Not much desire the last few days to write and seeing how we are retired and not overly interested in doing something we don’t have to do, these things will happen. So we are writing this four days after this section of the trail.
Prior to our third hiking day we relocated ourselves and all of our belongings to the surf town of Sagres. This is the most southwestern part of Portugal and therefore all of Europe. In fact, it was one of those locations that the ancient mariners called the end of the world.
Because we woke up in Sagres we decided to start there and walk north to south for the first time. This section of the Fisherman’s Trail is considered the hardest of all thirteen segments. It is 19.5 km long and more importantly, has some very steep elevation changes. It really wasn’t that bad, mainly because we shared carrying duties of one partially filled backpack and the previous day off allowed our bodies a good recovery. But we think the primary reason is the previous two hikes seemed to be nonstop up and down, whereas the length of this trail included large segments that were relatively flat.
During this segment we came upon a bicycle that was sitting by itself off the path. We figured someone was out exploring the cliffs and parked their bike there. Shortly thereafter, we approached a beach that had a small cafe and another very unique bicycle parked near the entrance (it was an Omnium Cargo bike and it had an extended front end which allowed the rider to place a regular size backpack in front — the type of bike that may interest us in future adventures). We decided to grab a beer and snack. At the next table were four young men in their early twenties and one of them was changing the tire on a bike. We learned the four of them had ridden their bikes from Copenhagen (4,000 km) and were on their way to Morocco. Unfortunately, the bike we saw near the cliffs belonged to one of these four and the previous day he broke his foot climbing around the cliffs. His lower leg was wrapped in a soft cast and he was assessing multiple boxes of medicines the hospital provided (while we were speaking with them he started a call with a doctor in Denmark, who told him the Portuguese doctors way over-prescribed his dosage and to only take some of the medicine). They were now contemplating their next move. Because they started as a team of four they were not going to continue cycling without their colleague. They were planning on still traveling to Morocco (train and ferry) and renting a car to drive around before flying back to Denmark with their bikes. They were all very friendly and chatty. We said our goodbyes, wished them the best, and headed off.
Arguably the steepest part of the hike took us down to a beach that we are now calling “Dolphins and Dongs”. We took our time navigating down the cliff in a Gollum like fashion, and when we arrived on the beach we were welcomed by two dolphins swimming very close to the shore. We sat down to rest our feet and enjoy the wildlife. Apparently, this was also a beach popular with nudist and one gentlemen in particular seemed to enjoy displaying his goods back and forth down the beach. I chuckled a little like a junior high student, but also appreciated his enthusiasm.
We made it to our destination of Salema in about 8 hours. We felt very good walking this difficult section with a light pack and believe our system of one day on/off is good for us this early in our journey.
you guys are killing it! must be part mountain goat.