Porto Santo

Portimao – Porto Santo – A further 460nm of Atlantic Ocean passed under the keel, representing the boys’ longest passage to date. Conditions on day one were a bit lumpy, but the sea state eased and we spent much of our final 48hrs flying our gennaker in a gentle, downwind breeze. 

Porto Santo is a small (6km x 11km) volcanic island in the Portuguese archipelago of Madeira. Here we spent a week at anchor, combining a bit of work, boat school, and lots of exploring. Porto Santo highlights included circumnavigating the island by bike, swimming in the natural pools of Porto as Salemas, climbing the many picos,  amassing more Geocache finds with mega views, and encountering a crazed, fearless, avocado devouring gecko colony. 

Always keen to teach the boys about foraging for wild edibles, we enthusiastically harvested lots of delicious prickly pears from the island, only to spend the following 24hrs removing their vicious barbs from fingers and lips! Another epic parenting fail! With a deadline to meet family in the Canaries and with a favourable forecast, we upped anchor on 15th October and set for Graciosa. More on that soon. 

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