More Corners

We rounded Cape St Vincent on Monday, and we're in Lagos (no, no, we're not that lost - it's in S Portugal - pronounced La'gosh).  The cape is another impressive corner.

We've had some splendid sails.  The wind always picks up, to really quite strong, in the afternoons, and it's been behind us most of the way.  But the real highlight has been the dolphins.  Large groups of them, up to 20 or 30 at a time, choosing to while away their time playing with the boat.  It's a real joy to see.

Portuguese bureaucracy continues to amaze us.  On two occasions, I had just returned from checking in at the marina office, where they typically spend 20 minutes copying out details of passports and boat papers (horsepower of engine?  do you have radar?  what was the colour of your grandmother's eyes?) to find two policemen patiently waiting at the boat to repeat almost the same, but subtly different procedure.  There are apparently at least three police forces, all of whom can go through similar processes.  Our last stop, Sines, consisted mainly of a very large police station, with a small settlement surrounding it, to service its needs. 

By the way, I promised a picture of the harbourmaster's office in Cascais.  It's on the right.

Still, now we are really down South.  And it's raining.  Our guidebook says that Lagos has less than one rainy day per summer.  So we're hoping it will stop soon.  We have met Ian and Helena here and we will be setting off with them towards Cadiz tomorrow.  We also met their friends, Janet and Michael, who live here, and gave us some local perspective over a lovely dinner at their home last night.