To El Rompido – 2 October, 23 miles

Weighed anchor at 1000 and had a brilliant sail – starting with a reach in a northery F4, then a run with Mr Blue to the entrance to the Rio San Piedras, a reach over the bar, for which we were a little early and had less than 2m, then close hauled, just laying the course up the river to El Rompido.

El Rompido	The cunning wavebreaker above El Rompido marina
Boardwalk over the dunes to the beach	The usual crowds on the beach

When they’d finished lunch, the marineros guided us onto the inner pontoon used for multihulls.

We spent the next 2 weeks almost finishing fitting out ready for the season! And getting to know the few other live-abords in the marina and exploring the area.

The liveabords included an Austrian couple with a very hairy trimaran – Light for the World – which had been leading the OSTAR until Reini had to retire; a French couple and an English couple. We greatly enjoyed the company of all of these, although regretting the pattern of finding most of our conversation was in English or French, when we’d come to Spain to learn Spanish! The local sailors were very friendly, but they were not voyagers, and our conversations tended to be limited to brief courtesies.

Finally, the English couple, Jim and Karen said they had business in Faro, and offered us a lift to the airport, so our departure was quick and painless.