Portimao & Friends
Suzie Too - Western Caribbean
David & Suzanne Chappell
Fri 8 Oct 2010 11:33
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Like David said " Its good to be back on the Circuit
again, we are seeing some of the boats we met last year on the way down through
Spain and Portugal. The weather has got warmer too, about 24c everyday
which is bliss, not got the body out yet as the breeze is too cold, time for
that later in the journey.
From the anchorage at Portimao we dinghed ashore to
rendezvous with Mick Woodruff who has a Legend 38, he's now living with his boat
is in the Med and he has an apartment in Lagos, so best of both worlds.
When we met he filled us in on what he had been doing since last year, he sails
solo and had taken the boat down from Portugal to Cartahena, and tonight he had
a hot date blind date so we only had time for drinks at the bar on the
beach. Before leaving we arranged to meet the next day for a trip into
Ferraguda and shopping at Le Clerc to top up the fridge provisions and maybe
collect some Portuguese wine.
On returning from the supermarket the next day to the
beach where we had left our rib, some kind fellow had lifted and wrapped
up our anchor so the RIB was filling with sea water and sand. Luckily
i had my swimsuit on under my dress always prepared!!, so i waded out to
the RIB in the surf while David tried to empty most of the water before we
tried to get our bags of shopping onbard. We arrived back at Suzie Too
very wet and full of sand, luckily on this boat we have a stern shower to
wash off the sand swimming platform, so as the boat rules say " all items
that have been on the beach have to be washed off and all food items to be
dipped in bleach" so as a dutiful little girl this is what i did.
Now you know where the time goes, 1 hour later i have got the provisions down
below, but not stored yet as i have to remember where everything goes and have
made lunch for the 3 of us, hot Chicken salad and fresh crusty bread, Mick had
to leave as his date called and wanted to meet him at the house at 1600 after
she finished playing golf
Next day the weather forecast looks grim, wet and very
windy weather on the way, so we up anchor and go into the marina, winter
rates so only 31 euros per night and internet for 10 euros a week.
Topped up the fuel tanks at the reception pontoon and
checked in, the guys then helped us onto to our berth as the pontoons only come
to 3/4 of way down Suzie Too. Safely in and we spot Jim, Anne and dog Emma
in their RIB, did a quick wave, we met them in Villagarcia last July.
Their boat a Nauticat 44, La Belle Poule is wintering in Portugal, later they
popped around for drinks and a catch up as you do, only to find out that they
had been following us on our blog all the way to the Amazon so they knew all
about us and the new Suzie. It does amaze us at how many people have
followed us.
The rain came, it was cold and blowy. This was the
day that Emma Anderton arrived to stay with Karen in her villa about 10 miles
away from this marina, we had arranged a girly day by the pool. Anyway, we
still went ahead with the day but ended up shopping and just visiting places, in
the end picked up cakes and a bottle of bubbly as it was so cold and
went back to the villa, had so much fun. Beautiful villa and they let it
out too if anyone wants a place in the sun..
While i was playing David and Jim sourced a couple of
hard drives and now we have over 3000 movies to watch, its all wired up now and
plays through the TV screen, cool.
We ended up staying longer in Portimao than we should
due to the Hurricane Otto which was tracking from the Azores towards Spain and
Portugal, that brought worse weather to us, huge waves of over 20 metres at sea
and waves big enough to break over the sea wall at the marina, we had to put
extra shore lines on the Trader next to us as she was going to hit she was
swinging so badly. We just battened down the hatches and watched some
movies. By Tuesday we had the weather back but no wind just
typical.
Friday we saw an opening, so we took it and set off 650
miles to Grand Canaries.
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