Capitalism is the exploitation of man by man.
Communism is the complete opposite.
- Unknown - (Described by Laurence J. Peter as a "Polish proverb")
Portugal
"Portus Cale" Once part of the Roman Empire centered around the city of Porto, since then conquered by muslims from Africa, then part of the Kingdom of Spain, became an independent Kingdom since in the 12th century. It became a republic in 1910. (Note, Aussies, are you ready to cut the umbilical chord to the Queen Mother, and become an adult nation?) About 500 years ago, Portugal started to build the most impressive European empire covering the planet. Large areas from Asia to South Africa and on both sides of the Atlantic (Brazil and much of Africa) was under Portugese rule. Yet, the 10-million-person Portugal today is no world power, despite being the home of the seventh most spoken language in the world.
Maritime history
For a small country at the edge of the Atlantic, Portugal has made a remarkable contribution to the exploring of the world - by the white man with dark hair. All the explored areas were well known by the natives, though. (Sometimes even Christopher Columbus is listed as Portugese, but he was really an Italian. After failing to get Portugal to sponsor him, he sailed under Spanish flag to find the world he never knew he found.)
It's no coincindence that there is no GPS manufacturer wanting to put Columbus' name on their product. But the Portugese Ferdinand Magellan has earned this immortality, leading a five-ship, 250-man fleet into the first ever cruise around the world. Juan Sebastian Elcano was leading the last surviving ship with its 18 surviors back home. Fernão de Magalhães died in the Philipines. Other notable Portugese explorers include Vasco da Gama - the discoverer of the route from South Africa to India, Bartholomeu Dias - first man to round the Stormy Cape (later renamed as Cape of Good Hope)and Pedro Alvares Cabral - the first European to see Brazil.
Other notable explorers include Lauri G. on his trusty steel-tub Sy Aliisa, the story of which I should promplty resume now that I've given you the synopsis of world history regarding Portugese at sea. Sorry... back to 2008:
I bet Bartholomeu Dias was never granted this treatment when returning home from his voyages. The night watch at the Viana do Castelo didn't speak much english but understood the word "pizza". Despite the late hour he made numerous phone calls which finally resulted a pizza delivery in the thickest imaginable fog, under the guiding torch of our night-watchman, directly into Aliisa's cockpit.
Viana do Castelo harbour is lined with the local fishing fleet. The coast is lined with their nets, suspended between two marked buoys floating deep under the surface, all the way past the 100m line.
The Portugese coast...
...is lined with ports almost excactly 30 miles apart. This makes a perfect coastline for the lazy cruiser. If you don't like the place, stay the night and take off next morning to catch some sun, soak the fishing line and have a few cold ones during the six-hour cruise down the coast. For some cruisers - the one's that are more hooked on sailing than traveling - these 30-mile trips may last all day. For us, despite the land-breeze dying at 1100 and sea-breeze not starting until 1600, we've been able to keep to the 6-hour plan. Thank you Yanmar and the seemingly endless flow of oil in the middle east, which can only be matched by our seemingly endless will to buy more the refined stuff to spin the prop and get to explore the next port.
Sometimes exploring means loading more money on our Vodafone pre-paid mobile internet sim-card and surfing the net for an afternoon. It also means early enough arrivals for hitting the town straight away. It means no stress and never to be more tired than what you get from drinking red wine from late afternoon until midnight... We might lack on the actual sailing stories, comparing all the different sail combinations that we've used during the day, but hey - I hate sailing anyway!
"In Portugal, the officials think that the Schengen area (free movement of EU citizens) only concerns air-travel" - says Carlos, the Port Captain of Viana do Castelo. The most helpful and friendly port captain I have ever met. But in every port in Portugal, we had to make the initial trip to the "office" with all the paper work. The inconvenience was about 10 minutes and all info was recorded by the marina office, so there was no real hassle at all.
The buses in Portugal run... occasionally?
30 miles a day
Our first thirty miles took us from Spain to Viana do Castelo. The weather had been coolishly sunny but ended up all grey with a threat of rain. No probs, there's only one direction from here - towards the equator! The little walking bridge swang open as soon as we approached and Carlos, running straight from the bridge operating booth, told us to pick any berth we want. We picked the first one. Daily routine: Plug in the charger, pull the laptop plug from the inverter and into the lead from the jetty, check for any local wi-fi and do every trick to get in. Got one! Great.
I had packed our 70-euro second-hand folding bikes into the forepeak. They weren't really the tiniest job and I had to take them in through the saloon as the bikes wouldn't fit, folded, through the fore hatch. I pulled them out and after a 30 min assembly job it was time to hit the cobblestones. We were on the hunt for a guitar. No luck. No professional quality Spanish Alhambra's for less than a hundred bucks. I was facing the reality of my own gospel: You must always pay for quality. I found one Alhambra P4 for €340 and a C3 for €260 but decided to keep looking around. (Any muso reading this knows now that I'm just eyeing out the entry-level guitars, hoping to find one that will make me feel like Eric Clapton, secretly in the dark, alone in the foredeck, plucking away when no-one can hear...)
The Gil Eannes hospital ship was lying in Viana harbour, open for visitors. It turned out to be the best museum I've ever seen, with full access to almost all areas. The difference between Dover Castle was tangible, we were THERE, as if we had been there, THEN! (I still didn't get the engine started, no matter what...)
The next port was just that, Port. Wine. oPorto. The birth place of Port wine. Yeah. Do I get you excited? Jeez, if I do there's something wrong with you... The world famous Port wine was probably invented by a bunch of piss heads, who noticed that the old red would be better if you pour a little white spirit into it. Well, it's sweeter, because the added booze kills the fermentation of the wine, leaving more sugar in the end product. It also gets you drunk quicker, so ohoy! Yahoo, cheers and kippis! The stuff was apparently invented in a monastry, where an old monk poured Brandy in the wine barrel while the wine was still fermenting. You learn all the tricks with grog when living in a monastry.
The big city apartment blocks weren't boring any more. In Porto and in Portugal, the houses are painted in bright colours, the windows and balconies have character and the walls are typically decorated with washing straight out of the machine.
The temperatures and weather was getting right. In fact, if this goes on, we'll have a positive balance of karma and are bound to get hammered soon. Portugese coast, for us, was calm, warm and sunny. I'm trying to come up with something to complain about but Capitan Peedoff has gone for holidays...
I wanted to go up river Douro and right into the city of Porto. Annina did not. We took the bus from Leixoes marina to suss out the place where we would tie up the next day. The 12 meter space between the tourist boats was supposedly public, though there was another commercial vessel tying up to "our spot". To keep the peace, I decided to stay in the cosy marina. The plan didn't work, I spoiled it by throwing a tantrum and trying to make Annina feel guilty about restricting our way of really travelling. We had a massive argument. Maybe one day I'll be content with all the blessings that my life is covered in... I'm such a bastard.
I bought a rod and reel in Porto - too bloody expensive, even though it was a far cry from the 300-dollar reels and 200-dollar rods. I managed to attract a lot of seaguls with my self-made lure. Still, 90 euros for a rod and 70 for a trolling reel seemed a bit much... The big fish are somewhere out there, when it strikes, you'll be the first to know...
Almost 40% of Portugal is wooded and Portugal is one of Europe's leading producers of pulp and paper products. This load is probably on its way for baking bread in an old-fashioned oven though... (Sao Jacinto, near Aveiro)
Azulejos, colourful ceramic tiles, a temperature controlling art form originating from the north African people (sometimes called Moors) and their strong influence in the Ibearian peninsula. They have become a trademark of Portugese buildings. Makes some of the houses look like bathroom walls, ay?
Outside wall of a local house in Sao Jacinto
Sao Jacinto's beach was longer than one could care to measure. Despite having only 1 person per square km, there was a bar open on the beach. The few people we saw, were all looking for worms as bait for fising. Perhaps the swimmers come on high tide, the surfers after gales, the tourist during the summer months and so on.
Navico makes an Impression
Despite the quiet, sleepy Sao Jacinto being quite enough for us, we had a reason to catcht the ferry to Aveiro. (There was - apparently - many marinas there, but we were happy with staying anchored. The bridge clearance to Aveiro is 14m, enough for us.) Our little 5" Northstar GPS/plotter had developed some fog in the display and I wanted to swap the unit for a new one. Navico UK would have made the swap, but we were in a hurry to move south. Once in Spain, I contacted Maritim in Finland and the next day I had the contact for the Spanish country manager, Knut Boe. Before I had time to open another cold one, David Pousa had driven 30min from Vigo and was knocking the hull of Aliisa, in the marina of Bayona, Spain. He only came to apologise and promised to get a new plotter sent to Portugal. Once in Aveiro, the service just got better. Mario - the local contact - had everything but the red carpet for us. He picked us up from the harbour, took us to town, gave us a 5min tourist info session and vowed to do anything for us, if we just call him, day or night! We were fine, though, and headed home happily with a new Northstar. Thank you Mario, David, Kunt and Jan and all others who make an effort in Navico!
Mario put in his best effort. Annina and I both told him to slow down, look after his family and care less about the super-efficiency that is killing all, except big pharmaceuticals selling us more valium and other drugs that might help us keep up the pace.
Oh, Aveiro? Yep, nice town, ultra-modern shopping mall surrounded by older and some not-so-well-kept buildings. A canal or two had been dug into and through the city, with some desparate and pathetic attempts to imitate Venezian gondolas driving in the narrow water way. Nevertheless, we got a topup on our Vodafone pre-paid sim, which offered us the first really fast internet throughout the coast. Pitty about the 300Mb limit per 10 days. Had to surf very carefully and suspend the Skype calls alltogether...
Figueira da Foz
After returning to the anchorage, it was time for siesta. The plan to hit the beach again for a picnic was taken off the list. The day in Aveiro had been hot and our faces were red from too much sun. After a wonderful dinner by Annina, I managed to start a good argument about middle-class versus working class. It's good to let some steam out and Annina did her share too. At the end, we huddled together in the aft cabin, with the hatch completely open all night - a first since leaving Finland.
I was up at dawn. I told Annina she could stay in bed. It was dead-calm and departing the anchorage didn't require a second person on deck. I pulled up the fake CQR and took off down the 4kn tidal flow, out the harbour. Instead of the Portugese trades, we were facing the Portugese wind shadow. 5kn of breeze is no good, I powered on, Simrad steering, another coffee, Annina still asleep. A motorless gaff-rigged ketch took off from behind the breakwater. He couldn't make it against the tidal flow the night before and had to be towed in for the night. Knowing that he didn't have an engine did not only make myself take my hat off for him, but it was interesting to see him almost keeping up with us motoring - in less than 10kn of breeze downwind. Yeah, we could have done 3kn, perhaps, but we're on our way to the next port, the next port is 25 miles away and we want to get there with still time to explore... We don't like sailing, anyway.
We tied up to the first vacant berth in Figueira da Foz. I went looking for the port captain - usually keen to see the passports and boat papers, "...because Portugal is a frontier" and "we must be on guard". The term Port Captain is the polite term for the marina staff member or often the marina person in charge, who is checking our passports and collecting the boat info on a one-page form.
André diligently collected the info and checked our passports, then walked to another office to take our money for the berth. He was wearing a "Fenix Intersecurity" shirt and oozed out a good Tom Cruise Risky Business - feel.
Nothing risky about the business, 21 euro for night at the jetty.
Here's a break from the boring stuff...
Every cow in Europe earns more than two bucks a day in gov. subsidies. That’s more than what 75% of Africans have to live on.
Cars kill two people every minute. Since 1896, 25 million people have been killed in road traffic accidents.
A third of the world’s population is at war. In 2005, 27 countries around the world were fighting in 32 armed conflicts.
Back to business...
Figueira was not our town. We reluctantly paid the 21 euros, had long showers and got ready to continue in the morning. Another 30-mile run took us to the fish-smelling town of Nazarè. With a blustery wind gusting over the headland, right into the marina, we had little choice but to let it push us sideways onto the outer berth. All fenders down and flat. We're in the middle of a fishing harbour and we can smell it. The authorities are more curious than normal, I have to follow an armed and dangerous looking man into his office, where he politely fills in one form and smiles. Obrigado! Moments later the immigration walks down to the jetty, to write down the boat's details. Welcome to Portugal. Yeah yeah, we've been here a few weeks now!
More boats come in and we have to move to a inside berth. I hate manouvering in tight places but all goes well. I set up the bikes and we're off - across the work yard about 1 km to the touristy little town. Lovely and warm in the sun again, though at sea the air clearly had the autumn coolness in it. (That's the northern hemisphere autumn, ok?)
Happy Birthday!
Annina's birthday continued a steady flow of reasons to open up a bottle of bubbly. (First sunny day, wedding anniversary, engagement anniversary, day-we-met anniversary, particularly nice sunny day, particularly cheap (under one euro) price for a bubbly, the-day-I-moved-in anniversary and so on. As all our finances are together and our budget is a bit limited, we had decided for no presents from shops. With restrictions already in place for our eating out routine, it was time to splash out in a really nice restaurant. Annina had been craving for fresh fish and Nazare was famous for its fish.
(The "Nazare Canyon" is an interesting feature in the Atlantic sea floor. A steep gully from the Atlantic abyss winds its way like a riverbed right up infront of the Nazare harbour, reaching depths of 500m less than 10 miles from the breakwater and 200m almost half a mile off the harbour. This allows the local fishermen to exploit the crack in the continental shelf and fish in steep drop-offs and abyssal depths right outside the home base)
Our first taste of Portugese food was during our week in a package holiday to Madeira. The experience was throughly disappointing, until we discovered the local Chinese and Indian restaurants... So far our samples of the local flavours had given us more understanding of why Portugese food is not well known in the world. The food has been ok, but completely tasteless. On our last real effort to give Portugese food another chance, we chose the nicest, restaurant in town, one that several locals and visitors recommended. To make the most of our choice, we didn't look at the prices at all. We picked a fresh fish from the selection of one fresh fish of the day. (yeah, choice was easy!) and had the chef grill the whole fish for us. Dinner was served with potatoes, carrots, beans and salad. The entree was made up with lovely moist and crispy garlic bread and fresh prawns.
Everything looked wonderful. Here:
It was probably one of the healthiest meal I've had for ages. Unfortunately it left our taste buds wondering about what was so great about it all. The fish was truly, absolutely excellent. In fact, there was nothing to complain about anything. But when we... ok, when Annina cooks in in the tiny galley of Aliisa, under the 1.2m long spice rack, the smallest measurable unit of garlic is one - whole one. In the rare occasion that I've grilled fresh fish whole, I've cut deep incisions on the sides, filling them with herbs, garlic, some butter, coriander, whatever...
A little trick I learned from Paula was to put some honey and sesame seeds with the fresh veges before steaming or boiling them. Not a strong flavour, but suddenly the plain humble stuff is no more plain, but humble plus, yum! Plain boiled potatoes are a bit like some of the so-called fine seafood: it has no taste accept the stuff you add to it. In a mash this could be nutmeg, pepper and butter. In plain boiled spuds, the least you can do, is add some butter, salt, parsley, pepper, something! But this is not the Portugese way to cook. They like their food as it is. Fresh and ... as it is. The fault was not in the food. We had trained our taste buds for stronger sensations.
Enough of ...
...that. Nazare was nice, though the ending of the tourist season made it fairly quiet and over-all, it seemed to be a villaged geared up for the tourists. The forecast was showing increasing northerly wind. That's good, if you like wind but us... well, we're not really sailors, so we opted to leave the next day, thursday. The forecast then was still less than 20kn, while a Friday departure looked like over 30 knots and a fairly large sea. That's fine when you have to take it, but I don't go looking for 30kn just for fun, even if it's downwind.
The seas were already rolling nicely, enough to put Annina back to bed as soon as we left the harbour. Her smile didn't fade though, we only had a 20-mile wallowing in the following sea before we got to Peniche. Finally a real local's town. Portugal as it is, withouth tourists. (I asked the marina office for a Chinese restaurant. The reply: "We used to have one but it's shut down. They're cooking is a bit funny")
The friday wind managed to squeeze us tightly against the marina jetty, with even our sea-anchor (a car tyre) deployed, well... pushing black marks on Aliisa's sides. The temperature outside was a dismal 16 C despite the sun and clear skies. Must move south. Must move south. Must move south.
Must move south.MUST MOVE SOUTH!
Must move closer to the equator...
PS.
For more info on Portugal and cruising portugal, check out Manorhouses.com. It gives a clear and easy guide for planning the trip up or down the Portugese coast.
