Cascais and Figueira da Foz

1 June 2024 – Figueira da Foz, Portugal

While waiting for the weather to turn around, we stayed in Cascais, just outside of Lisbon, for four nights. Though Cascais has a large bay to anchor in, we witnessed a surprising amount of drama once the wind started blowing over twenty knots. First, a hundred-eighty-five foot old fashioned schooner came super close to us to drop their anchor as they Mediterranean moored against the megayachts dock. My dad was home alone and he panicked a bit but once they were properly moored they were a good distance away. My mom, Jonas, Sirius and I came back to the boat with falafel wraps and we were just sitting down to eat when the schooner started dragging and came towards us as they pulled up their anchor. They had a massive bowsprit and were drifting sideways in our direction; it looked like Festina Lente was about to get impaled. We ran into the cockpit and my dad turned on the engine just in case, but in the end a pilot boat came out to push them away and nothing ended up happening.

185 foot schooner and Festina Lente – Cascais, Portugal

We returned to our falafel wraps when a charter boat came out of the marina and anchored a little ways in front of us after getting their bowsprit jammed into one of the fishing boats moored nearby. Then a second charter boat came and rafted on them, then a third and a fourth. It was really blowing by now and they were all sort of crookedly tied together and slowly dragging backwards towards us. In the end they didn’t hit us but slid beside us a bit before their anchor caught – it was so stuck they had to abandon it and send someone to dive for it the next morning.

Also in Cascais, Jonas caught a spider crab and a sea bass off the breakwall and my dad took the spinnaker to be repaired. I broke my book buying ban, which had held for a surprisingly long time – because there are so many tourists in town, there were a lot of English language books and I couldn’t resist.

Spider crab and sea bass – Cascais, Portugal

Eventually the north wind grew light enough for us to sail to Figueira da Foz, where we stayed for a week. Anchoring is not allowed in port so we had to stay at the marina, which felt luxurious. Power and water were included so we used this opportunity to deal with a laundry backlog and did ten washes.

Math homework at sea – off the coast of Portugal

White-sided dolphin – off the coast of Portugal

We had done a pit stop in Figueira da Foz in September on our way down this coast and didn’t think that much of it, probably because we barely walked around and left early the next morning. It turns out that Figueira da Foz is actually quite a nice town: old brightly coloured buildings, cafés at every corner, and a great walking path along the coast. Unfortunately Sirius has decided that he isn’t built for anything except lounging about in the sun so we didn’t get much walking done. There is a large market right across from the marina, selling produce, fish, ceramics, baked goods, and more. One stall was filled with rows and rows of dried fruit and herbs, from which we bought several bags.

While in Figueira da Foz, my dad and Jonas re-bedded the aft midships cleats and the some of the stanchions, caulked one of the deck saloon windows, tested the air conditioners (successful), and tried to fix the freezer (unsuccessful). We went to a café for breakfast and my mom and Jonas went to the beach one afternoon.

Off the coast of Portugal

Eventually the weather pattern changed to be slightly more favourable, becoming lighter and offshore in the mornings. We will hopefully be able to travel every morning this week, getting into port before the wind switches to be more on the nose in the afternoon. Today, we are headed to Saõ Jacinto.