#4: [11-Dec-11]

#2: [13-Aug-09]

#1: [21-Jun-01]

09-Apr-2011 -- After a business trip to Guimarães (60 km north of the confluence point), I had the weekend to spend in Porto (60 km west of the confluence point). On early Saturday morning, I rented a bicycle and cycled along the Douro River. Initially I thought that I would have plenty of time to ride to the confluence point that day. But then I realized how mountainous the area was – riding along Douro River actually meant to either ride upwards or cast down.

It was already 4 p.m. when I started the final climb upwards to the confluence point – from quasi sea level to 1132 m altitude. Travelling in these mountains was beautiful - riding on small roads, passing through tiny villages and meeting nice people.

The confluence point is located on top of the Serra de Montemuro. Recently, a wind park has been built around the confluence point where the nearest wind generator is within 229 m distance to the confluence. I abandoned my bike at the nearest wind turbine and hiked to the confluence point. There is an amazing view towards the valley in the south from the confluence. The area is quite barren with only some grass between large boulders. The ferns that can be seen in summer had not grown yet.

After documenting the confluence, the sun was already setting. I cycled to the nearest village (Gralheira, 2.5 km beeline) in order to find a place for the night. It turned out that opportunities for accommodation were quite sparse in this area. But a friendly group of teachers gave me a ride to Cinfães (40 km) saving me from cycling in the dark. After spending the night in the little town Cinfães, I cycled back to Porto on Sunday morning.

Why is there no picture of the GPS? Let me try to summarize this long story: After returning home I copied the pictures to the external hard drive attached to my PC and deleted the images on the camera’s SD card. Then I dropped the hard drive – thereby destroying it. I have had already some experiences with data recovery from a flash card, but data retrieval from a hard drive is complicated and expensive due to the need for opening it in a cleanroom. Therefore, I preferred to recover the pictures from the SD card instead (which can be done quickly with some simple software). Unfortunately, I had already overwritten the images where I had taken the picture of my coordinate evidence.

Interestingly, there are now 3 visits: one without wind turbines, one with wind turbines under construction and now this visit with a fully developed wind park.

CP visit details:

• Minimum beeline distance from CP: 0 m
• Accuracy of the positioning: 3 m
• Walking time to the CP: 5 minutes
• Time at the CP: 6:24 pm
• Vegetation: grassland, ferns
• Distance to a road: 1.5 km
• Distance to a track: 250 m
• Distance to houses: 2.5 km
• Topography: Almost on top of a mountain on a slight slope. Generally mountainous area.
• Weather: fair, windy, 14° C (felt temperature)
• Description of the CP: 60 km out of the city of Porto; high above Douro River. On top of a mountain in a wind park.
• Given Name: The Giant Wind Park Confluence