The journey from the Lisbon estuary to the south coast of Portugal is just over 100 nm, and it’s conveniently split in half by an anchorage and marina in the fishing village and oil town of Sines. That means two daysails, with the advantages of both leaving and arriving during daylight, as well as avoiding an overnight passage.
The wind cooperated, with 15-20 kts of steady breeze on the beam, and Oso was in her element. Speeds were steady from 8.5 to 9.5 kts, with a few peaks above 10 kts. Fantastic sailing, only spoiled by an unruly 10’/3m sea state, and a few squalls that either made the wind gusty or completely sucked it away for an hour or so.
It was during one of the squall-induced lulls that we saw a pair of tall, curved fins approaching. Already on edge from numerous reports of boats losing their rudders, and even sinking, because of orca interactions, we were out of the cockpit and peering over the edge of the boat in a flash.
Sure enough, the fins circled back to the stern of the boat, and the distinctive white patch on the side revealed the animals as orcas. Luckily for us, they swam near the rudder for what only seemed like a few seconds before turning and swimming north. Perhaps our rudder isn’t the right flavor, or they weren’t feeling playful enough, or they’d already had enough hunting practice – whatever the reason we were very, very happy and relieved that they weren’t interested in our boat, leaving both us and them to continue on our way.
A few hours later, with the very choppy seas common around headlands and capes, Oso rounded Cape St Vincent, famous both for the epic sea battle in the late 1700s and for being the gateway to the Algarve region.
It’s good to be here.
