Martin Northey’s Blog

Yes, I have AND she is for sale in Portugal and there she is in a photograph to the right, she is a 1961, 25 foot long, 5 ton Laurent Giles Vertue.

I sold my last wooden boat about 25 years ago in 1987, she was an R & A Hamper 3.5 ton Bermudan sloop called Tawnie Yeck, she was and I hope still is very beautiful but with due respect not quite as beautiful as a Vertue.

Many people look upon a Contessa 32 as being the ultimate, yes I like them and they sail beautifully. But they do not have the classic lines of a Vertue and they are not built of wood.

Her name is Simo (not a name that I would have chosen but I am sure there was a good reason for it). I spoke to her owner on the telephone today to ask him for permission to use the photograph above from his blog, and he supplied me with the following information. She was built in 1961 and he is only the 3rd owner, the first two kept her until they died, the present owner has cruised usually I think single handed with her for many years. The only reason that he is selling her is because he is hopeful that he won’t follow in the steps of her previous owners and leave his executors with an assett that might be difficult to sell from Britain. 

Both Tawnie Yeck and Simo are heavy displacement and will have a very steady motion at sea, cutting through the waves rather than leaping over them and then crashing into the trough on the far side like a modern light dispacment cruiser, they also have great directional stability and will sail themselves closehauled for hours with the tiller lashed.

Simo has a Beta 20 HP deisel engine and is cutter rigged, she has a wooden bowsprit and a bumpkin (similar to a bowsprit but it sticks out over the stern and supports the back stay giving the boom more space in which to swing). She has teak decks, pitch pine below the waterline, oak frames and a lead keel. Down below the interior is all varnished mahogany, in the fo’c’s’le there is an original baby blake loo and a solid mahogany door for much better privacy than I had with Tawnie Yeck who had just a curtain.

Since selling Tawnie Yack I have been sailing ‘plastic fantastics’, the first two were Henry Morgan a Rival 34 and Navicula a Rival 38, so whilst they were plastic they did sail well. Since then I have chartered boats for teaching on, one was a Beneteau Oceanis 43 that made horrific leeway and now a Bavaria 36 which actually sails quite well but also makes dramatic leeway.  The only thing that those two boats can do that Tawnie Yeck and Simo can’t do, is go backwards under engine in a Marina. Tawnie Yeck or Simo would not be able to do this with any precision at all, but then Tawnie Yeck was built in 1959 and Simo 1961 and there weren’t any marinas then!

Am I going to buy her? I am very tempted, but I think not, I really don’t have the time to either sail or maintain her in the way that she deserves to be looked after. I am on boats as a part of my job 5 days most weeks and don’t have much energy left at the weekend. But who knows, I might just buy her and sail away with her, or not even sail away, she is being sold with her mooring on a beautiful river just an hours drive from where I live, it would be nice and so peaceful just to go and sit on her and spend the occasional long weekend aboard. I have started reading Patrick O’Brian’s books about Jack Aubrey and Steven Maturin again, I can’t think of a nicer place to read them than on board Simo.

To read an article that I put on this site in 2010 about Tawnie Yeck and another almost identical boat called Belinda go to:  http://www.theiberianseaschool.com/component/content/article/18-articles/159-yacht-belindas-re-birth

I am sure that most other RYA examiners have a few aspects of the RYA Yachtmaster exam that they look upon as being particularly important.  I must confess that ‘Passage Planning’ for me rates very high on my list of importance and yet in my experience it is the part of the syllabus that candidates are often not very good at.

Very recently I asked a Yachtmaster Coastal candidate to prepare a plan to sail from Christchurch to Weymouth and asked him if we would have time to stop & have lunch at anchor in Swanage Bay.  After working for two hours as we sailed along the coast with the other candidate acting as skipper I asked him how he was getting on, he replied that he was just finishing working out the tidal streams.  10 minutes later I asked him to run through his plan with me, but first asked him whether or not we would have time to stop at Swanage for lunch, his answer was yes we would have plenty of time to anchor there for lunch. This surprised me because he had also calculated that we would leave Christchurch at about 09.30 am at high water and arrive at Swanage at about midday, all fine, but I pointed out to him that given that it is difficult to have lunch in less than an hour we would not be weighing anchor until 1300 hrs which would put us only just west of St Alban’s Head as the strong spring tide turned against us at about 1500. The wind had been forecast to increase and veer into the NW at about midday so that too was now ‘on the nose’. I pointed out to the candidate that stopping for lunch at Swanage was not such a good idea as he would have been much closer to Weymouth and with much less foul tide at 1500 hrs had we kept going and had lunch under sail.

I then asked him how he had worked out the tidal streams and he explained that he had calculated the tidal stream at each tidal diamond at the time that he expected to be at that position. Even these calculations did not show him that he should make an early start and not stop for lunch. A little exasperated I asked him why he hadn’t used the tidal stream pages in Reeds, he did not seem to be aware of the tidal stream pages in Reeds or that they are an essential tool for passage planning. In fact if he had looked at the tidal stream pages for the Central Channel in Reeds at the beginning of his calculations he would have known that he had to plan to leave Christchurch as early as possible THEN he should have worked out the heights of tide for Christchurch to see when he could leave. In fact he could have left at 8.30 which was an hour before HW but he still would not have had time to stop for lunch at Swanage!!

This candidate had completed both the RYA Day Skipper Shorebased course and the RYA Coastal / Yachtmaster shore based course.  I do not blame him for his lack of awareness of the tidal stream pages in Reeds and what a useful tool they are for passage planning.

I do however blame the RYA who I feel give much too much emphasis to tidal diamonds and not enough to tidal stream pages in their theory courses.

To see the tidal stream pages for the central English channel go to pages 196 and 197 of Reeds 2012.

To read my full length article on passage planning please go to: http://www.theiberianseaschool.com/component/content/article/18-articles/160-passage-planning

John using the handbearing compass & wearing his golfing base ball cap

During a 3 day ICC course last week when on passage in a Quicksilver sports boat from Lagos to Portimão we stopped to get a fix using the water tower at Alvor and the entrance to the Alvor estuary. Our skipper for this passage was John Doe shown taking bearings in the photograph to the right. Both of the bearings that he took were more than 90º out from what I knew they should have been.

I asked my other client, Gavin Stephenson Bennet, if he would take bearings of the same two points, which he did and they were as I thought they should be. As a double check I also took the bearings and mine concurred with Gavin’s.

There was clearly something very wrong with John’s bearings and I asked him if he was wearing anything magnetic, to which he replied that he wasn’t. I wondered if it could be his watch but ruled out that as it was on his left wrist and not anywhere near the compass when he was using it. We questioned him as whether or not he had had surgery to his hand wrist or head and had any metal fitted to any of these parts of his body, to which he replied that he had not. Gavin suggested that perhaps John was actually from the planet Krypton and therefore had body parts made from Kryptonite which would account for the extra ordinary effect that he was having on the hand bearing compass!!

John finally came up with the answer himself, when he said did I think that the problem could be caused by the magnetic disk that was sewn into the peak of his golfing base ball cap, this he explained was for holding a ball-marker disk when playing golf.
Closer inspection of his cap showed the outline of this magnetic disk and we realised that this was exactly the cause of John’s problem!!

As a cruising sailor I have often heard the maxim that there are three things that are absolutely useless on a yacht. 1. An umbrella  2. Another man’s wife 3. A naval officer. Perhaps a golfer wearing a golfing base ball cap should be added to that list!

Incidentally, if you want to buy a wood burning stove in the Algarve, Gavin Stephenson Bennett is your man at ‘The Heat of the Moment Lda’ Tel: 281 328551 and if you want to buy or have built a house to British buildings standards John Doe is the man for that, John’s web site is: www.quintaarruba.com  email: johndoe11@sapo.pt and his telephone 281 325516.

One of the many magnificent buildings in Lisbon

I have just returned from my second four day motor cruise so far this year which took place during the last week of June, again with Janice and Pieter Bruggenwirth in ‘Just 4 Us’ and it was a great success. We visited Sines, Cascais, Expo Marina in Lisbon and the new Marina at Troia.

Another beautiful building

I always enjoy visiting Lisbon by sea because it reminds me so much of my great great grandfather, Edward Richard Northey who arrived in Lisbon on September 1st 1812 by ship having sailed from Spithead in order to join his regiment the 52nd light infantry who were near Madrid fighting the French. Edward was only just 17, he arrived with two other young officers of the 50th Regiment and another slightly older officer from the 3rd light dragoons.

This is the quay where my great great grandfather landed in 1812

I have his diary which I am reading as I write, he wrote “It was a fine day, & I shall not forget the first impression made upon entering the Tagus - the features of the country on both sides of the river are beautiful, but the contrast between the parched up yellowish brown hills and the green fields we had left behind us in Old England, was very great.  We went ashore in a boat and landed on the Quay which forms one side of the Plaza - it was about the middle of the day and very hot - the sun shone with all its force upon the pavement, & seemed to draw out the various descriptions of filth that had been thrown there an odour which to the olfactory organs of an Englishman was not particularly agreeable”

Torre de Belém

Edward visited the fruit market the next day and praised very highly the quality of the fruit and in particular the grapes and melons. He went on to say in his diary “The next day we went  to Belem where we knew we would find an officer of the 52nd commanding the Depot. He was  of great use in assisting use to provide ourselves with what we wanted for our march up the country.”

The April 25th Bridge over the Tejo in Lisbon

Expo Marina - which we liked very much - is mentioned towards the end of this article

We left Vilamoura Marina at 10.30 am and at a steady 22 knots in a totally flat sea we had a very comfortable cruise of 45 nm up to Cape St Vincent in just over two hours. There we encountered bad visibility of less than a three miles and such low level cloud that we couldn’t even see Cape St Vincent lighthouse when we passed just a mile off.  As predicted in the forecast, as soon as we rounded the Cape the wind increased to about 18 knots with a fairly big sea from the north west.  To be comfortable this forced us to reduce our speed to just 12 knots, with almost 60 nautical miles to go to Sines it was another 5 rather uncomfortable hours before we arrived at Sines. I had not been there for about 13 years and it seemed unchanged except for a very smart new marina reception building which I decide I would take a photograph of in the morning.  We decided to put ‘Just 4 Us’ on a hammerhead and gesticulations from someone who we guessed was a member of the marina staff suggested that he was in agreement with our choice.  Having secured the boat to the pontoon we were welcomed in perfect English by the young man from the marina plus a policeman who gave us a very smart salute and shook us warmly by the hand and escorted Pieter up to the office to show the boats documents and our passports; the RCC Pilot Atlantic Spain and Portugal suggested that we would receive a friendly reception and we were not disappointed. Janice and I stayed with the boat to finish securing her to the pontoon.

The castle at Sines

We spent a comfortable night and in the morning any idea of my taking a photograph of the new reception building was out of the question owing to the fog being so thick we couldn’t even see it! Hoping perhaps that there was less fog at sea we attempted to leave at 11 and again at 2, we were thwarted on both occasions by even thicker fog at sea and returned with careful use of our radar to anchor just off the beach and under the castle shown in the photograph above taken just before we finally left at 3.30 pm.

Our next port of call was Cascais just 50 nautical miles to the north west, the sea was a little calmer than the previous day but our speed was still reduced to around 15 knots until we passed Cabo Espichel.

With Cabo Espichel about two miles abeam to starboard I took a photograph of the Sanctuary that we visited in March 2009 which I wrote about in my Martin’s  Motorbike Travels under No 19 ‘Chocolate, a Windmill and a Pilgrimage’.  The sanctuary was built to commemorate the Virgin Mary appearing to an elderly couple there in the year 1410, in the photograph to the right you will see the sanctuary itself and the long row of accommodation for pilgrims and then the small white building on the left is in the position where the Virgin Mary appeared.

A beautiful house just outside Cascais Marina

We arrived at Cascais at about 7 pm and were given a berth in the marina. We needed to fill up the boats water but after connecting our hose pipe discovered there was no water, a telephone call to marina reception confirmed that the entire marina had no water and it was hoped that they would resolve the problem by the morning. Going ashore for dinner we selected La Brasserie de L’Entrecote in the marina, on asking for a menu we were told that they did not have a menu because the only dish that they had was entrecote steak and chips, this actually suited all three of us and we had an excellent and very filling dinner.

The next morning after breakfast on board we moved ‘Just 4 Us’ down to the re-fueling pontoon where we were a bit surprised that on arrival at the pontoon there was no one there to take our ropes. Eventually someone arrived and told us that filling up with fuel was self service and left us to manage for ourselves, he also confirmed our suspicions that the water problem had not been resolved. After filling up with almost 2000 litres of diesel, Pieter went up to the office to pay and we left hoping that we would be able to top up our water tanks at our next port of call.

Forte São Julião

Our next destination was the Expo Marina approximately 14 nautical miles up the Tejo river to the east, it was a beautiful morning as we motored past the well known Carcavelos beach, Forte de São Julião (shown in the photograph above) and Oeiras Marina.

The Monument to the Discoveries

Past the Torre de Belém (completed in 1521) and the Monument to the Discoveries (built out of concrete in 1960), under the April 25th bridge then past the centre of Lisbon containing so many magnificent buildings.

We arrived at the ‘Expo Marina’ at about 2 pm, 3 of the staff from the marina in bright yellow shirts came down to the reception pontoon to take our ropes and we were allowed to leave the boat on the reception pontoon while we went to have lunch at an excellent restaurant called Cervejanário in the marina.

A very friendly send off from Expo Marina

We left the marina, with help from two of the marina staff shown waving and grinning in a photograph below, at about 4 pm and set off back down the Tejo overtaking a very large cruise ship and then turned south just after passing Forte de São Julião again, then past Cabo Espichel again and following the coast east past Sesimbra to Troia Marina a total distance of 40 nautical miles which we did in about 2 ½ hours.

I last visited Troia marina on my motorbike just before it was opened in August 2008, whilst the marina was completed when I went there the development of what is now a large holiday resort was only half complete.

I wrote an article about it then which can be found at: http://www.theiberianseaschool.com/component/content/article/18-articles/125-troia-marina 

Approaching Troia Resort

As we approached the marina I was impressed by the architecture and by how well it all blends into the very natural and remote surroundings. Two marina staff came down to the reception pontoon to take our ropes and we were soon given a berth and by 8.30 pm we were ashore enjoying dinner of Rack of Lamb at the Troia Resort Hotel, our dinner and the service were excellent.

Topping up with diesel at Troia

The next morning after breakfast on board we topped up the boat with diesel and set off in a southerly direction at around 20 knots to cover the 90 nautical miles to Cape St Vincent, having seen no Dolphins during the previous 3 days we did see 3 on this passage but I was not quick enough with my camera to get a photograph of them.

The lighthouse at Cape St Vincent

We rounded Cape St Vincent about a mile off and this time although the visibility was not perfect it was good enough to get the photograph of the lighthouse which you will see to the left.

We arrived back at Vilamoura at 5 pm, throughout our four days Janice and Peter had done all the navigation with only an occasional bit of advice from me. They had used both paper charts and the boats GPS chart plotter plus of course the RCC Atlantic Spain and Portugal Pilot book for their pilotage. I thoroughly enjoyed the trip and am very grateful to them for taking me with them.

From left to right: Michael, Selwyn, Richard, Alex (Principal and Chief Instructor of the School), Victor and Andell

I have recently returned from Grenada in the Caribbean where I spent three days examining 4 Yachtmaster candidates and one coastal skipper candidate.

It took one very long day to get there flying from Gatwick to Barbados where I spent 5 hours then a very short flight to Tobago and then an even shorter flight to Grenada.  I arrived at Grenada at 7 pm and despite spending 7 weeks in the Caribbean 4 1/2 years ago when I visited St Lucia, Dominica, Guadalupe, Martinique and Antigua,  I was quite surprised by the heat and humidity.

An island just off Grenada where we anhored for lunch one day

I probably might not have heard of Grenada had it not been invaded by the Americans in 1983.  This caused quite a stir at the time in Britain because the newspapers informed us that President Reagon hadn’t informed Mrs Thatcher of his intention to invade Grenada which was a member of the British Commonwealth. However, the people in the photograph above told me that there was a British aircraft carrier standing off the island throughout the invasion which suggests that the British government did know rather more than they officially admitted at the time!

I was very impressed with everything that I saw and everyone that I met.  All the Grenadans were incredibly friendly and rightly proud of their achievements as a totally independant country.

St Georges - capital of Granada with its natural harbour

Grenada was discovered by Christopher Columbus in 1498, but there was no one settled there until 1627 when the island was given by Charles 1 of England to his cousin the Earl of Carlisle.  However, no serious settlement was established as a result of active discouragement by the population of Caribs who themselves had invaded Grenada from Venuzuela in the 13th century and killed Granada’s indigenous population who were known as Arawaks. In 1654 the French settled in the island, and in 1674 it become a French colony.

Another view of where we anchored for lunch one day showing a rustic beach bar

In 1762 during the 7 years war the British invaded Grenada whose people put up no resistance because they were unhappy with French rule and felt that they might be better treated by the British. In 1763 at the Treaty of Paris Grenada was formerly handed over to Britain and has remained British ever since apart from very brief periods during our wars with the French. The culture however has remained very French, with many of the locals still speaking fragments of French creole, likewise during the time it was a French colony the African slaves were introduced to the Roman Catholic faith which they have continued to follow and the Catholic church plays an important role in the community.

A secluded house near a beach surrounded by rain forest

In 1833 slavery was abolished and this had a dramatic effect on the economy of Grenada, until then sugar cane had been the main crop, the ending of free labour meant that profits from sugar production which was very labour intensive dropped to almost nothing. Plantation owners began to grow cocoa and nutmeg which were more profitable than sugar.

Grenadans served bravely in both world wars, many came back from the second world war with left wing political views and in 1967 Grenada gained her independence but with Britain still responsible for her defence and foriegn affairs. Total independence from Britain came in 1974 under their first Prime Minister Sir Eric Gairy. His goverrnment was overthrown in 1979 in a coup by Maurice Bishop and his New Jewel movement. Assistance came from Cuba and the USSR and Grenada began to make progress in agricultural reforms as well as in improvements in medical care and education. With Cuban labour and machinery a new airport was constructed. 

Victor, Selwyn, Alex & Michael

On October 13th 1983 Bernard Coard and his wife  led a coup against the government of Maurice Bishop with the backing of the Grenadan army, Maurice Bishop had massive support from the people of Grenada and when he attempted to resume power he and his entire cabinet were executed by soldiers of the Grenadan army.

Bernard Coard put the island under martial law. The overthrow of Maurice Bishop’s government which was considered to be moderate, and its replacement with the Coard’s extreme left  regime worried President Reagon and his government. On October 25th 1983 at 5 am the United States invaded Grenada with 8000 troops, many people considered this to be an over reaction as Grenada placed 1,500 miles from the United States could hardly claim that Grenada was a threat.

Michael and Victor sheeting in the main during a man overboard exercise

Since the American invasion Grenada appears to have achieved political stability, however an economical setback occured in September 2004 in the form of Hurrican Ivan which damaged or destroyed 90% of the houses on the island. In the 5 years since then Grenada has recovered with remarkable speed and seems to be going from strength to strength.

Going back to the reason that I was in Grenada, my candidates throughout the three days gave me a fascination account of the history of their island plus numerous accounts of their life there which encouraged me to learn more about Grenada and its people which I have achieved by buying a book called ‘Grenada - A History of its people’ by Beverley A. Steel, to whom I am most grateful for many of the facts that I have included in this article.

Selwyn taking bearings to fix our position

My examining of the 5 candidates finished at lunchtime on the third day when we celebrated their having all passed by having a wonderful lunch in the cockpit to which they all brought delicious contributions of food. In addition they brought for me presents of wonderful locally made chocolate, cocoa balls, cocoa tea, guava jelly and nutmeg syrup for me to take home to Portugal.  I am very grateful to them all for their kindness, sadly the two chocolate bars are finished already, but I will be enjoying all the other things for some time to come.

Andell and Richard on the first day

If I am invited back to Grenada again to examine, I will be asking Selwyn Maxwell, who in addition to being a professional skipper also offers tours round the island, to take me on a tour of the island for a day or two. I am looking forward to that enormously.

John just after his lifejacket had inflated accidentally

I very recently examined four yachtmaster candidates for an RYA Sailing School, where the candidates had done a Yachtmaster Practical Preparation Course, it takes two days to examine four candidates and so I had time to get to know them and was naturally keen that they should all pass the exam.

They had just three days of their yachtmaster preparation course to practise for the practical aspects of the exam, there is not time in a preparation course for the Instructor to give the candidates theory tuition, it is assumed that candidates will have prepared themselves by completing a theory course (preferably RYA) either on-line or by attending a shore based course.

I do not make exams difficult, there are however certain things that they must be able to do effectively such as, a ‘man overboard exercise’ - ‘picking up of a mooring’- ‘anchoring and weighing anchor’ all usually under sail. Otherwise, they need to show that they can arrive at and leave a pontoon under engine.

In addition they need to be able to complete a navigation exercise at sea, often just going to another harbour, but perhaps finding a specific position at sea just using bearings and a depth on the way. Otherwise I tell them that my general criteria is ‘would I trust this person to take my grand children (if I had any) across the English Channel, would my grand children enjoy the passage with this skipper and if they were unfortunate enough to fall overboard would the skipper be able to pick them up under sail (if perhaps the boats engine would not start) before they got hyperthermia?’

It is also necessary for candidates to prepare an imaginary passage plan in the English Channel, I supply the charts and a pilot book for this exercise.  Whilst it is not a pre exam requirement for candidates to have completed an RYA Shorebased course prior to taking the exam, my experience has been that candidates who have not done an RYA Shorebased (theory) course often have an incomplete knowledge of the RYA shore based syllabus, sadly two of the candidates in this recent exam had not done any RYA Shorebased course and as a result their passage plans were not up to the required standard, I was not therefore able to recommend to the RYA that they be awarded the Yachtmaster Certificate of Competence, despite their sailing skills being very good.

The third candidate whilst excellent in every way unfortunately experienced an accidental gybe during his time in the exam as skipper and helmsman, sadly if this should happen to a candidate I am not able to recommend that the candidate be awarded a Yachtmaster Certificate. The only way to prevent this happening is to always have a gybe preventer fitted when the wind is more than about 30º abaft the beam.

The fourth candidate John Davies who is Principal of The Menorca Cruising School & Charter was well prepared for the exam and passed, he had completed an RYA shorebased course and so his passage plan was excellent. His exam was not however totally without incident, whilst winching in the genoa the toggle attached to the gas cylinder in his lifejacket caught in the winch, triggered the gas cylinder and his life jacket inflated, it certainly gave me a fright and it must have given him an even bigger fright! The photograph above is of John just after his lifejacket inflated!

I was very dissappointed to be able to only pass one candidate out of four, it would have given me enormous pleasure to have passed more of them and if possible all of them. People want to take the Yachtmaster Exam  because it is the most respected yachting qualification in the world,  but candidates must realise that the reason that it is so highly respected is because the standard required is very high and they must know every part of the syllabus of the ‘RYA Sail Cruising & Yachtmaster Scheme’ in order to pass the exam.

Bond and his Qantums of Solace

We went to see the new James Bond film, Quantum of Solace, this afternoon. I should have realized that a film with such a ridiculous name wasn’t going to be any good.  I have always been a James Bond film fan and have thoroughly enjoyed them all, this one was awful.  I found it impossible to identify any kind of story line and very difficult to follow what was happening. As ever there were lots of characters who were clearly bad guys and one good guy who had been M’s bodyguard for 5 years who turned out to be one of the bad guys, but it wasn’t clear to me as to who they were working for or why except that they were going to make a fortune selling water! Which makes a change I suppose from oil or nuclear bombs!

There was a very exciting boat chase in which several ribs were destroyed by James Bond who was driving a metal dory.

If I had been the manufacturers of Aston Martin I would have been very upset that their car could not loose an Alfa Romeo which throughout the car chase was just feet behind. There was a lot of action which was made dramatic by the fact that the action shots were far too close up which no doubt reduced the amount of stunts that actually had to be done.

To be more positive, the acting was brilliant. But even with good acting I was so bored  by the interval that I nearly went home, the very weak story began to hang together a bit in the second half and there were some spectacular explosions, a couple of the girls were quite good looking and sexy but not nearly as attractive as Ursula Andres in Dr No or Pussy Galore in which ever one she was in.

James Bond used to be funny and had some interesting characters such as Q, Miss Moneypenny, Jaws etc. This film wasn’t funny at all and had no interesting, amusing and eccentric characters. When we came out of the film I really felt that we had wasted 11 euros, arriving in the underground car park my slight depression caused by the really pathetic film plunged to an even deeper low as a result of Christmas carols being played over the loud speakers, yes b….y Christmas carols on November 15th!

One of our many escorts

I see Dolphins often at sea, in fact on two occasions in the last two months I have been asked by clients to find Dolphins, on both occasions I was successful - much to my relief!  I may of course have found Porpoises, because sadly I don’t know the difference, I have just gone on line to find out more about them, looked at photographs of each and am still none the wiser. What I have learnt however is that there are 6 different Porpoise species and almost 40 different species of Dolphin, looking at pictures on line and comparing them with the ones on this page served only to confuse me more.

Surfacing alongside us at speed

From October 13th to 16th I went on a four day cruise to Morocco and Spain in a Sunseeker Manhattan 52. Having checked the weather forecast which gave us near perfect conditions for our cruise, we left Vilamoura on Monday at about 9 am heading for Gibraltar, we had filled up with diesel the day before and also had telephoned the two marinas to try and book a berth. Queensway Quay told us that their marina was closed because of damage to the marina in a storm two days before and Marina Bay asked us to telephone when we were about an hour away.  About half way to Trafalgar we passed some Dolphins and I have to confess that I missed them because I was sleeping at the time.

Two dolphins swimming alonside us

Soon after passing Cape Trafalgar we telephoned Marina Bay Marina and were told that they were closed because an oil tanker had gone aground on Europa Point, split in half and lost a large quantity of oil. We decided to stay well away from Gibraltar to avoid getting oil all down our waterline and as soon as we were past the traffic separation scheme we altered course to pass east of Ceuta and then go on down to Marina Smir on the Meditteranean coast of Morocco.  Arriving late in the afternoon at Smir, we checked in and soon after went out to dinner in a restaurant in the marina. The next morning my two companions went by taxi to Tetuan to see round the town which they enjoyed and arrived back at the boat at about 4 pm carrying a carpet each! When I heard the price that they had paid which was extremely reasonable I wished that I had gone with them. 

They had gone right under the boat and appeared on our port bow

We left Marina Smir at 5 pm with 50 nautical miles to go to Puerto Banus our next port of call. We had arranged to have dinner at 8 pm at a restaurant in Banus and so went rather faster than we had the day before, arriving at our destination in less than two hours. Only slowing down when about 10 miles south of Banus when we were surrounded by hundreds of Dolphins. 

We left Banus at about 1 pm the next day having filled up with fuel, the fuel guage was showing 1/4 of a tank left, which was really not too bad after a total distance of 220 nautical miles.  Our next port of call was going to be Cadiz so we set off towards Europa Point and in almost the same position that we had encountered Dolphins the day before we found them again, but this time not 100s but 1000s!  More than I had ever seen before, the day before I had not taken any photographs but this time I did. They were clearly feeding but not so hungry that they didn’t want give us a show by swimming alongside, under and in front of us and often leaping out of the water. 

At one point we saw something that I had only seen before on National Geographic TV, the Dolphins were swimming and leaping out of the water in a circle and in the middle of that circle the fish were contained in a tight cylindrical shape from about a metre blow the surface to a depth of about four metres, we unintentially motored within about four meters of this tightly packed column of fish and could see the Dolphins were taking it in turns to swim at speed into the fish catching them in their mouths as they swam through. Sadly the photograph that I took of this amazing spectacle did not show the fish because of the reflection on the completely calm water.

Tanker aground and split into two parts on Europa Point

After probably an hour of motoring slowly and taking photographs we carried to Europa Point where I took the photograph to the left of the tanker aground on Europe point that we had heard about the day before.  I have since heard that the ship was ‘in ballast’ at the time of colliding with Europa Point and the oil lost was its own fuel oil

After a fast and uneventful passage down the Strait of Gibraltar and up to Cadiz and no more Dolphins we arrived at Puerto Sherry at about 7 pm after travelling 102 nautical miles from Puerto Banus. We had hoped to go into Puerto Americas but were told on the telephone that they did not have a berth large enough for us, so we went on to Puerto Sherry where we there were several berths large enough.  I had not been in Puerto Sherry for about 13 years and was surprised to find that the buildings surrounding the marina were still in the same unfinished state that they were last time I was there. 

An alongside acrobatic display

We left Puerto Sherry at about 9.30 am and with just 95 nautical miles to Vilamoura we expected to arrive at about 1.30 (Portuguese time) but when about 15 miles south east of Cabo St Maria, we came across another enormous group of Dolphins and probably spent an hour and a half cruising with them and taking photographs.  We arrived back at Vilamoura at 3.30 pm, the fuel tank guage was again showing around 1/4 so we filled up with diesel while we checked in at the marina reception.

Reflecting on the last four days, the boat had performed faultlessly, the weather had been perfect, we had visited interesting places, spent time with interesting and amusing people and had seen Dolphins everyday - it was a really enjoyable cruise.