Its a Dogs Life!

Had my last run on the beach for about 4 or 5 days. It all depends on the winds.

The humans are fickle about winds. They do not want the winds too strong and then moan when they are too light. We are sailing along with the foresail (front sail) poled out and averaging 4-6 knots. We all hope this will continue.

Being at sea is ok when the weather is like it is today. The sun is shining and the waves are not too bad. But best of all we can catch tuna! I get so excited when they catch one. I know sashumi is on my menu. They have even caught me licking the dying fish in anticipation. They have caught one 6 lb tuna so far on the ‘lucky lure’.

Now if I tell you what the humans lucky lure is…you have to promise to keep it a secret…and not tell another soul. Can’t have you other dogs and humans catching all my tuna. The ‘lucky lure’ is a plastic yellow and blue squid trailing a hook on a 4 m clear leader. But here is the secret: tied onto the end of the squid lurer is another 3 m of clear leader with a silver spoon. Two lurers for the price of one! We have had fish grab both. There is a smallish weight added to the start of the first leader just to keep them below the surface.

Needless to say, with fair winds and good fishing, the humans will be dinning in style…and I am sure I am invited. 3 or 4 more days to go.

Dogs are allowed on the train in Portugal, so I got to come to Lisbon with the humans. The train from the Cascais to Lisbon is 4,60 euros return, dogs ride free, and it follows the coast right into the centre of town.

It was a still and misty morning, so we had no view on the way out, but the sea mist had cleared by the time we headed home and we finally got to see all the castles, fortifications, monuments and bridges that line the route up river into Lisbon.

Our first stop was the Praca do Comercio. This 18th century arcade would have greeted all who arrived by sea to Lisbon.

The cobbled city streets behind the arcade are lined with umbrella covered tables outside cafes and restaurants.

Just off of this we found the odd looking Elevador de Santa Justa. Built by the apprentice to the Eiffel tower, they share many similarities.

Rather then paying for the ride up we hiked up to the hill and enjoyed a commanding view from it’s platform.

We explored the winding narrow streets and were charmed by the fountain filled squares.

We then headed to the eastern end of and town and up to the castle and hill top fortifications.

 

We were a little taken aback that they wanted 7,50 euros each to enter the area, but I understand that includes a museum and commanding views of the city.

If you are not up to the walking and hill climbing the city has trams you can ride. No dogs allowed though.

We were a little surprised by how much graffiti and litter covered the homes and streets. It did smell a bit too, maybe we have been in the clean ocean air too long. We are glad now we stayed in the clean and free anchorage in Cascais and just visited by train.

In closing notes, not all the graffiti in Lisbon was ugly. Some of it was quite artistic.

We have only given our opinion of Lisbon on a misty damp day.  Our neighbours loved Lisbon and went back by train to explore it everyday for 6 days.  Maybe we were a bit spoilt by other towns and cities that we liked better.

We spoke to another boat that stayed in the Marina in the town centre.  They felt the Marina was noisey, dirty, smelly, expensive and had rubbish facilities.

No

We did not sail our boat inland….

We took the bus.

We went to the VERY touristy town of Sintra in the mountains above the coast.

 

No, I did not get to go this time, because dogs are not allowed on the bus.

I got left behind on the boat to watch the weekend day trippers make a mess of anchoring….more on that later.

But the humans brought back pictures and told me all about it.

 

The first story was of their bus ride.  The bus was 4 euros each way per person.  Not as cheap as the train, but not expensive either.  But the bus drivers are MAD!

The humans took the longer scenic bus that followed the coast and hit the pennisila that claims to be the ‘furthest westerly point’ in Europe.  They do not reccommend that bus if you are at all afraid of heights or nervous of speeding down narrow streets.  Even the return journey on the inland bus was ‘hairy’.

If you are a nervous person take the train to Lisbon and a connection to Sintra.

 

With that adventure survived the next was to wade through tons and tons of tourists wandering about town.  Admittedly the old town is very pretty.

 

There are lots of castle like estates with beautiful gardens.  One of the most famous ones is Quinta da Regaleira and it is open to the public.  The humans headed for this first and got stuck there all day.

 

 

It costs 6 euros to enter.  But the exit door is an unmanned, unlabeled wooden door just to the right of the entrance.  Next time!

I was told it was worth the 6 euros, but bring a torch for the caves.

 

 

The gardens are extensive and you have full run of them, the house, the caves, the grotto’s and loads of follies.

 

One of the best things about the gardens is the lack of ‘health and safety’.  You can climb turrets and hang off balconies.  You have steep stairways descending into black and complete cave networks with out a single light.  It took the humans the whole day to explore the gardens and they were glad of the packed lunch they brought along.

 

 

 

 

 

I was happy to have them back on the boat, but it was short lived as a power boat snagged the trip line of a neighbouring sail boats anchor.  The power boat proceeded to drag the sail boat out to sea.  Into the dingy and abandoning me again, they went off to save the sail boat from drifting with no owners aboard.  The power boat cut the line free fo their props and the humans got a load of chain down to hold the boat where it settled.

 

They were just about to sort out a trip line for themselves.

We had seen a lot of boats use them and we liked the idea of knowing exactly where our anchor was in relations to our boat and new arrivals.  We had to start our engine, last night, and reverse to let a boat who had anchored across our chain pick up his anchor after the wind changed direction.

They have decided, after seeing people try to:

-moor to anchor trip line boys,

-pick up anchor trip line boys because they think they are floating fenders,

-and of course now we have seen someone drive over the line and lift the anchor by accident with their props.

So we have decided that the disadvantages of an anchor trip line out weight the advantages.

Then finally I got my run on the beach.  Heaven is a tennis ball!

 

Well they sent me out to sea again.

 

 

South down the coast of Portugal from the fishing harbour of Peniche to the anchorage off of Cascais.

I do not know if it was;

the weight of all the canned goods they bought at LIDL’s, and stuffed in the bilges,

or the longer wave length (12s);

but it was a much more pleasant sail.

It was a gentler roll, and we were able to ‘goose wing’, sails out either side, all the the way to Cascais.

 

Just as we were accepting the fact that we would make another port in the dark the winds picked up.  In no time we were surfing down the waves at over 9 knots.  Pretty good for our old heavy boat.  This meant we were able to make Cascais before dark and have the dying light to help us pick a good spot to anchor.

 

 

Cascais’s anchorage is more of a nook in the rocky cliffs of the peninsula then a harbour.  The breakwater of the Marina on the West offers additional protections from the winds and swell.

 

 

 

The sea side summer resort homes and buildings are built on the tops of the natural cliffs and added wall fortifications.  The base of the cliffs are littered with clean sandy beaches.

The anchorage is very popular with vessels of all sizes and the fisherman are courteous enough to travel through them slowly.  A stark difference to the fishing port of Peniche.

We just arrived last night and I am dying for them to take me for a run.  I know they are delaying to see where everyone else lands their dingys to get ashore.

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We asked the neighbours and we can tie dingys up to the fishermans pontoon as long as we stay on the ends out of their way.

 

The town has some nice buildings.

And examples of Portugese tile work.

 

 

Like many towns along this coast it is fortified against attack.

 

The town has quiet residencial streets.

And busy touristy streets.

 

Do not forget all the tourist tat as well.

And there are lots of streets inbetween.

The town overlooks a multiple of beaches and the anchorage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We snuck out of Nazare in the early hours. The humans realized, in the morning light, that they had moored up in a private Marina on the wrong side of the port. How they got themselves backwards, I will never know? So they rushed me out early in the morning before anyone arrived to tell them off.

As the sun was rising we could see Nazare on the hill top above the beaches. It looked really cool. Maybe next time round we will visit.

Leaving early, did mean we made the next port early. This made a nice change, since we have crept in after dark at the last few ports. This also gave us the rest of the day to have a look around the town.

Peniche has a nice collection of forts and baroque churches. The city is fortified by cliffs to the sea and town walls up the river that crosses through it into the sea on the other side. It really makes the peninsula more of an island if it were not for the bridges and low tide. The beach on the other side of town is quite impressive with at least 2 surf school we saw.

 

 

 

I enjoyed running around the beach, but the humans got all excited about a discount food shop called Lidl’s. Some thing about stocking back up on canned and frozen food for cheap. They also found a shop that sold Camping Gas and the bottles for a reasonable price. Both are reasonable here because the Government subsidies it.

The port and the Marina docks with in it are nothing to write home about. The sea wall offers great protection from the waves outside, but not from the wake of huge fishing boats that tear through the harbour at full speed. We are lucky as one of the harbour patrol boats is in for a service and we have stolen his spot on the inside of the visitors pontoon. I would not want to be on the outside of the pontoon as the wake from the boats hits everyone.

It is still very awful out their with high waves. Some people say it is the remains of Hurricane Nadine, others say it is the result of low pressure systems trapped over Britain due to the jet stream moving south. Who knows. Short trips down the coast are all we fancy until it settles. The humans want to remain here another day to stock up and see if the waves soften a bit.