Zia had the pleasure of spending nearly a month in Portugal this summer. As usual, we didn’t see everything that we wanted to, but we made the most of our time there and really enjoyed it. We sailed south from Baiona, Spain, on a 22-hour passage to Peniche on July 27th. Our original destination was Sao Martino do Porto, a few miles north, but the swells were too big to enter the cove, so we continued on to the next reasonable stopping place.

Although not a particularly attractive village, we found plenty to keep us busy in Peniche.  We stayed at the marina for only 23 Euros a day (gotta love Portugal!) so we had easy access to shoreside activities.  The girls could scooter along the boardwalk within view of the boat, enjoying a little bit of freedom from old Mom and Dad.  Town was a short walk away, with a myriad of restaurants to choose from. Peniche is a bit of a tourist town, but is filled mostly with Portuguese and Spanish tourists. There are many nice beaches, including a surfing beach on the other side of the peninsula. The water was clean and jellyfish-free.

One of the highlights of our time there was the day trip into Obidos. Obidos is a tiny village, about one square mile in area, enclosed on a hilltop by an old Moorish wall.  Although it is not accessible by boat and there was no mention of it in our cruising guides, we had heard from several sources that it is a must-see.  We ventured off to the bus station in the company of a few fellow cruisers.

The 45-minute bus ride deposited us at the foot of a staircase that led up to the entrance through the wall and into the old city walls.  Although a huge tourist attraction, the crowds did not detract one bit from the sheer beauty of the place.  We set out to walk around the top of the old walls, with many cautions sternly delivered to the kids, as the inside of the wall lacked a railing in most places.  The views made up for all the anxiety.  Inside the walls the red tile roofs and whitewashed buildings gleamed in the sunlight. The surrounding countryside revealed neat rows of crops in a patchwork of fields decorating the gently rolling hills.  This tiny little village was just as lovely centuries ago.  

In 1282, King Dinis presented the fief to Queen Isabel as a wedding present.  For the next 600 years, every Portuguese monarch continued the tradition, and the area became known as Casa das Rainhas, the House of Queens.  Today, aside from the lovely walk around the walls, legions of visitors stream through the streets, which are lined with restaurants, cafes and shops.  I found myself imagining what it would be like to live in a little walled city like this (minus the hoards of tourists, of course).

There isn’t a whole lot along the Portuguese Coast between Peniche and Cascais, so when we had seen all there was to see in Peniche, we cast off on a six-hour trip down to Cascais. The easy trip south ended with a windy approach to the harbor. We decided to anchor among a few other cruising boats in the busy fishing harbor.  The mountains surrounding the area make for a pretty good funnel for the northeasterly wind. Joe went and checked us in with the local authorities but we decided to hang on the boat for dinner, just to make sure our anchor was solid.  The holding proved to be fine for our trusty spade anchor, although we did see another boat drag during a particularly gusty period.

Cascais is a wonderful town to explore in its own right, and we spent our first day touring locally, stopping by the tourist office to get the lay of the land and to find out about the trains going into Lisbon.  We found some glorious parks, a maritime museum and many great views of the harbor and beaches.

The train into Lisbon runs frequently. The station is an easy walk from the public dock downtown where we tied up our dinghy. We did put out a stern anchor to keep it from drifting under the pier and getting trapped during the relatively large tides. We also locked it up, just in case!

The open-air bus tour of Lisbon and suburbs that we caught from the Praca do Comercio proved educational as well as beautiful.  We got to see all the sights without having to cajole the girls along.  There was obviously going to be way too much for us to see it all before we had to head south for the Algarve, so the two-hour guided overview made us feel a little better about our limited timeframe.  After an ice cream break, we made our last stop the Castelo de Sao Jorge located on a hill close to the Baixa district.  The views of the city from the restored Visigoth castle made the uphill trek worthwhile. 

We decided to devote our next day of touring to the Belem district, also a train ride away, and full of sites.  The Coach museum, Presidential Palace and the Monument to the Discoveries were all within walking distance.  I felt a certain kinship with the legendary Portuguese explorers honored in the monument.  Although our adventures were much more modest in scale, we are traveling the same waters as they did so many years ago.           

The Mosteiro dos Jeronimos, dating from 1496, astounded us with its intricate Manueline architecture, and we loved the Torre de Belem, a fort built around the same period to guard the river passage into Lisboa.  This was about as full a day of touring as any of us were ready for and we were thrilled to find a taxi for the last part of our trek to the train station. 

After too little time, we had to head out for an overnight sail to Alvor, where we were scheduled to meet family.  More light winds accompanied us south around the southwestern-most cape in Portugal, Cabo de Sao Vicente. The cliffs and caves that line the coast made a beautiful backdrop for a sunrise.

We had arranged for a family reunion in a little village called Alvor. The anchorage proved to be well protected in the middle of some tidal marshes. Although the approach is a little tricky getting around the sandbars, it is relatively well marked. It is best to enter at high tide to avoid the many shoals. Be careful as you enter through the breakwaters. Just inside there is a nasty shoal area that reaches across the right side of the channel.

The city itself turned out to be in the heart of the tourist area of the Algarve and full of vacationing British families. The whole area is built around the tourist industry and everyone speaks English. Taxis are cheap and plentiful, as are restaurants and bars. The beaches are quite crowded, but there are a few that are only accessible by boat and are spectacular. There are a few tourist attractions to see by land, but we spent our time hanging with family so bypassed them. It was a welcome surprise when our guests’ favorite pastime turned out to be daysailing on Zia!

If you are a windsurfing or kiteboarding fan, Alvor is a perfect location. We saw scores of people out playing in the steady 20 knot breeze.

Forty-five miles to the east, the bigger city of Faro and the "fishing village" of Olhao share a similar geography, lying behind a crescent-shaped expanse of marshland about 9 miles long and 3 miles at its widest.  A series of barrier islands, unique to this part of the Algarve coast, protects the whole area from the ocean swell. The terrain throughout is a waffled pattern of land and sea that covers and uncovers with each tide.  The channels into both towns, Faro to the west and Olhao to the east, are long and narrow, with wicked currents and, at least for us, strong winds.  Luckily, they are well marked and easy to find, especially if you have traveled them once. 

We opted for Olhao over Faro based on the fact that the anchorage was right downtown, and the town itself was much smaller and, we hoped, less tourist-filled.  The anchorage proved to be one of our most challenging yet, starting from trying to find it.  The narrow channel ends at the ferry dock, with a marina to the west and the anchorage just beyond it.  No more than 40 feet off the 250-yard pier of the marina, at either end of it, are a couple of red buoys marking the channel into the anchorage (red being on the LEFT!).  With the wind pushing us into the pier, a sportfisher tying up along the outside of it, and a wicked sandbar just to the south, we made our way west to the small anchorage area right off market square.  

Our next challenge was getting our anchor to hold in the mud.  We tried twice to set it, with the wind gusting up to 25 knots and blowing us all over the place.  We would hold for a little bit but as soon as Joe backed down with the engines over 2500 rpm, we'd start to slide.  There really weren't too many choices in terms of spots to try, so we decided to haul out our spare Danforth anchor, supposedly excellent for mud, and shackle it to our anchor chain just inboard of our Spade.  It worked like a charm and we didn't budge even up to 3000 rpms.  We felt much better a few days later as we watched another, smaller catamaran come in and try to find holding at least a dozen times before they finally hauled out their Danforth and found the secret!

Olhao is billed as an authentic Portuguese fishing town.  The sprawling development that mars the coast to the east has seemingly halted at Faro.  Long a favorite vacation destination for Portuguese from all over the country, and hordes of British in search of the sun, the Algarve started regulating development along the coast after it was much too late for most of the western portion, but there is hope for the area west of Faro.  Given the geographic challenge of getting to the beaches here, which has to be done by boat over the marshlands, your average tourist on holiday opts for the much more accessible beaches further west. 

Aside from authenticity, Olhao offers another huge bonus.  For the first time in a month and a half, we have found a great wireless Internet connection on the boat!  It struck us as very funny in this authentic Portuguese fishing village, but we have happily put up with the VERY BAD karaoke emanating from the cafes for five nights in a row in order to enjoy the limitless connection time.  It is amazing what you forget to do when you are sitting in front of your computer at an Internet cafe.  Having it right here on the boat is such a treat, although we might have to resort to working out a timetable for computer usage between the adults onboard! 

There are many remote anchorages in the huge tidewater area between Faro and Olhao. For various reasons, we stayed put in town, but there were other cruisers enjoying the seclusion of the barrier islands. Of the few places in Portugal that we stopped, I would put this on the top of the list.