Highlights – the overview
We are flying to the USA from Porto, so we can first pick up Sher’s official residence permit card, which is important to have for re-entering EU when we return. And also, because we have two important things to do in Porto… buy port wine at our beloved Quinta Dos Corvos, and Pastel de Nata at our beloved Castro bakery. All they make is the most delicious Pastel de Nata and coffee. Although all the Pastel de Nata sort of looks the same, there is a huge difference in taste and texture.
We rent a car from Porto (we get a Tesla!) and drive to Sher’s landlord to pick up her mail and her Portuguese residence card. On our way down, we see lots of storks standing in their nests… two storks per nest. Wow!!! We weren’t prepared for this delight, however, so didn’t get any photos. But we were ready to get some pictures on the drive back. What?… only empty stork nests now???! They must be off delivering babies!
Then it’s on to San Francisco, over the Atlantic, Canada, and the Rocky Mountains.
Sher is going to give up her little storage space in San Francisco and she’s sorting out things. What to take to Dione IV, what to store with family, what to give away to the thrift store.
After that, we take the train from San Francisco down the peninsula to Silicon Valley where we meet Sher’s friends Cheryl and Barry for dinner.
Then we’re flying off to Prescott Arizona for a visit with MomCat (Sher’s Mom). We stay in a wonderful Airbnb in Prescott Heights with a table and chairs outside. We have coffee, lunch and dinner with MomCat each day, and totally enjoy our visit!
We take a drive to Sedona, only a 90-minute drive away, and marvel at the beautiful red rocks.
After a few days, it’s back to San Francisco for 2 days before flying on to Porto. We stay at the same hotel, but this time have a room on the top floor with a full view of Union Square, beautifully decorated for the holidays!
We take a ferry across the bay to Sausalito and back, enjoying the city skyline views and the Golden Gate bridge. On the way back, we take the cable car, which Sher loves. It passes right by where she used to live!
Then it’s back to Porto, where we celebrate the anniversary of our first meeting and Thanksgiving! We meet our cruising friends Harm & Ilona (who are in Porto marina with their boat) and have a wonderful dinner together.
We travel back to Spain the following day and are so happy to be home on board again, but there’s a LOT of stuff to find a place for! 🙂
Now it’s time to move on. We need to decide where we will spend Christmas and New Year. Do we go back to Ribadesella where Dione IV will be the centerpiece of the harbor all lit up? Or, do we continue west and make our way to Viveiro?
The weather forecasts for tomorrow look reasonably good for going west so we decide to move on to Avilés, a day sail. We go to Jesús office to pay the bills. When we tell him our plan, he advises something else: Puerto Cudillero. A much more beautiful port, in his opinion. Well, we hadn’t thought about that because it seemed a small fishing harbor with no places for visiting yachts. But Jesús is living in Cudillero and he knows the the harbor and the harbormaster very well. He knows the current situation and that there is currently one available place on a pontoon. He shows us the webcam of the port and points out a pontoon: “here you can stay!” It’s only a little further than Avilés (27 sea miles instead of 20) so that’s a perfect day sail for these days with only 8 hours of daylight.
We are excited! We never expected that! Yes, we’re going to sail to Cudillero tomorrow!
The Captain’s Log (T+150,151…167) – the complete story
Nov 15-18 – the journey begins
We drive to Vigo with a rental car and take the bus to Porto. Along the way, we stop at several ports to see whether they might be a safe and nice place to spend Christmas and New Year. We go to Aviles, San Esteban de Pravia, Ribadeo, and Viveiro. Viveiro is our top choice, along with Ribadesella (where we were before), followed by Ribadeo. San Esteban is lovely, but no place to put Dione IV. But it depends on the weather as well.
Of course, once in Porto, we have to do 2 important things to do! 1. Buy Port wine at our beloved Quinta Dos Corvos port cellar and 2. Buy Pastel de Nata at our beloved Castro Pastel de Nata bakery:
We stay at the airport hotel for the night.
Next day, we rent a car (we get a Tesla!) and drive to Sher’s landlord to pick up her mail and her Portuguese residence card. We have a lovely lunch in a local restaurant with the landlord and his wife and after that, we drive back (2 hours) to the airport hotel in Porto.
On our way down, we see lots of storks standing in their nests… two storks per nest. We weren’t prepared, so didn’t get any photos. But we were ready to get some pictures on the drive back. But what?… empty stork nests!
Next day, in the early morning, we fly to Lisbon and in the afternoon we have the long flight (13 hours) to San Francisco.
A frosty Canada (near Montreal).
The Rocky Mountains are beautifully covered with snow.
Nov 19-21 – San Francisco
We stay in a lovely hotel at Union Square. Big city!
Sher is going to terminate her little storage in San Francisco and she’s sorting out things. What to take to Dione IV, what to store with family, what to give away to the thrift store.
A side note: We get a photo from the booth of Mito Solar on the METS tradeshow in Amsterdam. They produced our solar panels and have asked us for permission to display Dione IV. It’s the drone picture we took at the anchorage at Îles de Chausey last summer. How lovely!
We take the train from San Francisco down the peninsula to Silicon Valley where we meet Sher’s friends Cheryl and Barry for dinner.
Nov 21-25 – Prescott, Arizona
We fly via Los Angeles to Prescott to visit Sher’s mom. We stay in a beautiful Airbnb at Prescott’s Heights (1800m) and the weather is gorgeous: 20°C with blue skies during the day and freezing during the night!
Everyday we have coffee, lunch and dinner with Sher’s mom and we have such a good time!
We drive to Sedona to see the red rocks. Spectacular! Because it’s winter time, the sun is low and that light makes the rocks look extra red. Especially in the late afternoon the rocks are even more red. Very impressive.
We fly back to San Francisco via Denver. Passing the red rocks and the snowy Rocky Mountains once more.
Nov 26-28 – Back to San Francisco
We stay at the same hotel by Union Square in Christmas decoration. But this time we have a room on the top floor with a full view of Union Square. Wonderful!
We take a ferry boat trip to Sausalito. Enjoying the city skyline views and the Golden Gate bridge.
6 pelicans fly with us from San Francisco to Sausalito. Surfing on the wake of the ferry, without moving their wings!
We take the cable tram back to the hotel, which Sher loves. We pass right by where she used to live.
Sunrise on our last morning in SF.
Let’s go home!
Regretfully, we can’t tell you what’s in this little bottle because it’s something you’re not allowed to drink during the flight. But it has something to do with 2 crows 😉
Nov 28 – Back in Porto, Yay!
First, the important things: buy 3 half-sized bottles of 20-year old White Port at Dos Corvos (2 crows) (easier to store on board) and buy a box of 12 Pastel de Nata at Castro to take home.
We celebrate the anniversary of our first meeting and Thanksgiving! We meet our cruising friends Harm & Ilona (who are in Porto marina with their boat) and have a wonderful dinner together.
Nov 29 – Back on board, home sweet boat!
But there’s a LOT of stuff to find a place on board for!
Everything is well on board. Jesús and his men have even cleaned the decks! That is really the first time in the 19 years of Dione IV’s age that somebody else than us cleaned her ! 🙂
We have been checking the cameras multiple times a day and she always looked good and quiet, even when there was a lot of wind in Gijón. Here are the pictures of what we see at night: the camera in the mizzen mast looks forward and the camera in the main mast looks aft.
Nov 30 – What’s in the box?
A box full of great stuff has been waiting for us! We ordered all kinds of things in the Netherlands. Things we couldn’t get here and Wim’s daughter Yara has sent it to the marina.
Dec 1 – Back to boat-talk, folks 🙂
One of the things that was in Yara’s box (aside from Sher’s favorite chocolate bars) is copper wire to rewind the burnt preheat relays for the engine. It needs 550 windings of 0.5mm copper wire.
This is precision work. So, the precisionist among us has to do it…
The repaired solar panel frame is waiting for us with Jesús at the office. They have straightened the bends and welded one spot. Well, it doesn’t look as it was before but the solar panel fits, more or less.. . The finish is pretty rough (Spanish standard?) so Wim finishes and polishes it to our standards (we have all stainless steel tools for polishing and grinder with us ;). Also, 2 new solar panels have arrived (we ordered ‘m from Mito Solar because the old panel got bent and folded and we suspected the cells were broken). We decide to mount the broken panel first because the frame isn’t such a nice fit as before and thus it needs some strain to fit the panel. We connect it, and to our surprise, it yields as much power as the 3 other panels! Despite the ugly folds in the panel! So we decide to see how this works and keep the new panels as spares.
Dec 3 – Which way to go?
We need to decide where we will spend Christmas and New Year. Do we go back to Ribadesella, where Dione IV will be the centerpiece of the harbor all lit up? Or, do we continue west and make our way to Viveiro?
The weather forecasts for tomorrow look reasonably good for going west so we decide to move on to Avilés, a day sail. We go to Jesús office to pay the bills. When we tell him our plan, he advises something else: Puerto Cudillero. A much more beautiful port, in his opinion. Well, we hadn’t thought about that because it seemed a small fishing harbor with no places for visiting yachts. But Jesús is living in Cudillero and he knows the the harbor and the harbormaster very well. He knows the current situation and that there is currently one available place on a pontoon. He shows us the webcam of the port and points out a pontoon: “here you can stay!” It’s only a little further than Avilés (27 sea miles instead of 20) so that’s a perfect day sail for these days with only 8 hours of daylight.
We are excited! We never expected that! Yes, we’re going to sail to Cudillero tomorrow!
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