| Datum: | 1-11-2016 Lagos (part 1) | | | | Saturday 01-10 to Monday 31-10-2016
Because the Marina charges decrease by 50% as of beginning October, we leave for Lagos. Her we are going to stay for some time, because of our back- problems.
Health
My back isn’t getting better, it’s getting worse, the pain now radiates through to my right leg and that doesn’t feel right. We decide to look for a physiotherapist. First stop is the Marina office, where they can’t tell us anything and redirect us to a pharmacy, they should be able to produce some addresses. Next we look for a pharmacy and there we get the address of a physiotherapist. The clinic where we works lies on a hill and walking uphill with a back like mine is really not easy. Alas, he is not in, he will call us! The next day we have an appointment and go there by taxi. This is a very nice Portuguese man, but he can’t do more than massage the tension away, a little. He advises us to go to a hospital to have some photos taken, because there might be a jammed nerve. For this aid we only have to pay him € 15! We order another taxi and let it carry us to a private clinic, where we have to take a seat in the waiting room. At that time I hardly know how to sit or stand for the pain and I’m waiting impatiently. After about an hour it is our turn and we are taken in by a female doctor. We want to introduce ourselves and shake hands, but she tries to avoid that; shaking hands in a hospital is apparently not the custom in Portugal. She explains that she might contaminate people. Rather ludicrous in my opinion, because a minute later she examines me! She thinks it is a hernia and a jammed nerve, which causes the pain in my right leg. This doctor has a very explicit opinion and lets me decide, as a patient, if I want to start with medication or if I want to first have a CT-scan and then the medication. I opt for the scan, maybe that will clear things up. For this I don’t have to wait very long and within 15 minutes we are outside again, but the result is going to take another hour and by now it is already well past 18:30. With the help of the very friendly doorman we are able to get a little bite to eat in a small café in the neighbourhood, because you can’t get anything to eat in the hospital. When we return we again take our seats in the waiting room, where the lab assistant, after half an hour, hands us the photos. And then again, waiting, waiting and more waiting. I see lots of people coming and going and we still aren’t called up. Finally I check at the counter how long it is going to take. By now it is 21:30 and my patience has run out. Oops….they forgot about us! Almost immediately we are received by a male doctor, who does shake our hands! He explains I have a small hernia, gives me a prescription for painkillers and anti-inflammatories and advises me an operation. For this we would have to come back the next day for an appointment with a surgeon, who will explain everything more elaborate, if I decide to take the operation. I have had it with this clinic, contort with pain and just want pills! With yet another taxi to the night pharmacy and then back to the Marina. All kinds of scenarios present themselves in my head: operate, here or in Holland? How, what, why? Fred is as calm as can be fortunately and is already working out solutions! What would I do without my loved one? The next days we obtain information from various medical experts. An operation is not something they advise as the first thing to do, in Holland. Most of the time, a small hernia resolves itself after a few months and if not, than you can decide whether or not to operate. The advice is: take the pills, take it easy, keep moving and wait and see! The pills work well, all day long I am a little high! Not at all bad, the pain is less, in any case. Fortunately, Fred’s back is much better now and after a few weeks mine is too, a little, that is. I still have to watch out for myself, not towing heavy stuff and make unexpected moves. Luckily we can stay in the Marina this month and use the wonderful warm showers, which is a treat when you have an aching back!
The city, Marina and public transportation
Lagos has a particularly relaxed atmosphere. The charm of a Southern-European town is here combined with nice little shops and bars and it has a very good hippie-like ambience. In the 80’s big crowds of backpacking-students and hippies floated to this town. And still you can see this coming back in street-art, the type of cafés and restaurants. In the street you regularly meet various artists who make music and sing. When on a terrace, we meet the singer/songwriter Michael Green from the U.K., who has been living in Lagos for 13 years. He plays guitar and sings songs – written by himself – who really appeal to us. The type of CD’s he sells we cannot play so we ask him to mail us a few songs. No problem and very soon we receive this beautiful music. After this we go more often to this café/ terrace for a coffee and always have a chat with him.
On a few minutes walking from the Marina you have the supermarket “Pingo Doce”. This lies close to a wasteland, which has been changed in some sort of nature reserve, with only a few industrial chimneys from old factories standing. They (the chimneys) have become the domain of “wintering” storks, because on every high chimney you can see a large nest that has been built there.
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The footbridge crossing the “Ribeira de Bensafrim” connects the Marina with the centre of Lagos, and leads to a long boulevard. Here you have, next to the regular souvenir shops, also the stands where you can buy tickets for boat trips to see the caves or spotting dolphins at sea. Near to the Marina you have a number of restaurants and shops very much targeted on the English. Not only does everybody speak English, many an owner comes from The U.K. and just for the sake of convenience they adjusted the prices as well! When you go to the old centre and take the little side-streets, you can find little bars too, which are very cosy and quite a bit cheaper than at the Marina. At the end of the month we make a cycling tour on the borrowed folding- bikes (of our neighbours) from Jersey. We cycle all the way to “Farol da Ponta da Piedade”, where the lighthouse stands on the top of the rock
The hiking trails lead down to the caves that you can visit. It was quite a cycling tour that was partly done on foot, since I still suffer from pain in my little ol’ back. But we were rewarded with a beautiful view! Pity that you are not alone there and busloads of tourists are dropped there, who also want to admire this view. Something that is scary, is that they haven’t put any barriers alongside the rock, so you can just stand on the edge of the cliff and look down. Perilous, more so, when it has been raining for some days. Still there are people who deliberately live on the dangerous side and stand at the edge, very stupid in our opinion!
The weather
In the beginning it is still pleasantly warm, later on a bit less and sometimes a cloudy day, sometimes a rainy day. It gets dark quite early and it also gets much chillier in the evening, but we still won’t have to get out our duvets!
Boat chores
We ordered quite a lot of things and we are eagerly looking forward to all the parcels that will be coming in from the various countries.
ROCNA anchor 33 kg
| Ordered in the Netherlands, received within a week and neatly packaged. We first hang the so called “Fenderflex” on the tip of the boat for protection. Than the ROCNA anchor, luckily with the help from our neighbour Brendan, because we are still bothered by our backs. |
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Anchor chain AQUA 4
Comes from Italy, also received within a week and packaged in a large cardboard box on a pallet. Someone from the Marina staff comes especially to the boat to inform us of the arrival and would we be so kind as to pick it up now? Will he be giving us a hand? No way, we can sort this out for ourselves, in spite of the fact that I asked this in advance at the reception! This is a bit of a bummer, I have to say. But anyway, Fred manages to load the chain - 230 kg!! – in a trolley and transport it to the boat. I, with the state my back is in, can‘t do much more than watch and open the gate. It is one big knot of chain and is giving a lot of trouble to disentangle. In the end, the chain is spread out all over the pier, ready to be assembled to the new anchor and then be put into the anchor locker.
And again Brendan offers a helping hand.
Autopilot
For the autopilot Joop Wilms (see blog before this) from Aqua Electronics has been on board. He fixed the old “wheeldrive”, so that we can use that as a backup.
The parts that where necessary to assemble the new “linear drive” have kept us waiting, but finally came in. Now it was Joop’s job to assemble and install. In advance we extended all the electricity wiring to be able to connect everything. For this, we ‘just’ had to empty the whole of the ‘working bunk’… it looked inside as we were planning to move! But at the end of the day we had an autopilot that works! This will not only make the sailing much more comfortable over the long distances, but certainly when we have to sail at night.
Checking the rigging
For this we called in “FOFOVELAS sails covers & rigging”. The owner is António Viegas, a very nice man.
All the rigging are checked and a number of pop-rivets in the jib are replaced. After the inspection we had our inspection report within half an hour, so we could send it through to our insurance company immediately. This company (Fofovelas) does not have a website, but you can find them at: Largo do Rossio de São João de Batista 1, 8600-707 in Lagos, phone 00 351 917550960. After the confirmation from our insurance company “Pantenius” that this report is registered in the policy, we can sail on with a light heart.
Railing
One of the rigging screws of the railing is broken. After visiting a water sports shop to buy a new one, it turns out that the screws on our boat are American ones, so none of the European (metric) spanners fit!
So we asked António to make a complete new railing including a new rigging screw. I explain to him why we want this and then António says that he might have some American ones lying around. And so we can buy three ¼ inch spanners at Fofovelas, one as a replacement and the other two as spares.
Radar, SIMRAD 3G broadband
Bought in the U.K. at Force4, www.Force4.co.uk
Again we send for António from Fofovelas, who assembles the radar onto the mast in no time, just above the first crosstree of the mast.
To connect the radar to the board computer, a special cable has to be drawn from the radar to the sea map table, where all the instruments are. The extending of the cable and the connecting we do ourselves. This takes some doing. Through the hole by the radar we lower a rope with a piece of lead on it within the mast, on this we attach the cable and pull it down. Unfortunately it takes us two attempts. Next, the ceiling of the cabin near the mast has to be opened to pull the cable to the sea map table. With all this, we are again quite busy for a day. At the end of the day, we try, excited, if the radar works. YES, it does! Now we can see virtually everything ‘on the road’. The 3G radar works with the help of an ordinary ethernet cable, which you can plug in directly into a network port of a computer. With the help of the Navico plugin at OpenCPN (our map plotter and navigation program) you can see the radar image on the pc screen. In OpenCPN all the options are available to set the radar.
Winchrite
Our winches are not electric and therefore it takes a lot of strength to hoist the sails or roll them in. To make it a little bit easier for me, we indulged ourselves by buying a tool for this, the so called Winchrite. This is an electric winch lever, that runs on a powerful chargeable Li-on battery. To lift Fred up into the mast, I have used this Winchrite. Because it is very powerful, you have to secure it with a rope. Otherwise it lashes out of your hands. This certainly requires some practice in the beginning!
Dinghy Wheels
Also ordered at FORCE4 in the U.K. These are solid sturdy wheels you can fit onto the rear of the dinghy, which makes it easier to pull the dinghy onto a slope or the beach. You can fold the wheels in or out, which gets them out of the way. Saves us a lot of towing and our backs are less burdened! (see pic)
Aluminium strips for the weather vane
Ordered in Holland, received, not yet assembled.
Various Things
Portable water filter, that we can fit in between the tap on the pier and our water hose, so to filter the water extra.
Cat food and cat litter for our Kit we ordered at the Portuguese “ZOOPLUS”. We also bought the stuff at this firm in Holland. All of the deliveries went well, except this one. The mailman who had to deliver this order must have lost his way… Anyway, after some e-mail and –cell phone contact the order, with some delay, was in in time.
Encounters
Next to us lies the “Baltic Dart” from Jersey with Brenden and Serena, who will be wintering in the Marina de Lagos in the half year to come. We regularly have a chat, in the evening a snifter together and lots of tips are exchanged back and forth. And again Fred’s knowledge of computers and such comes in handy. Every now and then we can borrow their folding bikes to cycle around, with many thanks!
We meet the Brabanders (Brabant is a province in the Netherlands) Maarten and Antoinette on the “Witte Beer”(“White Bear”). Maarten and Fred took the SSB-course in Dordrecht together. What a small world, the sailing world! Every now and then we have a cosy evening together on the mutual boats and again exchange tips and tricks. We can help each other out with various things: Fred with his knowledge of IT, and Antoinette and Maarten with info on the spots along the coast and on the Canary Islands. So, not only very sociable, but also useful!
We spot Ruben Donné with his boat in the Marina, but before we know it, he has already gone. He sails solo over the Atlantic to give publicity to the disease MS (Multiple Sclerosis). You can buy a sea mile and thus support the research for MS: www.sailingchallenge4ms.com .
Hans, of the sailing boat “Olle-P” is also in the Marina and hops over for a chat. He and his wife have been sailing for years and also have been coming to Lagos for a number of years.
Kit
Gets bolder by the day and now jumps regularly over to the neighbouring Brazilian boat. One day the neighbours are not at home and Kit jumps – unseen by us – on their boat. A small hatch is open and sure enough….he is inside! Whatever we try to get Mr. Kit back on board again, nothing succeeds. Fortunately, at some point he is bored and casually comes out of the hatch. From that moment on, we put him in a harness with a long adjustable dog leash (sort of a pulley). Since the handgrip of the thing is fairly heavy, we just let it lie on the floor, thinking he will keep quiet now. We did not foresee that Kit suddenly shoots into the cockpit, with the leash dragging behind him, clattering over the deck. He is so terribly startled by this, that he wriggles himself out of harness and leash. Completely aghast and stressful he sits in the saloon some moments later, trying to recover. For the rest of the evening, he is extra on guard and jumps at every little sound. Well, it seems like Kit learned his lesson. At least for a day or two, because after that he merrily goes back to jumping onto the other boat. He just defies us every time! And keeps us nicely busy!
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| | | 13-11-2016, reactie van Jeroen en Karin | Heftige tijd! Liggen jullie nog bij Faro? Marinetraffic stopt met jullie weergave vlak voor de ingang bij Faro. Wij gaan dinsdag het water in.misschien zien we elkaar nog. En anders goede oversteek!
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