Despite a good anchorage in the shadow of the cliffs, it was still a windy and rolly night in Albufeira. But we slept enough to be bright and bushy tailed ready for the next leg. We planned to continue to Culatra with SV Quintessence while SV Lysander would be returning to Ferragudo.
For the early part of the leg we were blessed with 10 kts of wind to get the sails up and cruise silently down the coast to the South East. We had planned to make good low tide at th entrance to Culatra and as the wind dropped off we switched to the engine.
Navionics has always proven to be reasonable with its bottom contours but the silting to South West of the entrance of Culatra is much more extensive than charted. So we chose to follow the 7m contour line with some hard turns towards deep water as the shallows appeared.
Just before low tide we turned into the Culatra channel and despite the relatively small amount of water movement, there were still strong eddies and tidal shifts to push Eclipse around.
We entered without incident and pressed on to a wide and well protected anchorage which was much less busy than we expected.
Already in the achorage was a 3 master that had returned from Cuba and a Swedish couple in an Amel that we recognised from Lagos.
We anchored mid channel so that we had room to swing but were close enough to hop ashore by tender.
One point to note is that at low tide, the route between Olhao and Cultara becomes a shortcut and so you get buzzed by every small boat that wants to move between the islands including the water taxis.
During the week we spent at Culatra, we shared a beach BBQ with the Lockhart family from SV Quintessence. A great evening but as the tide drew out it became clear the dinghies where beached and it would be a long draw and punt back out to the main channel and before we could motor back to the yachts.
