Porto Santo to Quinta do Lorde, Madeira

Marina do Lorde at nightfall

This was just a day sail.

After a quick breakfast we hoisted the dinghy up and stowed it fully inflated on the foredeck, got the anchor up and headed for Marina do Lorde on the eastern end of Madeira. Our main reason for heading there was to undertake what is billed as a dramatic walk out on the spiny penninsula sticking out into the Atlantic Ocean. 

We had a light north easterly breeze and so had a very pleasant if rather slow sail there making an average of about 3 knots. One other boat left the anchorage after us and took a more southerly track. I assumed they were bound for Ilhas Desertas but when we arrived, the Swiss boat, Migaloo as it turned out had come here too. 

The major event of the passage for me was being trailed by a pod of small whales for about 10 minutes. They were very similar to pilot whales but a bit bigger and were a grey/brown colour unlike the pitch black of the pilot whale. They only stayed around for about 5 minutes. Before they left the largest of the pod swam up right alongside our quarter and was almost rubbing alongside the boat. Thankfully they did not indulge in any overly inquisitive activities unlike their Orca cousins. Unfortunately I didn't get any photos!

When we arrived at around 1900, we moored in between Niord and Migaloo who had both sailed there from Porto Santo. Migaloo's crew applauded our patience by sailing all the way. They got fed up with the slow progress and motored the second half of the trip.

Out and about in Porto Santo featuring man eating fish

Here's the long delayed summary of our time in Porto Santo..

Porto Santo is the smaller of the two main islands in the Archipelego of Madeira; Madeira itself being the largest island in the group. There are a few smaller ones about five miles to the south east of Madeira, collectively the Ilhas Desertas - no prizes for translating the name! It is possible to visit the  larger of the that group - Grand Desertas, and indeed Tony and I did so in Arctic Smoke in 2015 and if you want to know more you can read my blog of that trip Adventures of Arctic Smoke navigate to May 2015;using the links in the side bar.

Porto Santo is extremely arid in contrast to Madeira's mostly lush landscape, except as you will see in my future post of our brief stay there this time, on the extreme north east of the island. Porto Santo's most striking feature is though it's long yellow sandy beach which runs down almost the entire length of its south eastern coast. This to is in stark contrast to Madeira which only has scraps of black volcanic sand on its rugged coast. As a consequence it's a favourite place for those from the main island to visit - a ferry plies back and forth twice a day between the two islands which are about 40 miles apart.

When Tony and I visited in 2015 - see the above link it was very early in the season - only May in fact - we had, perhaps a little foolishly, crossed Biscay in April in bighting south westerly winds with Arctic Smoke"s self steering still not operational! On arriving at Porto Santo we found it almost completely deserted - we were the only visiting boat in the Marina. 

Back to the present...This time it was a complete contrast. The marina was full and we had to anchor in the bay outside which was actually most pleasant and much cheaper - for 6 euros a night we had access to the free showers and free laundry. Mind you we ony used the showers once and the laundry was always backed up so we never used it.

We spent our first two days on the boat at anchor owing to the mildly inclement weather but consoled by Tony's cake and Howard's Jack Daniels! 

On the Tuesday we finally got ashore in the afternoon and walked into town - Vila Baleira - along the beach. We had a very pleasant and cheap lunch and wandered around the charming but now quite bussling little town which was in great contrast to the quiet streets Tony and I meandered around in 2015.

Deciding it would be nice to explore the island we hired two electric scooters for the following day, at the very reasonable rate of 20 euros each. 

And so Wednesday saw us tour the island on two surprisingly nippy electric scooters...

Stopped for lunch at an excellent but reasonably priced meal at the family run (3-4 generations) Torres restaurant at Camacha on the north side of the island.

The last section of our tour was the south end where a number of low rise hotels have been established fairly sensitively.

Afterwards we walked back to the marina and had another good value dinner at the marina cafe

Thursday was supposed to be a laundry and jobs day but the laundry was backed up and not many jobs got done. I did however manage to scrub of the seaweed beard that had taken hold around the water line. I did this from the dinghy and in the process was attacked by a fish! Some sort of snapper. Only about  6 inches long. The little chap had clearly decided that Bonny's bottom was his own private property and wasn't going to tolerate any intruders on his patch, so as my hand went in the water to do the scrubbing, the little bugger repeatedly tried to take bites out of the back of it. Repeated slamming of the water above him with my scrubbing brush failed to deter him for more than a second or two before he was back for more. In the end I had to resort to wearing a thick rubber glove to protect my hand. Perhaps the Orca's resistance movement has started to spread to the fish population too. Imagine Oceans full of creatures intent on wreaking revenge on mankind!!

After picking Mick up from his failed laundry mission (honestly you just can't get the staff these days) we stopped off and had a chat with single hander Rob from the Walton Backwaters just up the Essex coast from the Medway, on board his Seacracker of around 10 Metres and as ancient as Bonny, if not more so, anchored just outside the harbour breakwater.

Rob's an amazing character with half a dozen Atlantic circuits under his belt including his first many years ago in a home built 22 foot boat which was wrecked in the Carribean during a hurricane! He gave us lots of tips about places to visit and avoid in the Carribean including in Barbados which we had earmarked as our likely first island. So if we get there in time for Christmas we now know the best place to visit for Christmas lunch - the Lagoon Resort at Port St Charles!

Rob had intended to start his latest trip last year but abandoned it after getting to Falmouth due to reports of Orcas misbehaving in the Wester Approaches!

I cooked a Pork Belly dinner on board that evening which was enjoyed by all the crew.

Not sure what happended to Friday but on Saturday we sailed to Quinta do Lorde, Madeira, just a day's sail away.

Madeira to Las Palmas, Gran Canaria and Lolo's demise

Madeira recedes in the distance.

I only started righting this on Monday morning with Las Palmas a mere 20 miles away and only got as far as "shortly after exiting...." 4 paras below before we had to start 'doing things' in preparation for our approach to Las Palmas and so the rest was typed after our arrival. 

We had made good time but I had not slept well on Saturday and it was only after a reasonable 5 hours or so last night topped up by another couple of hours thgis morning that I had the energy to make a start. I still need to write up our stays in Porto Santo and Madeira, but they will have to wait until we are hopefully settled into Las Palmas.

Having at one point talkd a little over enthusiasticly about departing at 0600, we rather more realisticly set 1000 on Saturday 26th July as our departure time. We knew we were in for something of a lumpy ride with 25 k NE winds and 3-4 metre waves forecasted but it was either that or wait 3-4 days for things to calm down. A delay of just a day would actually make matters worse. The sooner we got out on Saturday the less time we would spend in lumpy conditions. We therefore agreed to get up at 0730 and prepare for sea. This included delfating and stowing the constituent parts of the dinghy; a laborious and time consuming task at the best of times. Of course, 1000 arrived and we were nowhere near ready. We had just about finished the dinghy but that left all the rest of the usual pre-departure tasks to get done. Midday arrived and it looked like we were almost ready to go, except the goodbyes to our various neighbours turned into rather protracted discussions over all manner of things. They included finally saying "hello" to Gary, a fellow OCC member on a nearby pontoon, whom we had noticed but not managed to speak to until now. He's planning on crossing to the Caribbean too so there was lots to natter about. Then there was Cornelia and Co on the Swiss boat Migaloo, who were keen to chat and swap plans. They are probably going to settle for a cruise of the Canary islands. We had said goodbye to Tony and Karen and their two crew on board Niord earlier - they had made an early start to their day! 

Finally, around 1400 on what was still a very blustery day, with help from our chatty neighbours, we left the pontoon in precisely the opposite manner in which I had intended and briefed every one on. The wind shifted a little as we slid backwards out of our berth and blew the bows to port instead of starboard. Once that happens there is absolutely nothing to be done except to accept it and change tactics. So instead of leaving forwards we left backwards. Fortunately there was plenty of room and to the casual observer it probably looked like a perfectly planned and executed manouvre!

Shortly after exiting the marina we set all sail and pointed roughly south towards Gran Canaria. It was a very pleasant sunny afternoon with a fine sailing breeze but we knew it would increase over night so at dusk we tucked a couple of reefs in the main and continued on our way. 

I re-heated the remains of the pork belly dish I had cooked in Porto Santo and added the remains of the broccoli and that was our dinner, eated down below in what were still reasonably civilised conditions.

However, shortly afterwards and by the time Mick started his night watch we had 20+knots of wind from the NE and were hurtling along under a full genoa and two reefs in the main at 6 + knots. As usual on my first night at sea I got very little sleep during my 6 hours off watch. I emerged at 0230 on Sunday morning already aware that we were rocking and rolling rather more than when I had retired.

The wind got up further over the next couple of hours and Bonny was slewing about a fair bit as Lolo struggled a little with the extra weather helm the gusts created and so I took in a few rolls in the genoa and eased out the main sheet to calm thnings down. The night sky had patches of stars but was mostly cloudy. Feeling very tired I cat-knapped most of the time in the cockpit tucked up under the spray hood to avoid the occasional dollops of the Atlantic that every now and then deposited themselves over the boat.

Mick took over the Watch at 0800 and I went below for a kip. Soon afterwards though Mick shouted down that Lolo's rudder had broken off once again!

The failed weld from below.

And from the side.

As you can see, the new weld and repair by Lolo remained in place.

In the meantime the autohelm had somehow blown a fuse and so Mick was having to hand stear. I got up, retrieved the rudder, replaced the fuse and went back to bed. Of course sleep escaped me because of the tiz my head was in given recent events. There was really only one option open to us now and that was to replace the main Hydrovane parts (the drive unit,  tube, shaft and rudder)  as we had previously considered doing. It was a right pain in the bum but far better that it failed now and not half way across the Atlantic. I'll email Hydrovane as soon as we get an internet connection and start the ball rolling.

The rest of Sunday continued in much the same vein under cloudy skies with the seas gradually building and occasionally we would rise up on top of a real wopper! Still feeling tired I couldn't be bothered to do anything other than check for shipping (we saw only two ships before arrival at Las Palms) and doze. Mick was feeling out of sorts and was occasionally sick if he spent to much time below not lying down. We did though continue at a fair old lick and at this rate may well be in by Monday evening.

Sunday night was a repeat of Saturday night (although I did get a reasonable sleep) and Monday a repeat of Sunday up until about midday when the wind eased off and I unrolled the genoa to its fully size. By 1500, off the NE 'corner' of the island we had only about 10 miles to go and had to gype onto the starboard tack to head for Las Palmas. To sail in, I really needed to rig the genoa on a pole but we were rolling about so much that it didn't seem worth the agro for a couple of hours sailing and so the engine went on and we motor sailed in with two reefs still in the mainsail.

We moored up at the reception pontoon around 1630, a two hundred and ninety nautical mile passage completed in around 2 days and 2 hours, giving an average speed of 5.8 knots! Pretty good going, but of course we did have strong winds from just aft of the beam for the majority of the passage.

We sorted out the paper work and then got shown to our berth by the very helpful Marina man.

The massive marina at Las Palmas. Bonny's in there somewhere!

Bonny in her new temporary (how long) home.

Unfortunately we could not book a long term berth because of the forthcoming arrival of the ARC fleet and so the best we can do is renew every seven days until we are required to leave. This is going to complicate arrangements for meeting up with Sharon and Co here on the 12th and managing their stay, and my planned trip home with them on the 19th and the delivery of the Hydrovane parts! As things stand I have no resolution to any of these issues other than to hope we are allowed to stay for a few weeks. The anchorage here cannot be used until the 15th of September and so if we have to move before then we would have to go elsewhere. There is an anchorage at the southern end of the island at Pasito Blanco which may be a option. 

Goodbye Madeira

Well we finally managed to leave Marina do Lorde around 1330 having planned on a 1030 departure! It always takes so much longer than I think it will to get ready!

We have a passage of around three days ahead to get to Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, where I hope to be able to park the boat up until the end of September/early October. It's not possible to book in advance and so it's possible we may have to find somewhere else to park the boat and that will take some time!

Sharon flys out to Las Palmas with Stephen and Ines and their two little ones, on the 12th September to celebrate our wedding anniversary on that day which is one reason for wanting to park the boat for a month or so. 

The other is I am fast running out of my 90 schengen days (which started counting down on 31st July when we officially entered Spain by virtue of getting our passports stamped) and am therefore hoping to leave the boat and fly home with Sharon and Co and spend 10 days or possibly longer at home/catching up with friends and family. That way I can 'bank' those shengen days and so delay our departure from the Canaries for the Cape Verde. An added complication is that Mick flys back to the UK on the 6th September and won't return until the 28th October or possibly later if he doesn't get his US visa in time!

🤞🤞🤞

I'll write up our short spell on Madeira whilst on passage.

Leaving Porto Santo

Leaving now for Quinta do Lorde, Madeira.

The harbour and town.....

Eta this evening - tracker on 2 hrly intervals.

Around and about Bouzas and Vigo

We arrived in Bouzas, Vigo around 2015 local time on Monday 7th August and moored up in the local Marina berth that Alberto, OCC Port Officer had very kindly arranged for us. The following morning Alberto arrived with Lolo from the local metal workshop to inspect the Hydrovane, following which Lolo pronounced "no problem" and took it off promissing we would to have it back the next day. See the Hydrovane posts for the details.

Once Alberto and Lolo had gone we booked into the Marina. 

The staff there were delightful and went out of their way to tell us about the local area, and Vigo itself about an hours walk from Bouzas. Neither of the two ladies could speak much English (and our Spanish is not up to much though Mick's is better than mine) but they used Google Translate very effectively to tell us all we needed to know.  They described the yacht club as a "sailing high school" and it certainly had lots of youngsters on the water in dinghies and canoes as well as using its land based facilities including a Gym and showers which were excellent and which we made good use of. 

They described Bouzas as a fishing village which rather undersold what was the busiest ship building and repair port (of small to medium sized vessels) we had ever seen. There must have been nearly a dozen working yards squeezed cheek by jowel along the water front that we nicknamed "Shipyard Alley".

Word had clearly got out about the local ship building facilities and capabilities because one of the yards had just completed the constrction of what - thanks to one of Mick's pals - we learnt was apparently one of the largest private motor yacht to be constructed in Europe in recent years. "Reinasance" was being fitted out and was soon to be available for charter....

We discussed why anyone would go to the clearly very considerable expense of buying such a huge craft. Clearly it's much too big for simply enjoying a day out on the water or even for taking the biggest family cruise, even if that included all of one's mates too. We concluded that whilst chartering and tax dodges no doubt figured in the 'owner's' calculations, the main reason for the commissioning of such an opulent craft, must be to 'make friends and influence people'. The 'friends' and 'people' in question no doubt include many of the richest and most influential shady characters on the planet. Of course that begs the question - if you've already got the kind of money needed to fund such an enterprise, why on earth would you need to influence any one else about anyhing? Oh, perhaps it's for hosting international gatherings aimed at saving the planet? Hmm, not a solar panel or wind genertor in sight, so perhaps not. Anyway at least its construction contributed to the local Bouzas economy and created some additional local jobs.

The locals on the other hand are clearly mindful of such issues - on our way into port on the Monday evening we passed a very large duel fuel - battery and LPG - commercial ship.

Bonny's berth was just yards from the water frontage of one of the many yards.

 It also seemed that the fishing industry was still in pretty good health here. Apart from the various fishing boats clearly in commisson and being worked on in the yards there were two very large fish warehouses near the marina. Indeed we had to walk past them to get to Bonny's second berth - allocated to us by the ever helpful and friendly President of the yacht club/sailing school so that we could back Bonny onto a pontoon, thereby providing us with a work platform for reinstalling the Hydrovane. For some bizare reason the first time we walked down 'Fishyard Alley' I didn't notice the aroma and asked Alberto what the large building to our left was used for. He gave me a slightly amused look and said "fish". The smell was certainly quite noticeable on all our subsequent walks past. 

You might think a marina sandwiched between a working ship yard on one side and fish warehouses on its two other flanks would not be a particularly attractive place. Indeed, Mick commented that it "must be the most unappealing marina I have ever seen". However, I found it had a unique charm and appeal of its own. The adjacent shipyard with its ever moving huge hoist and crane, its persistant daytime banging, booming and clattering and its industrial, night time beauty....

.....and most of all, the extremely friendly, warm and generous local people, creates an eclectic and most pleasing atmosphere. The preponderance of fairly modest craft, the well populated marina bar and the near constant activity at the club/marina/sailing school, including its use by lots of young people, encouraged this general feeling of wellbeing one had when in and around the marina.

I also thought I spied a familiar shape in the middle of the marina. I'd first noticed the ketch with brown sails as we sailed up the Ria on our approach to Bouzas and here she was again and so I had the opportunity to investigate. Sure enough, I had stumbled across one of Arctic Smoke's relations - another Elizabethan 33! 

I'd not come across a ketch (two masted) version before and was surprised to come across an example of this limited run of British designed (and most probably, built) boat in a marina in Spain.

Looking at her made me realise how narrow the Elizabethan 33 is compared with the Biscay 36...

Of course there was a sizable fishing fleet too and no doubt a number of the yards served it, but there were also all sorts of other vessels in the various stocks, slipways, docks, and sheds strewn around the Bouzas water front.

We found some examplesof the local catch in the local market..

Significant evidence of the old fishing village remained with old buildings and cobbled streets and much of it was host to a plethora of reasonably priced restaurants and bars - which were doing extremely good business. Some appeared to be family concerns and others run by young entreaupenere types. A few were clearly up-market. Of course we were duty bound to sample the more economic ones during our stay. We got generous meals with a couple of rounds of beer and/or wine for around 20-25 Euros per head. Once again, all the staff we came into contact with were absolutely charming and helpful - doing their very best to help translate their menus for us.  Another remarkable feature of the eating out pasttime here, as in Gijon, was the complete absence of tipping. When we tried to leave a tip it was politely refused!

Once we had completed the our check in at the Marina we set off on foot to explore Vigo. Our route took us the entire length of 'Shipyard Alley's' two or so miles which started just round the corner from the marina and ended at the cruise ship terminal on Vigo's water front. In addition to the shipyards on the waterfront side of the 'Alley' all sorts of related industrial, commercial, administrative concerns, including a college, lined the other side of the 'Alley'. Just past the cruise ship terminal was Vigo's main marina - "Real Club Nautico" where Tony and I parked Arctic Smoke in 2015 also on our way to Madeira. Being in pre-Orca days though we then had the luxury of also visiting Lisbon. Indeed, on that occasion we visited Lisbon twice. Once by train from Vigo to link up with Sharon and Sue and again a few weeks later in Arctic Smoke. This time, however, Brexit and the Orcas have combined to make a similar itinery impossible. Brexit means we have a time limit of 90 days within the common Schegen area and the uppity Orcas make passage making down the Portugese coast a riskier than 'normal' undertaking.

Indeed, we have already fallen victim to the complications arising from our non-EU status. We completely forgot about the 'need' to formally check out with the immigration authorities at Vigo. Had we done so, our estimated 5-6 days at sea between Vigo and Madeira would not have counted towards our 90 days limit. This over-sight may well complicate things for me later in the European section of the passage because I will be very close to that limit. Assuming we check out of Madeira properly and that we spend 3 days at sea before checking in in the Canaries, we'll either need to leave the Canaries by 1st November or I'll have to leave the Schegen area temporarilly for an appropriate period. Mick doesn't have the same problem because he has already arranged to return home for six weeks or so during September and October to attend to a variety of matters. So I may either need to find somewhere safe and cheap to leave the boat for a couple of weeks and fly home, or take the boat out of Shegen. The nearest and obvious place would be Morocco. The former would be preferable subject to the costs and then I could see the family. The complication is finding that safe cheap place to leave the boat. The main marina in the canaries is at Las Palmas, Gran Canaria and is very good value but the ARC - Atlantic Rally for Cruisers - has all the visitors berths booked out, I think from late September to mid November so I'm not sure whether that will work for me.

Anyway it was pleasantly nostalgic to retrace some old steps made with another ship mate. I remember scratching my head the first time Tony and I saw this poor fellow near the Marina...

After a wander around the marina area Mick and I set off uphill towards the main town centre. However, it wasn't too long before we felt in need of sustenance and refreshment and so headed up a promissing looking street leading from the area around the cruise ship terminal towards the town. As we walked up the street the occasionl local bars and cafes morphed into densley packed and increasingly trendy restaurants. These were all packed withcustomers and so we retreated back down the hill where it looked like we had a better chance of finding a table. We did and at what tuned out to be an excellent Mexican Oyster restaurant which would not have been out of place amongst the trendy restaurants. We didn't realize it was an Oyster place until after we had sat down but luckily given that neirther of us are big Oyster fans, they served other seafoods too. We had roasted prawns in a delicious sweet sauce and a roasted cheese dish served with wraps.

Both were absolutely delicious and with a beer and the ubiquitus cheescake and coffee (for me) for desert provbided an ample lunch. The proprieter was clearly a little surprised we did not eat more however. He was a charmig chap who had emigrated from Mexico a few years previously and set up the business here. Perhaps returning to family roots? It turned out he was familar with some of New Mexico too that Mick had visted during his time in the USA back in the 1980s.

After lunch we continued on our way into the town centre where we encountered another example of the Spanish prediliction for dramatic street art...

The ladies at the Marina had recommended that we climbed the hill above the town to enjoy the stunning views over the Ria and so we continued upwards to do just that. The hill is topped with old defence embankments similar to those found above many British ports.

It was quite a climb to the top but it was worth the effort because the views were in deed quite stunning...

After taking it all in we headed back down via a different route and encountered another example of dramatic street Art...

It was a pretty warm day and we had neglected to take any water with us so the priority on the return leg was to find the nearest bar for a refreshing beer. Thankfully we did not have to walk to far to find one.

After leaving the bar we came across this rather remarkable tree. It's trunk had been almost completely hollowed out, presumably by some sort of disease but it was still flourishing as you can see. Another feature which I did not notice at the time of studying it in the flesh as it were, was the addition of painted marks on its trunk which gives the appearance of a rather charming face....

Approaching Bouzas we came cross the biggest Lidl store I had ever seen and stopped off to top up the boat's dwindling supply of beer.

[insert Liddl photo]

The very next day as promissed,Tuesday, Alberto and Lolo retuned with the repaired Hydrovane and what an excellent job Lolo had made of it. Lolo only charged 180 Euros which for me was the bargain of the century - see my seperate post on this topic for more details.

Thursday and Friday we spent working our way through the ever growing list of jobs that comes with sailing an old boat on long distance ocean passages.

In this connection, my thanks go to one of Mick's old pals John, whom I have never met but is following the blog and who, being an educated chap mentioned to Mick that it reminded him of "a philosophical conumdrum, posed by the ancient Greeks, called 'The Ship of Theseus'. Theseus and his crew embark on an epic voyage and over the course of some years, every part of the ship is replaced, but at different times. So is the ship that returns home the same one  that departed?..."

The first of two major jobs of the couple of days concerned the ancient Rutland wind generator. Mick had previously worked out that in order to get an significant benefit from it it needed a new regulator, the current (pun not intended) one being designed to keep a lead acid battery topped up, 'sees' our starter battery as always full, because, thanks to our solar panels always is, and therfore never allows any significant current into our battery bank containing in addition, two 100 Amp hour Lihium batteries. But, not only was it not contributing anything it was also undermining the effectiveness of our solar pannels by casting a rathe large shadow over the main top panel whenever the sun was shining from the port side of the boat. It would be doing this a lot on our passage south and west and with all the added consumption devices we had installed - mainly the water maker and water heater and the new fridge, we couldn't affort to waste an Amp. A new regulator could not be aquired locally quickly (although the excellent local Chandlery coud have ordred one for us) and so we decided to remove the wind generator. This seemed to make a significant difference and will hopefully provide just enough power for all our needs.

The second concerned the anchor chain. It's not that there was anything wrong with the chain itself but the cable ties we had been using as rather ineffective markers of the length of chain deployed, had started to break off leaving what was now a completely random sequence of cable ties along the chain that bore very little resembelence to the series of markings we had originally fitted. It was therefore becoming increasingly difficult to work out how much anchor chain we had let out. The Mate suggested a paint job was therefore required and devised the following colour code to show all would-be anchor hands, how much of our 50 metres of chain they had allowed to slip through their fingers...

10 Metres = Yellow Red Yellow

20 Metres = Yellow Red Yellow Red Yellow

30 Metres = Yellow Red Yellow Red Yellow Red Yellow

40 Metres = Yellow Red Yellow Red Yellow Red Yellow Red Yellow

45 Metres = wait for it ...... Red Red Red Red Red Red Red Red Red Red - actually one continuous band of red.

Some may think the amount or red at 45 metres a trifle over the top BUT there is a very good reason for the apparent excess.

 The perenial anchor chain is the source of the expression "the bitter end". That's the end that's made fast to the boat! But in order to avoid accidently pulling the front of the boat off in the event of all the chain running out with 50 llbs of anchor on the end (which would create a rather large yank) , the 'bitter end' is made fast with a relatively light piece of rope, that would in such circumstaces, break. The boat would be saved, but it would be the bitter end for the anchor and its chain!

I'm not entirely sure why it's "bitter" however. If I was writing this with access to the internet I'd look it up, but I'm doing so whilst we're enroute from Vigo to Madeira. My guess is that it's connected to the term "bight". A "bight" of rope - and originally anchors would have been deployed on rope not chain - is a section or loop of rope and so perhaps the "bight" or "bitter" end distinguishes the end made fast to the boat as apposed to the end on the anchor!

Our last day in Bouzas was Saturday. We got up early (for us) at 0800 and went out to shop for provisions. The last job before leaving the Marina was to fit the Hydrovane rudder. This required getting in the water and so I donned a wet suit before getting in. The water was quite warm but I was glad of the wet suit because I wasn't sure how long the operation was going to take. It turned out that instaling the rudder was quick and easy and I was back out within a couple of minutes. 

On leaving the marina we fueled up and headed down the Ria and out to the open sea bound, we hoped for Porto Santo, Madeira.