Today we drove around the headland to Cape St Vincent to see the Farol de Cabo São Vicente (the lighthouse). The coastline is pretty rugged around here and there appear to be plenty of places where people might wildcamp. There are long steep paths to beaches that are obviously frequented by surfers judging by the amount of 'camping' vans around.

The opening times of the lighthouse quite clearly stated that it should be open to the public when we were there - it wasn't so we had to content ourselves with looking at the outside and the spectacular scenery around, including the Bratwurst seller, the pure wool hand knitted poncho seller and the trinket seller . Mike spotted some compasses for sale on a stall, three of them pointing in a different direction for North!

Sagres is a very popular area for Ornithologists apparently, during the Autumn migration up to 5000 birds of 300 species can be seen - not all at the same time I shouldn't think but what do I know about birdwatching - zilch!

After our visit there we had decided that we would go to the beach, Praia de Mareta, that we walked to yesterday only this time we would drive to a parking area just above the beach where we'd seen three campers parked. When we got there it was full and no spaces up the road but we managed to find one up the hill. We walked down to the beach restaurant for lunch and it was a good lunch too! Mike had some spicy gambas to start while I had fish soup. We both opted for fried fish for our main course. This consisted of two fried mackerel, a sardine and a small skate wing (at least that's what they looked and tasted like), rice, chips and salad . Of course, we had a glass of wine (Mike had two) and finished with coffees. There was no room for desserts.

We struggled back up the hill to the camper to fill my rucksack with books, water and sun lotion and change into sun bathing gear. Armed with the bag, towels and beach mats back down the hill we went. By the way, this hill is single carriageway and cobbled. The rest of the sfternoon was spent sunbathing and watching surfers. There are various surf schools here.

Did I say yesterday that the sea at this beach was calm - well, I lied! It certainly was surfer sea today. We both attempted to get wet but there was a really strong undertow as the water receded. It looks as though I won't get my sea swim this year either. I knew I should have gone in the pool at Mikki's but that wouldn't have been 'the sea'.

When we'd had enough of sun, sea and surfers we crawled back up the hill to the van. Jeez, it was hot in there!

Once we'd got ourselves sorted out we drove off down to Intermarché to empty the waste water and loo. We didn't get fresh water because you have to use a 2€ jeton (token) which gives you 100 litres of water and we only needed 40. From Intermarché we came back to the Fortaleza Sagres again to park for the night. We can get water from the public toilets so we'll get some before we leave tomorrow.