The river water was warmer than I expected. Not warm. But warmer than the Atlantic, which I had put one hand into and pulled back fast.
Vila Nova de Milfontes is where the Mira meets the ocean. I arrived in late July and the river beach was close to where I was staying. For two weeks, that was the only water I went into.
The ocean side frightened me early on. One morning I walked down past the fort, over the wooden boardwalk, to the wide sand where the waves came in long and grey. The sound was heavier than anything the river made. I grew up in Hamburg, close enough to the North Sea to know what cold water does. This was different. I stood at the edge where the foam touched my feet and pulled back. Something in my chest went tight. Not fear of drowning. Fear of the pull. The way the water moved without pausing for anything.
I went back to the river and stayed there. I swam every morning before the families arrived, when the water was still and the far bank hadn’t caught the sun yet. Small fish moved in the shallows near my feet. I could stand anywhere, put my toes down, find sand. The current was gentle enough that I barely felt it unless I closed my eyes. A heron stood in the reeds on the far bank one morning. It didn’t move for a long time. A woman selling drinks from a cooler appeared at the same spot each day, her umbrella tilted against the morning sun. She nodded at me once. I nodded back. That was the extent of it.
The river bend had a rope swing that the older children used in the afternoons. They swung out over the water and dropped in with shouts and splashes. I watched them from the path, their towels spread on the sun-heated stones, bicycles lying in the grass. They knew where the deep parts were, where the current caught, where to jump and where not to. I stayed in the shallow end.
Some evenings I walked to the harbour wall and watched the river mouth from there. You could see both waters from that angle. The ocean side looked rougher, waves breaking on the sandbar in white lines. The river side looked calm. I always went back to the calm one.
Then on a Tuesday I was floating in the river. Not really swimming. Just on my back with my ears under the surface. Everything above went muffled and far. When I turned over, a child was near me. A girl on a yellow inflatable ring. She was paddling with her hands, her face serious. Her hair was wet and plastered to her head.
She was drifting. The current near the mouth moves faster than upstream, and the water was carrying her sideways toward the line where the river ends and the ocean begins. She didn’t seem to notice. Her hands kept paddling but the water was taking her.
I watched her hands. Small, steady, useless against the current.
An old man sat on the sand, not far from the water. He had a folded newspaper and a hat and sandals placed beside him in a row. Then he looked up. He raised one arm. Just raised it, straight up, without standing. Hand open, fingers spread. The girl saw him. She stopped paddling, looked at where she was, and kicked hard back toward the bank. She got out further upstream, pulled the inflatable behind her, shook water off her arms. The man lowered his arm and went back to his newspaper.
I stayed in the water. The current tugged at my legs. I could feel it more now that I was paying attention. It wasn’t strong enough to pull me, not where I stood. But further out, closer to the mouth, it would be different. The girl had been near the line where the water changes from fresh to salt, from still to moving. I thought about swimming after her. The thought lasted a second. I didn’t move. The current would have been too strong where she was, and I knew it.
I sat on the sand afterward and watched the man. He turned a page. Then adjusted his hat. He looked out at the water again, that half-absent gaze, level and patient. One movement. No shouting, no running. He’d been watching her the whole time, I think. Or maybe he looked up at the right moment. I never worked out which.
The morning I went to the ocean, the path over the dune was already hot underfoot. I stopped at the top and looked at the water. The surface was smooth for once. The wind had dropped overnight and the waves were low, coming in soft lines. I walked down to the wet sand and left my things above the tide line.
The water was colder than the river. I went in to my waist. The sand under my feet was rough, broken shell fragments pressing into my soles. A wave caught me at chest height and I staggered sideways. Then another. The rhythm settled after that and I could stand. The pull was there, the same pull I’d been afraid of. It was real. It was just not as large as I’d made it. I stayed in the water for a while, letting the waves hit, then walked out. The old man was on the sand again, same spot, that hat. He didn’t look up.
I wanted him to see me in the ocean. I don’t have a good reason for this. He was watching the water the way someone watches who has done it for years, steady and half-absent, ready for something he expected not to happen. I stood in the surf and he read his newspaper and neither of us looked at the other.
Getting there
The ocean beach was past the fort and down a wooden boardwalk, then over a low dune. No shade on the path after the first stretch of pine trees. I carried water and wore a hat and still came back with my shoulders pink. The river beach was closer, an easy walk along the paved path beside the Mira, and that was the one I took most mornings.
When to go
Late July into August was hot. The river beach filled with families by mid-morning and emptied again after six. The ocean beach was less crowded, partly because the water was cold and partly because the walk discouraged people carrying too much. I stayed longer than planned. The mornings stayed cool enough to walk, and by August the heat didn’t break until late afternoon.
If you’re thinking about it
- The river beach is calmer. Good for swimming if you want to actually swim rather than just cool off.
- The ocean beach has no shade. Bring an umbrella or go early.
- The current near the river mouth is stronger than it looks. Stay upstream of the sandbar.
- The boardwalk to the ocean beach has no facilities after the fort. Bring water.
- River beach has a kiosk in season. Ocean beach has nothing.
I’ll tell you the rest if I remember it.
