Nazaré

Today we placed a bet and we went all in 🃏. We bet on the fact that we wind would shift from a south western to a western direction. The shift should would start further down south around noon. For us, it would probably shift around 2 p.m. According to the predictions 2 o'clock turned into 4 o'clock, which turned into 5 o'clock, which in the end turned out to be 7 p.m. By the time the wind had shifted we had already spent close to 45 of nautical miles tacking and we were almost there. We think in the end we motor sailed about 50 instead of the 35 nautical miles we set out. We definitely lost our bet. Oh well, we have to try it every now and then.

It does mean that we are now officially in the Valhalla of surfers: Nazaré. We mostly hoped there would be any of the magnificent waves by the time we arrived. The waves here are so big because there is a big trough (trog) very close to the beaches of Nazaré. Which makes that within less than a mile the water depth goes from 150+ to 20 or less. Since we arrived in the dark we were extra happy there weren't any big waves when we entered the area. Instead we were welcomed by another fog party. But we made it!

The next day we went into town a bit before setting off to Peniche. There is supposed to be an escalator that takes you literally up town. Since we were covered in fog again, and expected we wouldn't be able to see anything anyways, we skipped this one. The parts of Nazaré we saw were very much accommodated to the summer surf tourists again. Also, as most of the towns we visit, a lot of the town's history lies in the fishing industry. And they seem to have a bit of a cat problem. Since we saw so many stray cats, who are able to stay in some sort of diy cat hotels. We didn't love it, so back to the Nimrod we went for another day of cruising.Read more