Suggestions for winter stops on French/Spanish/Portuguese Atlantic coast

[lumphammer]

We have started on our way to warmer climes, leaving the UK in search of sun during the hottest days of the year. We have no real itinerary, other than to work our way as far south as we can before October/November this year, without pushing our limits, which at the moment are no more than two nights at sea at any one time, and not to rush.

We originally felt that we would aim for Rota on the north of the bay of Cadiz as a possible winter spot (we stayed with cruising friends over the New Year at the town and liked it a lot), but realise that we might need to think of somewhere a little closer.

So our question is what other ports should we consider on-route for the winter period of say Nov to Feb?

 

[PlanB]

After September the weather can be iffy for sailing down the coast of Portugal, and there are long gaps between ports, some of which may close during bad weather. So you either need to have made it as far south as the Algarve and beyond by early Oct, or stop further north, where the temperature and rainfall may be higher. In the latter case, La Coruna or La Rochelle would be high up my list.

 

[GrahamM376]

How fast do you want to go south? There's much to see on the way, a full summer could be spent on the French north & west coasts and the same in northern Spain and the Rias. As PlanB says, the Portuguese coast is not the place to be sailing from late autumn through to the spring due to heavy swell and port closures, whereas the Algarve is excellent in winter but, to get down there in time you will miss many interesting areas.

Presumably, you will want to haul out at some stage to antifoul and maybe do a bit of maintenance so, if you want to sleep aboard, this will limit choices.

 

[jimbaerselman]

How fast do you want to go south? There's much to see on the way, a full summer could be spent on the French north & west coasts and the same in northern Spain and the Rias. As PlanB says, the Portuguese coast is not the place to be sailing from late autumn through to the spring due to heavy swell and port closures, whereas the Algarve is excellent in winter but, to get down there in time you will miss many interesting areas.

Complete agreement.

I've met many people cruising the Med who, when swapping experiences about how they got there, wish they'd "done" Biscay France, N Spain (especially the Basque country) and the Rias of Galicia.

There are good layup spots in all these regions. You can read more about them at http://jimbsail.info/tidal-europe/biscay , with port descriptions, links and maps on linked pages.

 

[vyv_cox]

We wintered at Rochefort, which we found to be far more sheltered and attractive than La Rochelle.

 

[RobbieW]

Agree with others that the North of Spain and northern Portuguese coast has to be treated with increasing respect from September onwards. As you said you can do a couple of nights at sea you can make the most of whatever opportunities occur. We set a goal of being around St Vincent by October 31st two years ago, we did that just, having left Falmouth about now. I dont think we missed anything that we yearn to go back for. Crossed from La Rochelle to Bilbao at the end of August arriving in Povoa in mid October. We skipped down from Povoa (that siren drove us mad) to Peniche, then to Lisbon to sit out a couple of southerly gales and round the corner. Then sailed up to Jan 6th when we settled in La Linea for a bit.

As much as anything your attitude to having a winter berth booked well ahead will drive the schedule, I dont think we lost out by deciding on arrival at La Linea that we would stay for a while. Most of the Andalusian marinas were then Junta run and had little scope for negotiation, however that changed as we headed north - I think we got a better deal in Sant Carles by planning a couple of months ahead.