One January morning my wife and I sailed from Southampton for Algeria,
on the north coast of Africa.
As we came into the Bay of Biscay, after leaving the English Channel,
our ship got into a big swell, the seas rolling us heavily, and
occasionally rushing over our bows in frothing green and clouds of
spray.
After about twenty-four hours of rough weather we sighted Cape
Finisterre--the first headland on the coast of Portugal, and not far
from that we passed Corunna, where, during the Peninsular War in 1810,
the British force under Sir John Moore successfully got away from a
superior force of French, though losing their gallant commander in
doing so.
The next important town on the coast is Vigo, and it was in Vigo Bay
that Drake "singed the Spanish King's beard" by capturing and burning
his fleet.
Also later, during the war of the Spanish Succession in 1702, an
Anglo-Dutch fleet under Admirals Rooke and Stanhope attacked the
Spanish "silver fleet" in Vigo Harbour, captured much treasure, and
sank many vessels.
Past the Torres Vedras. where Wellington successfully held off
Napoleon's army till his own was fit to take the field.
And near that is Oporto, where the port wine comes from, and which is
well known to Britons as being the place where the Duke of Wellington
defeated the French troops under Marshal Ney in the Peninsular War by
crossing the River Douro unexpectedly--the French thinking it quite
impassable by British troops,
We got into calmer water near the mouth, of the River Tagus, and here
we saw the palace of our national guest, the young ex-King of
Portugal, standing high up on a mountain peak above Cintra.
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