbra. Yesterday, it was a busy day to go around the place, to hike to ‘castelo’…. One of the beauty of travelling in Europe — each place, no matter how small it is — has some history behind. Sesimbra is not an exception. The village / town / fort was established in 12 century as the advance of Portugal against the caliphate… ( Do not know remember which one… ) And to degree — the place was very important at this point as the border establishment…. The most interesting part — how 1201 the authorities were trying to convince people to established the settlement — providing the economical and social benefits… Looking backward — not much has changed since under the moon… The principles are the same — no taxes, free money to settle, titles if you would like to defend the place… The place for the original town / castle was selected on the top of the mountain, from which the whole area around may be easily observed and controlled. And from the first days — access to the ocean and control over it was playing one of the major roles. Modern life is divided between the fishing — they do have a relatively big instalment for fishing port — fishing fleet & its base support…. And the resort(s)… The place ‘moved down’ from the top of the mountain, where the original settlement was located towards the nice beach. It seems like in the village / town consists of resort buildings, apartment buildings, rented for the tourists, and some infrastructure — banks, hospitals, school… Yesterday, I spent the whole day going up and down the whole place. I even went up to the top of the local mountain, to visit what the called ‘restored 12 century castle… ‘ . There is no actual castle. They restored most of the perimeter walls, no buildings inside … Beautiful view around… and a nice hiking exercise all together… Indeed, as you are on the land, and there is no wind against the water — it is hot. For the first time, since Antigua ( May ) — I should admit, it was hot. I started to understand why people are coming to the beach… But I still failed to understand how they can survive in that water… ( much below 20 degrees…. )… May be that is my curiosity, may be it was too much heat as I was walking around… But as soon as I arrived on board, I decided to try… and went into the water… For the first time since May, I was swimming… Interesting experience. ;-) After you survive the initial chill of entering, if you manage to swim a bit… the good part — to come out of the water! The difference between being in the water, and feeling warm weather as you stepped out… That part has been always missing on the Caribbean, where most of the time the water was the same temperature as the air, or even felt warmer because of the wind… I wanted to leave today further, to Seine. But in the morning everything was covered with fog… It was even impossible to see the bow of the boat, standing at the wheel… Returning fishing boats — were a bit of ‘excitement’, as they were coming really close… GPS navigation is good… But my guess, at certain point they get used to switch to visual… and today it was not the case… Then the fog raised… but shortly after the breeze appeared from the sea, and the fog came back…. blown by the breeze from the ocean… Nice to watch, but unpractical to go anywhere… No problem — people are paying huge money to be at those resorts… I’m here nearly for ‘free’… ;-). The only challenge — I have to wait until the fog disappear even to take the dinghy to the shore… After precise measurement how much fuel I still have, I decided to drop the idea to re-fuel here. The gas station is in the middle of the fishing base, completely industrial, big cement wall… Not easy to manoeuvre, and on top — after / if the boat is docked — the wall is still so high — even in high tide — that for me it is impossible to climb from the boat… It was a mistake not to get it in Cascais…. ( nice approach to the station, but 30 cents/L more expensive… ) The fog left too late… together with the wind… So, mañana…. ;-). We are ready to leave as soon as at least some wind and visibility are present! ;-) Everything is OK on board, and I’m looking to start to move further South… But as I mentioned — the local shore weather creating some challenges, with the light variable winds, which appear late afternoon and are lasting till midnight… A bit too late to make a next ‘jump’… But, I’m sure we will find some way! Talk to you soon, M. P.S>. No matter that the building are build with the modern technology. The streets are kept extremely narrow anyway… You may see Eleonora on anchor…  |