Barco do Mar (sea boat) or Xávega
Xávega could have a broad and technical concept, but its genesis is in symbiosis with its people, their mannerisms, their tribulations. At the beginning and end of their stories, there is the sea, and on the way the boat that humanized them.
Painted in blue, it was once lost on the horizon between the sky and the ocean, now it is a representation of the only two companies that still try to survive on our lands. At Praia da Vagueira, the João da Murtosa company and at Praia do Areão, the Valdemar company.
Since the sixties the boats have been smaller, due to seasonality. In winter the boats are stopped, and with “very luck” they work from April to October. But nothing is certain in the life of a fisherman!
The Vencedor is an imposing boat measuring nine meters and seventy (inside out) in length, with a beam of three and five meters and a shallow crescent-shaped base, allowing movement around the sand. Its gross tonnage of five thousand tons, has been breaking the swell since 1972, displaying a customary back, with a magnificent pro spout measuring three and seventy meters high.
The oxen were family, and they pulled the nets, some five hundred meters wide on each flap, more than the law dictates, and with a bag. The two ropes, one at each end, made it possible to pull the nets and guide the fish to the mouth of the net. After each fishing trip this bag had to be sewn to its profile. Trawl nets could be handled from the boat or on land, but always launched into the sea from the boat.
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Arte XávegaPraia da Vagueira | João da Murtosa Company
Praia do Areão | Valdemar Company