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  • Day 42

    Windy Muros

    July 5, 2016 in Spain ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    We had our alarms set for 06.30 for a 07.00 start to make an early start to get up to Camarinas, about forty miles to the north of us.
    I was looking forward to rounding Cape Finisterre and getting to Camarinas where we’ll be spending two nights as we get the boat ready for the last leg of the voyage home. Finisterre means ‘The end of the earth’. Imagine being able to say you sailed around the end of the earth?

    However I was awake long before the alarm and was gloomily listening to the wind whistling in the rigging in between Paddy’s snores. Tony like me had a broken night’s sleep and I later discovered that he too had been listened to the wind.

    It had been windy yesterday but as it's usual for the wind to die down during the night, we had been hoping to take advantage of the lull and get half the journey done before the wind came up again about 11.00. Unfortunally the wind doesn't seem to have eased this time.

    Soon after, Paddy's alarm went off and I stuck my head out of the hatch to check the wind both on my face and on the wind instrument. It was in the low twentys and gusty.
    I had been checking forecasts on the iPad while lying in my berth and the new forecast had increased the wind speeds for today and tomorrow. If we didn’t leave now we were stuck till Thursday but could we leave?
    It was looking like Cascais all over again.

    Following a short crew conference we decided it would be safer to stay put and instead leave for Ireland from Muros when the wind died down on Thursday.
    There was no dissenting voices so we went back to bed and slept for another few hours.
    Even though we were now in Spain, the Portuguese Trades just will not let go!

    When we did get up, the crew were back to their usual good form.
    When they were not bitching about each other, they were bitching about me!
    There were even murmurings about Captain Bligh not being a fictional character and that he mightn't be the last skipper to be set adrift.

    We had a lazy morning preparing for the voyage home and made a list of jobs that had to be done before leaving. Basically, Tony and Paddy were going to do the jobs ashore while I did the ones aboard. Most of the provisioning we were leaving till tomorrow.

    One of the crew made a lovely salad for lunch which we ate in sun in the cockpit.

    Sometime during the day I discovered that Tony had done Spanish to leaving certificate standard while I, with a failed intermediate cert, was the one that was trying to translate as we went along.
    The crew must have being having a good laugh about that! We now have a new translator whether he likes it or not.

    We spent the afternoon wandered around Muros sussing out where we'd be getting things tomorrow.

    After showering we headed to last night’s restaurant for dinner but as often happens a second visit is never as good as the first.
    We chilled out over a few pints and as we were going nowhere tomorrow there were no alarms set.
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