After France, and even the coast of Spain, Portugal is pretty sparsely populated with suitable stopping places for cruising yachts. So we found ourselves with some long hops to make to reach the next night’s berth. On the upside, we found that we were putting lots of miles behind us an the target of reaching Gibraltar by mid-September was starting to look easy. At 67 miles, the run from Leixos to Figuero do Foz was one of the longer ones and also one of the least eventful. The light wind was almost on the bow so the sails weren’t much help and, once again, the engine did all the work. It was an easy passage with a few dolphins for company for a while and “George” the autopilot doing the helming work for us. We talked briefly to a Canadian on a British flagged boat that we overtook named Onegin (apparently and disappointingly not pronounced One Gin) and agreed to meet up for a drink if we happened to arrive in the same port. Figueira da Foz is located on the Mondego river with the marina lying on the right bank a short way up the river conveniently placed for an easy walk into town. After a quick look around we had dinner on the boat and turned in for the night with another long day ahead of us.
Sailing Synergy 