Lisbon

On the third day after Porto, Ella and I arrived in the bay that is also home to Lisbon. We spent the first afternoon and evening in the anchorage off Cascais. Ella had already been ashore there with her friends, so we had no “boat fever” driving us onto dry land. That’s when anchoring is truly wonderful: you drop the hook, check that it holds, and you’re done. No fenders to hang out, no lines to prepare, no docking manoeuvres, no harbour master to negotiate with about where and how, no bystanders sticking their noses in. None of that, just instant peace, and afterwards you still have the place to yourself.

Meanwhile the plan was as follows: we were to be in Lagos in the Algarve on or before the 18th, where Ella would be holidaying with her regular summer-holiday crowd. After a week and a half I finally got hold of the yard there, Sopromar. That was a disappointment: no time, the Algarve is busy in summer. And the marina was full too. Not that I’m keen on the Algarve in summer anyway, far too crowded: the Benidorm and Scheveningen of Portugal, so to speak. So a marina near Lisbon it would be, and then we’d figure out how to get the Hoyt boom repaired here. The marina where we’d had such a nice berth last time, on the east side of Lisbon on the old World Expo site, Parque das Nações, had no space either. You’re kidding me! I’d rather not stay in Cascais, so I quickly rang the marina in Oeiras (pronounced: Oy-rash) and yes, we could come in the next day. Great spot and friendly harbour masters, a view of four restaurants, all perfectly fine. And free bread rolls every morning to boot. Now that we had an address to ship things to, I quickly ordered a press, some other hydraulic bits and a printer. Talked things over with Marion and adjusted the plans: she’d fly to Lisbon the next day, and later in the week the three of us would head to a lovely little house on a resort somewhere in the Algarve. But first Miguel, Paz’s son, who has a job as an engineer in Lisbon, came over for a nice evening meal.

Since we’d all seen Lisbon a few times before, we skipped the real touristy stuff, but I noticed there’s a national tile museum. Tiles being a true Portuguese speciality, the three of us went there by Bolt (wonderful invention). Fantastic to see, highly recommended, and it actually teaches you more about Portugal than a traditional museum full of paintings. The link with Harlingen is fun too: at some point the Protestants were thrown out or bullied out; in any case a lot of them fled to the then still tolerant Netherlands and brought the technique of making tiles with them.

As we were in no hurry and had a rental car, we explored the coast west of Lisbon and took the slow coastal road down to the Algarve. Interesting to see how the south-west coast of Portugal has a completely different feel from the Algarve, much more laid-back and authentic. Plenty of tourists, but more of the proper camper type and above all surfer dudes.

When we got to the house, it turned out to be on an older complex, the pool was shared and no more than OK, and the driveway was tight, but the house itself was nicely furnished and looked straight out over the rocky coast. After putting the router on the roof terrace we even had decent WiFi. We ate very well nearby: the owner gave us a great tip for an excellent fish restaurant where we had a lovely meal.

On the 18th I dropped Ella off with her friends in Lagos. With a bit of sweet-talking I managed to book a lunch table at short notice at a two-Michelin-star restaurant by the sea, Vila Joya, where we celebrated our 31st wedding anniversary. Two couples were doing that there that day, a Portuguese couple and us, how special is that. Abundant food and drink. Tip for next time: go for the simpler wine pairing…

The food was so abundant that the next day, when Marion flew home again from Faro, we didn’t do much and both felt a bit out of sorts. Very tasty, but a touch excessive, then. Marion had to go home because our friend Marleen wanted to celebrate her birthday in Milûk. After dropping Marion off, I drove back up the motorway to Oeiras that afternoon, where I met up again with Wim and Mar from Pelagia. The next day Wim and I went to the “Centro Náutico de Algés”, 4 kilometres further on, where I had an appointment with the yard boss, Tiago. A great guy, and he was happy to take both Merrimac and Pelagia: summer is actually their quiet season, because all the Lisboetas are down in the Algarve. Snort.

Now, almost two weeks later, quite a lot has happened already. The boom is in pieces, it really is just wear and tear, and we’ve agreed with the yard how to make it as good as new again with a few improvements, or rather better than new. From now on: reef first before gybing the jib in a force 6 or 7! On top of that, the outer rudders have been re-coated with Trilux, because the primer doesn’t bond all that well to the stainless steel rudders and after 2-3 years it’s soon back to square one.

I’ve also spent two weeks working on the boat myself: optimised the watermaker plumbing and made the supply to the new inverter for the induction hob switchable, because the inverter stayed on all the time, turning battery capacity into heat 24 hours a day. A waste, obviously, so that’s sorted too. The headlining in the forward cabin has been refitted with some extra clips, so that’s secure again. Etcetera, etcetera, buy a boat, …

Meanwhile, at a yard like this you soon get chatting to people; I went out to dinner with an Englishman and his Austrian wife, and the most remarkable was a lunch with two Germans, Jan and Matthias. Matthias blew in here last December with a Lagoon 38. His engines needed servicing, and his new friend Jan, who has been living here for a few years (with a boat), knew a mechanic. Two months later his engines still weren’t back. The end of the story was that his engines came back in even worse shape and he was €5,000 lighter. So now he’s had the yard itself fit new engines. Now I understood why Tiago, the yard manager, had explained that he doesn’t just let outside contractors in: bad experiences. Jan, who has lived here for five years, was keen to take us (Matthias, Wim and me) to lunch on the south side. And afterwards to an “illegal” fishing village where you can drink a drink made of “liquid”, and after the third one you can only tell the truth…. Okay…. On the way he showed us a fort from the First World War. Nice, because it’s unrestored and in a beautifully dilapidated state. Apparently there was never a steel shortage, because the old cannons were still there. Then a lovely meal at a restaurant where really no English was spoken and where, according to Jan, you could only pay cash. But decline has set in here too: they now took cards as well. He was visibly upset. In the meantime we got his entire life story, with jobs, houses and assorted girlfriends. Parties with booze and drugs during Covid. In short, a man of the flamboyant type. We thought he had a girlfriend, but as it happened she was eating at the same restaurant with her father, and that’s when he told us they were currently having a little time apart. He liked his girlfriends the way he liked his coffee. (… I won’t explain that any further here, you’ll have to work it out yourself…)

Anyway, after a very convivial afternoon we rolled back to the boat stuffed to the gills, and not much else got done that day… It only occurred to us afterwards that he knew nothing about us; he never asked.

Tomorrow morning Wim and I fly home together with TAP. I’ll be away for 3 weeks, then I’ll come back here to carry on with the preparations before Koen and Saskia arrive in the second week of October to sail to Madeira together.