Thanking Day
During the night the wind got up- not forecast so an early hour visit was made to the deck to bring in washing and to tie down the paddle board and to let the dinghy back behind the boat so it was not rubbing on the side.
The day started with it being quite muggy with early mist and a cloudy sky which we were not used to. So I did a few jobs, fixing the forepeak bunk and preparing the cabins for the next crews arrival. Although we had named Puffin we had not properly launched her and so we got everything out but unfortunately the fixing at the bottom of the mast needed securing further so all we could do was to row which was still nice. She looked good in the water with her white hull and blue line around – just like Stormbird. She sat in the water proudly with Puffin in white on both sides on the blue line and then in blue on the white stern t/t Stormbird. Puffin is a pram wooden dinghy which means she is in two bits and when unassembled the front section fits into the stern. When assembling you bolt the parts together. This saves space on deck and enables us to have a sailing dinghy with us. It was good assembled that she was not leaking. By about 11.00am normal weather of sunny blue sky resumed and it became very hot as there was no breeze.
We were still trying to confirm a mooring at certain marinas so that we could change crews near Huelva but they only spoke Spanish and despite using google translate they did not reply to our emails. I therefore contacted Keith Watson – who was coming out to crew next to ask if his wife who spoke Spanish could help. In any event we wanted to move on as we needed to empty our holding tanks (sewage) and we needed to make water as our water supply was low. So we decided to go to Tavira some 18-20 miles away and still part of the Ria Formosa and an old Roman town.
As we headed out of the Faro entrance again there was a 2m swell- not sure why as there was no wind. We kept in about 20-25m of water and we soon emptied our tanks and the water maker got to work.
On the way we passed numerous lobster pots, fishing nets, tuna nets, farms – some of which had black markers and on first glance you thought – that looks like a pod of Orcas. Luckily it was not. The tuna nets are marked by yellow cardinals and some are quite close to the shore. Most of the time you can go between the net and the shore in settled conditions. We then came across a large pod of dolphins fishing and it was great to see them frolicking about and jumping. The water maker was working overtime.
After a few hours we came across the Tavira entrance which was a narrow breakwater corridor entrance and it had a sandbar. The river itself is quite shallow -2-3m which is an issue for us (as we draw 2.5m) but there were some 5m bits and we hoped there would be some space for us to anchor. The swell pushed us through the entrance and the depth at one point reached 3.7m at one point. As we entered the river it was clear that the anchor areas shown in the Pilot book were all now taken by moorings and it looked full. This is what is now happening to anchorages throughout the world and Tom Cunliffe is not impressed about this development. We inched down the shallow river being passed regularly by ferries and water taxis. It was not obvious where we could go and we had no plan B. We saw a spare mooring buoy so took it but it was not clear what tonnage this buoy could take. A water taxi man came up and told us that we were too big for the buoy and the only chance was to anchor near the entrance. By this time the chicken supper was in the oven and we then made 2 attempts to anchor so that when we swung with the tide we would not go aground. This was quite tight but our second attempt was good and we were almost at high tide. We would have to set an alarm for low water 3.00am to check then that we would be ok. Anchoring can often be a worry. So we had a beer on the deck watching all the ferries and activities in the river being thankful that we had a space and we enjoyed our supper even more.
As I checked my phone there had been an Orca attack at the Faro entrance at about 5.20pm that day about an hour and a half after we had left and we thanked our lucky stars that this was not us. We had passed the exact point ourselves a little earlier than the attack. We were thankful that it had been another good day.
If you have any questions, comments, suggestions – do email me on hine.nick9@gmail.com