Marina Quinte do Lorde, Madeira Oct. 9, 2005 Hi Folks, We are secure in this marina on Madeira while Judy’s Dad is visiting for a couple of weeks. He is staying in a timeshare condo 25 kilometres down the coast. We had a great 500 mile sail from Lisbon (actually Cascais, a suburb of Lisbon on the coast) to Porto Santo, one of the Madeira Islands. Yes! We actually sailed all the way with 15 to 25 knot winds abeam and astern. It was heavy going with 3 metre quartering seas, but we flew along at hull speed 24 hours a day, with a double reefed main and full or reefed genoa. It was great to be in constant trade winds from the north or northwest as we were headed southwest. The second night we furled the genoa as the wind was astern, and we didn’t want to risk wing on wing with the whisker pole at night. However the third night we left the whisker pole up and sailed for over 36 hours, wing on wing, in reliable 20 knot winds. For passage making I am happy if we sail 100 nautical miles a day. On this passage we averaged over 125 miles each day. More about this fast passage in the relevant log. I am sending a picture of the dramatic rocky shoreline along which we anchored as described in this log for those of you on my pictures address list. We will stay in Madeira until about Oct. 21 when after Judy’s dad leaves, we will then head down to the Canary Islands, a 250 mile passage. I hope you enjoy this log about our arrival in the lower or southern rias (Rias Baixas). All the best, Aubrey ****************************************************************************** Log # 36d La Coruna to the Rias Sept. 1, 2005 we left La Coruna for a 36 mile motor down to Laxe (Lage in Spanish). Enroute we caught a fishing line on our prop and I went in to clear it off. The prop would still rotate, but had a bad vibration and so it was better to clear it than just leave it until our next anchorage. We anchored off the nice sandy beach of Laxe (43 degrees 13.22’N, 009 degrees 00.15’W) but did not bother to go ashore, motoring next day 18 miles down to the large Ria de Camarinas. We actually had some heavy force 6 winds around Cape Villano and had a double reefed genoa out for a half hour. We went up the ria, past the town of Camarinas, past the smelly fish canning factory, to anchor in Punta Lingundia (43 degrees 08.24’N, 009 degrees 10.11’W). Once or twice during the evening shifting winds brought the smell of the fish plant across to us, but otherwise it was a lovely secluded anchorage with no other boats around and just the treed shoreline converging up a small inlet to a stream at the inner end. The only signs of civilization were wind generator blades from an adjacent wind farm protruding above the crest line. We took a long enjoyable two mile dinghy ride up one of the rivers, Rio de Puente de Puerto, to the town of the same name. Coming back the tide was ebbing and we saw several shallows and rocks that we did not see on our way upstream. We enjoyed the isolation of the anchorage. At most anchorages we have a million dollar vista to enjoy, another of the joys of cruising. Off next day we rounded Cape Torinana, the westernmost cape of Spain (43 degrees 03.52’N, 009 degrees 18.53’W), and went around the fabled Cape Finisterre, a high barren promontory topped with an isolated lighthouse, Galicia’s version of England’s Lands End, to anchor off the lackluster town of Finisterre (Fisterra in Galician) in gray overcast drizzly conditions (42 degrees 54.68’N, 009 degrees 15.50’W). It was a Sunday and everything was closed up. We stayed well inside the traffic separation zones, and saw no upbound or downbound shipping. The British yacht Yvonne was at anchor there as well, and we were to see them again at the next port after we motored the 19 miles down to the anchorage at Muros. This next stretch down to Muros is the beginning of the four great estuaries of Galicia’s southern coast, known as the Rias Baixas (Rias Bajas in Castilian Spanish), the lower rias. This first one, Ria de Muros, is an estuary about 8 miles in depth and two miles wide with a half dozen bays and five major towns nestled along the two sides. We anchored off Muros (42 degrees 46.79’N, 009 degrees 03.55’W), north of the breakwater and small fishing harbour, and took Sprite into town to get some supplies and send some E-mail. It is a pleasant town, divided by a drying tidal stream, the quaint old town on one side and the newer one on the other, joined by a couple of flower-bedecked bridges for local and pedestrian traffic. The newer side is favoured by a large expanse of sandy beach while the harbour and fish docks are part of the picturesque cobblestoned narrow-streeted old town. The other three estuaries are Ria de Arosa, Ria de Pontevedra, and Ria de Vigo where our last Spanish port of call will be Bayona. These are all large rias with many bays and anchorages from which to choose, a difference from the smaller northern rias where there was only one tidal river, with wide drying banks, and few narrow deeper channels. These rias are not like Norwegian fiords; they are far wider with gently sloping pastoral land and beaches sustaining many fishing, farming, and industrial communities, with tourism and vacation properties expanding prospects. The islands off-lying the lower three rias are part of a national park and provide some stunning scenery, conservation trails, and pristine geography. We enjoyed these last three rias most of all our coastal cruising of Atlantic northern Spain. Next day, Sept. 5, was clear and sunny with the wind not against us for the first time in a couple of weeks. We actually motorsailed for several hours and sailed with the engine off for an hour as we made our way into the shoal-strewn Ria de Arosa, past hundreds of viveros (floating shellfish farms, large wooden rafts about 30 metres square, anchored to the bottom with a latticework of timbers from which long oiled hemp lines support strings of mussels) to Santa Eugenia de Riveira (Santa Uxia de Ribeira in Galician) where we anchored off the beach just north of the new marina (42 33.89’N, 08 59.19’W). The marina looked to have good facilities, and next day I took Sprite in to fill up a couple of jerry cans with diesel. We wandered around the town waterfront by the marina, but were not impressed, and so left next morning to head across the ria to Isla de Arosa. Weaving 5 miles between several shoals and viveros, we nestled inside a small bay on the west side of Isle de Arosa with a pine covered beach, protected by a fantastic rock promontory south of us, an idyllic anchorage (42 degrees 33.89’N, 008 degrees 59.19’W) off a conservation area. We haven’t been in any anchorage so spectacular since the Magdalena Islands of Sardinia or the Benjamin Islands of Lake Huron in Ontario. We spent two days in this picturesque well-sheltered anchorage beachcombing along the fine sandy waterline (made more interesting by a couple of topless bathers), and scampering through the fantastic rocky landscape, with spectacular boulders worn smooth from the elements and stretches of undulating granite finely ground as if by glaciation. We took Sprite on an interesting 10 mile circumnavigation around this large island, puttering around a wide seascape of boulder-strewn capes, through rocky shoals, extended tidal shallows, fishing harbours, and observed many types of aquaculture. The fishing ranged from a few sport fishermen in yachts; to locals in wooden dories line jigging, bottom dragging, or hauling nets by hand; to large crane-bedecked mussel gathering vessels alongside viveros, hauling up coils of the shellfish. These larger vessels would then head over to Porto O Xufre, the fishing village on the island, where their cargo would be hauled out into dump trucks which would take it to the local mussel canning factory for further processing. The area was quite active with large and small fishing boats coming and going. The east side of the island is connected to the mainland by the O Vado bridge, a high two kilometre long structure spanning an extended shallow patch that dries at low tide. We had to take Sprite out to midchannel to get through. We then saw a string of open skiffs, 50 to 100 in number, stretched along several kilometres of shoreline. We went inside them and realized they were all linked together, and the two or three men in each were busy raking the seabed with 20 metre long flexible poles attached to open baskets, dragged along, scooping up other shellfish (tellines, cockles, clams) from the bottom. On we went, completing the circumnavigation, rounding the craggy points, exploring a couple of shoal and seaweed infested small bays on the south side before rounding the dramatic boulder-strewn promontory protecting Veleda’s anchorage. It was a long but interesting and exhilarating exploration in Sprite. Next day we were off, anchoring for lunch at the Island of Ons off a topless beach before heading into the Ria de Pontevedro. Next log