TheTall Ships Sail Away....

Sunday 23 July, midday, strong heat, the sun high and shining from across the RiverTejo. We assemble & wait from 11a.m. in our many thousands. Something unique is about to happen. People cling to the little shade available, namely, the Monument to the Discoveries that I showed you last week.
In the end, it was impossible - to choose just 4 photos from around 200. But it's done. 3 are for sheer symbolism (1, 3 & 4), because I was struck by so much historical symbolism as we waited.
I looked up at the Mon/Disoveries and saw the sun shining on the caravelle that Henry the Navigator holds, watched the hundreds of yachts, cabin cruisers, dinghies, even canoes pouring outof the marinas to accompany the ships to the sea beyond. And I thought: the Portuguese have forever been essentially a people of the sea. It is what they have always done well, out of necessity. Even today, there are so many marinas, ports, boats, so many fisherman - professional, leisure, pure necessity to supplement the food budget.
And here they were, under the shadow of their founding fathers. The pic. shows the first of the largest ships waitng to start, from beyond the bridge, watched over by those ancient discoverers.
And then it began, majestically led by the Portugese beauty, the 'Sagres', named after the 15th-century school of navigation at the south western tip of Europe. Across the river, another monument, the sombre, over-large 'gift' from the 20th-cent. Dictator Salazar, Cristo Rei (Christ the King), always watching everything, like Big Brother.
Half a mile (3/4 km) further towards the sea stands the Torre (Tower) de Belem. More symbolism. Built in only 5 years & finished in 1520, this is a masterpiece of Manueline architecture; it has no rival anywhere in the world & is perhaps Lisbon's greatest monument. Proud, magnificent, in perfect condition, it was not constructed for glory, or for admiration. it had a vital role in the defence of the city, erected at the mouth of theTagus estuary to watch & warn of threats from theAtlantic. On Sunday, only VIPs had access to the view from its upper storeys, or could watch the ships from aspeciall-erected (& shaded) grandstand, we the plebs kept at a distance by barriers & some police.
You see a Spanish ship that was second in line, already beyond theTower. I think it is poetic.

My last picture is, I feel, very special. I saw maybe 30 of the 75 ships sail by, heard the crews cheering and chanting, met with applause from the over-heating spectators. This is the ship I choose to show you, in its rightful place, passing the Tower.
She is the 'Vera Cruz' a perfectly-scaled replica of a 16th-century caravelle,the ships in which Portuguese sailors departed from this spot to discover the world.
It was a once in a lifetime moment. If I could, I'd show you a slightly later pic of the comparatively huge German, Dutch & Argentinian ships that caught it, overshadowed it, slowed & then passed it.
And you had to wonder: How did they do what they did in the15th/16th centuries in such a tiny vessel?