This voyage, at 775nm on the rhumb line, was about the same length as the leg from the Bahamas to Bermuda, but it also presented some unique challenges.  The most significant challenge was to properly navigate the Portuguese Trade Winds and the Portuguese current.  The trades are created by two semi-permanent weather systems during the summer months.  Normally there is a thermal low pressure system over Iberia during the summer, similar to the thermal low pressure system over the SW United States.  Also the Azores-Bermuda high pressure ridge lies just off-shore of Iberia.  These two systems produce a funnel of northerly winds and current down the coast from Finisterre to Cabo de Sao Vicente.  When the two systems are particularly strong these trade winds can reach gale force.

Therefore the navigation objective is to normally to approach the coast of Portugal some distance north of the destination.  For us the destination was the Rio Tejo and Lisbon.  Our initial stop was to be Cascais at the mouth of the Tejo after which I planned to find a winter berth in the city of Lisbon.  As it turned out there was no space available for a winter berth in Lisbon and I had to accept a winter berth in the resort town of Cascais at a very high price.

Around 1400 on Thursday, August 25 we moved Sarah to the fuel dock at the Ponta Delgada Marina, toped off the tank and cleared customs for our departure to the mainland of Portugal.  Once out of the harbor we picked up a light NE breeze and set sail as Ponta Delgada receded behind us (photo by Mike Repass).

The NNE wind was not what we really wanted as we needed to get well north of the rhumb line course to Cascais to allow for the winds and current off the Portuguese coast which would push us strongly to the south.  Initially we were able to sail slightly above the rhumb line, but by the second day the wind had shifted more to the east and was forcing us sail well below the rhumb line.  At that point we had three choices, continue sailing to the south, tack to the NNW and give up some of the easting previously made, or turn on the engine and motor to the NE to find better winds.  In the end we elect to start motoring.  This was the first time since we departed the Bahamas that we were motoring in winds strong enough for sailing.  This made the use of the engine even more frustrating than normal.

Consequently, after about 15 hours of motoring to the NE, we shut down the engine and started sailing east as soon as we detected the wind had shifted slightly back to the north.  This wind shift did not last long and a few hours later we found ourselves sailing to the SE.  During this period I was having difficulty getting a good enough Winlink connection to download some of the weather documents I felt were important to our navigation, but I had enough data to know that the Portuguese Trade Winds were not in effect along the coast.  Still I expected those winds would re-establish over the next few days as we approached our destination.  So I believed it was essential for us to get as far to the north as possible before we entered the area of the Portuguese Trades.  For that reason we once more turned on the engine and motored off to the NE.  This time I was determined that we get as close to 40N as possible before we started sailing ESE toward the Rio Tejo.  This took over 40 hours of motoring to cover about 190 nm.  By the time we turned east and started sailing we had transferred all of the fuel stored on deck in Jerry Cans to the main fuel tank and were down to about 40 gallons in that tank.  With nearly 300 miles to go, we did not have sufficient fuel to motor all of the way.  Fortunately we had sufficient wind to sail much of the time over the next 48 hours.  Finally, about 120 nm off the coast we started to pick up the trades.  Initially the winds were barely 10 kts, but they slowly filled in to around 15 knots and we were able to sail all the way into the Rio Tejo and then motor into the Cascais Marina.

During the day the trades continued to fill in.  By that afternoon the trades were reinforced by Katabatic winds off the local hills and were blowing over 30 kts. in the Cascais area, justifying our efforts to avoid a close reach or beat into the Rio.

Here is a link to our log of the voyage in an Excel Workbook.

Below are some of the surface weather charts from the period of the trip.

In December I was visited by friends in Cascais we did a land tour of Portugal via rental car.

We waited for two more days before finally departing on the 25th.  We still had NE winds along our course, but they had diminshed somewhat as the pressure gradient weakened.  The Portuguese Trades had abated as well.  We didn't feel waiting a few more days would produce any great improvement, and with more than a 600 mile range under power in calm conditions we felt we could seek out position Sarah for better winds using the engine.

We were then encountering light NE winds which hampered our ability to get north of the rhumb line course and we had started to use the engine more and more.

So it was a great crew.

This wasn't a lot of fish, especially after I somewhat butchered the filleting.  With the landing of this fish I discovered that I really hadn't prepared a method for cleaning any fish we might catch.  Cleaning a slippery fish while on my knees on the deck (bottom picture) turned out to be a little more difficult than I anticipated.  Still I was able to remove two decent fillets from the fish, which we cooked a day or so later - it was delicious.

On our last night at sea we crossed the main shipping channels off the coast and encountered an almost continuous stream of freighters heading north and south.  It made for a series of very nervous watches, but at least we had no trouble staying awake that night.

Photo by Mike Repass

 I initially requested a berth for two nights to give me time to find a permanent berth nearer Lisbon for the winter.  The next day Steve and I took the train into Lisbon to check on the availability of a berth at the Doca da Alcantara marina near the city center and to do some sight-seeing. 

Photo by Mike Repass

The dock master at the Alcantara marina said he had no long term space as they were in the process of filling the marina with Portuguese boats.  Because of our mutual language limitations I did not get an explanation why this was being done, but I had heard from other cruisers that many of the marinas in Lisbon, other than Alcantara, were silting in very badly.  I suspect the marina operators were transferring boats from the silted marinas to allow them to dredge those marinas over the winter.

As a result there would be no winter berth for Sarah within the city limits of Lisbon.  Instead I would have to take a winter berth at Cascais at a significantly higher cost (€3,000 for six months) than the going rate almost anywhere else on the Portuguese coast.  Still this was less than I paid for a berth the previous winter in Fort Pierce, FL