SHIP'S LOG - M/V AVALON

Norfolk to Maine

2010-05-26T14:54:00.011-04:00

Norfolk to Annapolis and then the final push to Maine

(with a photo that got left out of the Fort Lauderdale crew, Jonathan, Mark's son)

4/10/10, Saturday – Left Norfolk around 11:30 and headed up the Chesapeake Bay. Sunny and clear, a Beautiful day on the water. Spent the night at Horn Creek.

4/11/10 , Sunday – Solomon’s – Great day on the water. Anchored off the Maritime Museum for the night.

4/12/10, Monday - Annapolis – Another beautiful day traveling up the Chesapeake. Took a slip at the Annapolis Landing Marina for a month. Great bath and laundry facilities and a pretty low key place. (Note from Joanne – I drove down, met Mark there and we went back to ME for a few weeks. Mark wanted to wait for some warmer weather before making the last leg north. He flew back down a couple of days before leaving Annapolis. While he was in Annaplois the radar got repaired and he installed a new electronic compass for the autopilot.)

5/12/10, Wednesday – Left Annapolis with my sister Joanne and her partner Brandy. We had a very calm day with no wind or waves. Traveled to Chesapeake City and anchored in the harbor there. Small and shallow, but I got too close to the west shore and plowed a new channel in. Dropped the hook and had to reset. I pulled up a set of Mardi Gras beads with the anchor to add to the collection from the last visit in the fall. In the morning I pulled up another set of beads with the anchor. It must have been a hell of a party in Chesapeake City.

5/13/10 – Thursday - In the morning, we were on the road at 7:00 a.m. to Cape May. Down the canal and then into the Delaware River. Again a fine, clear and windless day and a good current for most of the trip. We did 9 plus knots most of the way. Anchored in Cape May Harbor SW of the coast guard station. Joanne (my sister) spent a good deal of time at the helm and refreshing her navigation skills. Very fine day.

5/14/10 – Friday – Left Cape May at 7:00 in the morning and had the tide with us all the way to Atlantic City. We traveled the 39 miles in less than 5 hours. I dropped Joanne and Brandy off at the State Marina and took off alone around noon. A front was predicted in the afternoon so I took the inside route on the NJ ICW up to Beach Haven where I refueled at a handsome price of $2.57 a gallon for diesel. I had planned to anchor at Mordecia Island but was gently warned by the dock master about how shallow the thoroughfare was where I planned to anchor. After plowing a new channel down the thoroughfare, I threw in the towel and went back to the Beach Haven Yacht Club marina and took a slip for the night. Severe thunderstorms were forecast so I was just as happy to be on a slip. Very tired, I went to bed early and woke up twice because of the storm but immediately fell back to sleep. Ahhh, a secure berth.

5/15/10 – Saturday – Had a leisurely morning and backed out of the berth at 9:00. This section of the inside route is tedious. The wind was blowing at 10 + knots out of the NW and constantly trying to push me out of the channel. Hand steering in this section was like trying to hold your breath for 4 hours. I phoned Joanne and wasn’t paying attention to my course. After the call I noticed that the makers were the small local sets and didn’t feel right. Too late, I missed my turn and drove into the mud up to my ears. This time I wasn’t going to power out. I had to make the humiliating call to Tow Boats US. All the way to the Exumas and back and twice I had to make the call in NJ. Damn. Wound my way into Barnegat Bay and put the anchor down around 12:30. Took a nap, got up around 2:00 and made a pot of chili. Spent the rest of the day checking the weather forecast and the charts. Hope to go outside to Sandy Hook tomorrow.

5/16/10 – Sunday – On the road at 7:10, the fisherman have been streaming past me for an hour headed for the inlet. Along the jetty the fisherman were lined up and the beach buggies are on the beach outside are as far as I can see. Hundreds of boats anchored and trolling along the way to Sandy Hook. Easy ride, less than 10 knots of wind and 1-2 foot seas on the nose. This really is a good boat at sea. Anchor down in Sandy Hook around two. The macerator had been tripping the breaker all day. Probably something clogged. Damn, just what I wanted to do, rebuild the macerator. Well, here goes. The whole thing starts in the head. The pump is located in the head under the vanity, below two removable shelves accessed at some expense to skin. I disconnected the hose to the holding tank to have the remainder of the slush in the pump spill over me and into the bilge. Nice. After taking the pump apart and finding the nut missing on the chopper blade, I reassembled the thing a couple times before getting all the right parts in all the right places. Success! Washed everything down and pumped the bilge.

5/17/10 – Monday – woke up to an overcast sky but quiet otherwise. Heading for the Big Apple. An easy ride up to the Statue of Liberty and then to Hell’s Gate. I hit the tide right and saw 13.6 knots on the GPS as I surfed the East River – upstream! I felt some vibration in the drive train and went into Brewer’s Marina at Stratford, CT and spent the night.

5/18/10 – Tuesday – Rod, the yard manager, was very accommodating and as soon as the tide was right, hauled the boat and recommended that the prop needed a tune up. This is no doubt a result of my cutting new channels in the mud across the southeastern US and NJ. The cutlass bearing will also need to be replaced in the fall. Rod was able to pull the prop and get it to a shop that afternoon. Spent the rest of the day relaxing. Heavy rain and wind came thru in the night but I hardly noticed sitting in a slip.

5/19/10 – Wednesday - Waited until noon for the tide and then pulled the boat and reinstalled the prop. One blade was out of spec and was a big part of the problem. Pulled out another “BOAT”* unit for the bill and was on the road at 2:00, heading for the Thimbles, a group of islands located off the coast of Connecticut. Lovely spot, with scenery that reminded me of Maine. Took a yacht club mooring and had a peaceful night.

*Bring Out Another Thousand

5/20/10 – Thursday - The morning was beautiful, clear sky, still water, and rocky coastline covered with evergreens. The day was an easy ride to Point Judith and into the pond beyond the harbor. Dropped anchor and watched the sunset.

5/21/10 – Friday – The day started out still and by noon the wind had picked up to under 10 knots and the chop in Buzzard’s bay was about two feet. The boat shrugged it off and with a good tide I cruised up the Cape Cod Canal at 11 knots. I took a slip at the Sandwich Marina which is ¼ mile inside the north end of the canal. Joanne delivered my brother Jay and his son Sam to the marina where they signed on for the final run to Maine.

5/22/10 – Saturday – The day started around 5:30 as the fishermen started launching their boats at the nearby ramp to begin a day of fishing on Cape Cod Bay. Joanne was off the boat bright and early and we headed into Massachusetts Bay. We stopped in the crowd of boats while Sam jigged for mackerel. He landed 7 good ones and we decided that would be plenty for dinner and headed for Gloucester. Another fine day on the water ended when we picked up a town mooring in Gloucester. We dropped the dinghy and headed for the marine store for a couple more mackerel jigs. We took a harbor cruise in the dinghy and returned to the boat to grill up the mackerel for supper. We managed to eat 6 of the 7 we prepared and Sam was quite pleased with his catch.

5/23/10 – Sunday – Left Gloucester at 6:00 and headed up the Annisquam River which cuts through the North Shore of MA to Ipswich Bay. The ride was beautiful. The homes were well kept and there was an amazing number of stone walls made of large granite blocks fitted together lining the shore.

A short distance into Ipswich bay and we ran into the first fog of the season. Even with Sam on lookout for clear skies it stayed with us until far into Portland Harbor. We grabbed the mooring at Centerboard Yacht Club around 3:30.

Mission accomplished, and a great one it was.

GA to Mile Marker "O" in Norfolk, VA

2010-04-10T08:57:00.005-04:00

Ship's Log - March 27, 2010 near Savannah, GA
to April 8, 2010, Norfolk, VA

Mark has been working his way north. Even though there are just a few photos, he does quite a fun read. From the last posting….. He last left us coming into Georgia……

3/27/10, Saturday – This morning I saw a fish jump clear of out of the water about 100 yards away. It was huge. I am guessing it was at least 4 and maybe 5 feet long. I didn’t think anything could live in this brown muddy water. Today was more marsh land and a maze of creeks and rivers. The wind blew all day and it made the sounds very choppy. The worst was Sapelo Sound. The waves were 4 feet with a few six footers thrown in a short chop, right on the nose. Avalon took it all on with no whining. The next fun came at Hell’s Gate. A short cut on the Little Ogeechee River where I managed to find the bottom. Fortunately a small boat came by and told me to move over 5 feet and I would be in the channel. I pushed the throttle down and powered thru the mud and back into the channel. I was not looking forward to the call to SeaTow. Spent the night in Herb Creek (ICW mile marker 584), this was an anchorage we used on the trip down.

3/28/10, Sunday – The morning was still and clear and the ride to Savannah was wonderful until the slow slog 8 miles up the Savannah River to the city. It was well worth the ride. It must have been an incredible sight to arrive on the waterfront in the days when cotton was king. I took a trolley tour of the historic district and was very impressed with the squares and the restorations of the buildings. Savannah boasts many firsts, but I didn’t realize the main industry was shipping. Over a billion cargo containers go thru the port each year. The second largest industry is tourism. Sightseeing trolleys are everywhere. Left the city in early afternoon ahead of the rain and anchored in Skull Creek (554).

3/29/10, Monday – What a day. It seemed like every cut between rivers had shoaled in – no problems at all on the run south. Many left me with 18” or less under the keel. A few times I could feel the mud dragging on the keel and I would have to power up and hope for the best because there wasn’t any place else to go. When I turned into the anchorage at Tom Point Creek (496) the chart showed 12’ of water. I was some surprised to hit bottom hard twice. Avalon bounced up and over, we made it thru, I sure do like a full keel and protected prop. The creek is in the middle of a marsh and I was tucked down between the banks. One other sailboat was there and I motored upstream past him and dropped the anchor. I let out scope a little less than usual maybe so I wouldn’t end up on the shore if the boat swung in the night. I woke up at 2:00 am and since I was awake decided to have a look around. The boat had swung with the tide and it was ripping out of the creek. The unfortunate part was I was 2 tenths of a mile downstream having glided past the sailboat and finally the anchor had grabbed again. I fired up the engine, re-anchored mid stream and went back to bed. I gave myself a good mental thrashing……. scope…scope…scope.

3/30/10, Tuesday – Headed for Charleston, SC with reservations in place for the Charleston Maritime Center. I had been warned the current could be tricky on an ebb tide and I arrived on the last third of the ebb and had no difficulty. Of course I couldn’t leave the GPS situation alone. I called Furuno and got a little more info. I modified a couple of connections and now I can download routes and waypoints from the computer to the GPS and then to the autopilot. This may work okay for the moment. Washed the boat down from the previous night’s blessing of a huge dump of pollen. Checked out some ribs and wings for supper, a southern chain called Sticky Fingers and was not disappointed. I walked around the historic district and it was again a huge tourist area but with shopping and restaurants on a scale much larger than Portland. A good day.

3/31/10, Wednesday – Found a small shop that hand rolls cigars. That was a good stop. Took a horse drawn carriage ride of the residential and business areas of the historic district. The lowest priced home on that area of Charleston is 1.7 million according to our tour guide and that isn’t a great place. Lunch at Café Cru. I ordered a fried calamari mixed in an Asian slaw that was outstanding. I love this town. Did some route planning for the next day, and then boiled some shrimp for dinner. As I started to do the dishes the fresh water pump quit. After a certain amount of deliberation, I pulled out the two five gallon collapsible water bags and filled them at the dock. I will try to fix this on the fly. I think I will have a whiskey and call it a day.

4/1/10, Thursday – Spent the morning on the bus going to West Marine to get a new pump and a socket for the starboard nav light. Amazingly, they had the same pump on the shelf. Bus ride back, lunch, and started repairs. Turned on the pump and the d--- thing started. Moved on to the light. I installed the socket, still intermittent function. I took it apart twice more and the same result. Idiot. Then discovered the problem appears to be in the wire itself. McGivered that back together and it should work. More shrimp for supper. I used the last of the macaroni with red sauce, Jon and I made to whip up some shrimp with garlic, onions, etc.. It may be another great recipe with some tinkering. The meal was just right along with the Buena Vista Social Club playing from the Ipod that Joanne loaded on and some red wine. Since the maid had her day off, I started the dishes. D--- water pump refused to perform. Maid would have been very cranky. I grabbed the closest dirty fork and headed to the engine room where I gave the offending pump a good thrashing on the switch and it, in blind obedience, started to work again. I guess the trip to West Maine was not a total waste of time. Looks like it was a typical April fool’s day. Hope tomorrow is a little more productive.

4/2/10, Friday – Spent the morning prepping for an overnight run to Wrightsville Beach, NC. The weather was predicted to be south winds at 10 knots and seas 1-2 feet. Perfect offshore weather. Couldn’t sit around any longer and shoved off at noon. The weather was milder than predicted and it was a great night for a passage. The stars were out and the traffic from other boats was light. I tracked two other vessels on radar and on the same course with me for many hours. I reached the Cape Fear River around 4:00 in the morning and the offshore buoy showed up on the radar like a landing strip. With the radar and the channel lights I crawled up the river against the strong current, which I was to fight for more hours. Back on the ICW I ran into a fog bank that would make a make a Mainer proud. I couldn’t see nothin’. Another boat in the same soup saw that I had radar and asked if he could follow me. I answered on the radio “no problem” and hung up the mic. The screen on the radar went blank. Don’t know why, still don’t but I took the lead anyway. Just another case of the blind leading the blind. Finally, the fog lifted and the boats behind me slid on past the pokey Avalon. I noticed that the voltmeter was reading low but I didn’t know what was causing it. Rolled into Wrightsville Beach (283) around noon and had a beer and a bit to eat and took a nap. So much for Saturday.

4/4/10, Sunday – Felt pretty good in the morning, hit the road for at least a 50 mile day. I became a little concerned because it didn’t seem like the engine was charging the batteries. I started the generator and turned on the battery chargers and put a charge back in the batteries. That charge held me until I reached Swansboro, NC (229). Wasn’t sure if that had anything to do with the radar or not. Fueled the boat and then pulled out the bible. Nigel Calder’s Mechanical and Electrical Manual is worth its weight in gold. “Don’t leave home without it.” I tightened up the alternator belts again for the second time in the first 100 hours of use and it looks like that might be the solution. Radar must have just been coincidence. Guess I will have a whiskey and take the day off.

4/5/10, Monday – On the road, puttin’ on the miles. Campbell Creek (155) turned out to be a lovely anchorage.
4/6/10, Tuesday - Another day puttin’ on the miles. Alligator River Marina (85) is strategically located on the river because there is nothing else around. It is also a Shell station. No cell phone service.

4/7/10, Wednesday – More miles. Decided to take the Virgina Cut route instead of the Dismal Swamp. Much of the time you have to steer by hand. The route for the last three days twists and turns or you have to stay in a dredged channel and the wind is pushing you off course. The color of the water is brown from tannin or from mud, stains the boat and is just plain ugly. Pulled off the river at Blackwater Creek (30) and anchored about one half mile up the creek in mud. The wing blew most of the night but it wasn’t too bad.

4/8/10, Thursday – the final push on the ICW. Tonight, I will stay at the Waterside Marina and the historic district in Norfolk (mile marker 0 on the ICW). The area is revitalized and I would like to see more of this area. Very glad to be off the “ditch” and into more open water of Chesapeake Bay.

Georgetown, Bahamas and back to Florida

2010-03-29T10:42:00.014-04:00

Ship’s Log – February 14, Georgetown, Bahamas

mid-March, 2010, East Coast, US

February 14, Valentine’s - was Tom and Suzi’s departure day. We got them safely off – a great week it had been, storms and all. We now had a week in front of us to get restocked, laundry, water and check back in with local friends and get ourselves moved north to meet my sister, Kathryn. We thought we had to make a hasty departure from Georgetown, but the weather (as usual) changed that decision and we were just as glad to have some time to visit with our friends on Ultra and Seas the Day. Just before dinner on our boat with guests coming aboard, the generator quit. Always something. The guys helped Mark work on it a bit then and more the next day and they narrowed it down to a solenoid or some such part. Parts were ordered and sent to Kathryn who would bring them along. But after some wonderful catching up time with Bill, JoAnne, Jan and Mark we started our northern trek on Friday the 19th.
Going out the cut from Elizabeth Harbor into the Northeast Providence Channel we passed a delivery vessel that had gone hard aground. We had heard the chatter on the radio but it was sobering to actually see it. For the ride outside in the Channel, Mark had set up some ballyhoo that he bought for fishing and we got them in the water. Nothing – nothing – nothing – nothing – nothing and 4 ½ hours later just as we were about to turn into Adderly Cut at Lee Stocking Island for our overnight, we had a big strike. Finally! Mark landed a Skipjack Tuna. After getting it landed we poked our way around the island through some skinny water at low tide of course and into a lovely anchorage. Nice calm night and fresh fish for supper!
Saturday the 20th we decided to go outside again as it is a lovely calm day. It was the day of the barracuda. The first one was caught shortly after leaving Adderly Cut. It became bait. The 2nd one was interesting. After quite a struggle Mark finally got it close to the boat and suddenly it seemed that we had lost whatever it was, only to pull in what was left – a head – of a huge barracuda. Shark food? Continuing on our way Mark remarked that he could see the bottom and asked what the depth was. It was 60 feet! Amazingly clear water. Then back into Dotham Cut and we pulled into Black Point where we had been about a month prior, headed to town for internet and beverage. Sunday morning we did some snorkeling at a near by cay where we saw the Iguanas on the beach and found some nice small coral heads. It was a lovely calm day and we had the place to ourselves for quite awhile. Then onto the banks to get to Staniel Cay and we dropped the hook by the closed Thunderball restaurant.
I dingied over to the Isles Store Monday morning to walk to the airport and meet Kathryn. Her 8 seater plane stopped at Black Point first then came back to Staniel. After meeting her we stopped at the Isles Store for a few things and then back out to the boat under very gray skies, but little wind. Not the most auspicious start for her week. But the repair parts that she brought along did the trick and Mark had the generator up and running in no time at all. We had a great dinner, had bit too much to drink and got ready for the (NEXT!?!) storm which of course made for a crappy night; rocked and rolled – got no sleep. Probably the rolliest night so far. Once it calmed down in the morning we pulled it together to snorkel the Thunderball grotto, a “swim-in” cave. It turned out to be very nice and absolutely worth it but I think the fish were expecting a handout! Then we moved via the banks – dead calm, still gray skies - to Tamarind / Mice for snorkeling and to prepare for the (STILL!?!?) next blow. This is a decently protected area and also has decent area to snorkel where you can get out of the hard current. We showed Kathryn the art of conch fishing (reach down, pick up) and got a good batch of conch. I felt kinda off still so handed over my dinner chores to Mark and Kathryn. I had a wicked headache and we figured out later that it was from holding our head up snorkeling (not the drinking!)
Wednesday morning the weather held off. Little wind but also little sun. We finally got going and took the dingy over to Thomas Is. to walk the trail to the other side and poke around. After lunch on the boat Kathryn wanted to hit the water again, so I geared up and went in with her. We first poked around the “Mice” keeping an eye on the manta ray asleep on the bottom near the boat. Then we moved over to the Tamarind side and poked along that side for quite awhile. The manta then checked us out from a distance and it was spooky watching him watch us as he glided by. He was big! Conch preparation time on the boat between Mark trying various methods of retrieving the meat and Kathryn and me trying to keep the shells for souvenirs made for a big mess. Mark did prepare cracked conch for us for supper. I have decided that I don’t really need any more conch. It was fun, I’m glad I did it, but they still taste like little erasers no matter how hard you pound them. The wind picked up after supper and we prepared for another night of rock and roll. Fortunately it was not too bad as we were pretty well protected but the wind did howl with a good lightening show and it poured. Kathryn has been very valiant in taking advantage of fun time on the boat and she has the upper and back decks all set up for sunning (what little there had been) and reading – which is what we are doing today (between cooking, eating and cribbage) as the wind continues to howl – seems to be the most wind we have had too. The sun however came out – finally! But - I’ve about had it. I am mentally planning our trip back to FL. I wouldn’t mind hanging out there for awhile, but I am sick of the constantly and intensely bad weather. It seems that I am not alone. Other cruisers are starting to bail. I do feel badly as Mark would be very happy just hanging out here.
Friday dawned lovely - thank goodness - and we moved up to Fowl Cay for what turned out to be one of the most gorgeous days we’d had in ages. If there were more like this – which is my understanding as to “normal” weather down here – it would be an entirely different story! There at Fowl, we found a great snorkel place and then took the dingy over to the Rocky Dundas to check out the caves there again. Finally getting cold having now spent quite some time in the water, we headed back to the boat and hung out for a while enjoying the lovely day. Not being a great anchorage though we moved on up to Cambridge Cay and ended up anchoring as the moorings were all full. (Can you guess why?) First we wanted to head to the island and for a walk over the island to the beach and back. It seemed cleaner of trash than the last time. While Mark was grilling the dinner steak we saw in the light of the aft deck on the water, the new resident bull sharks. They were impressive. No night swimming here!
Saturday we dubbed around in the morning and prepped to move back to the Mice for yet ANOTHER blow – which is why the moorings at Cambridge were all full. Back at the “Mice” we did more snorkeling and hiking on Thomas Cay.
Sunday’s blow was primarily wind, no rain to speak of and a full moon peeking through the clouds. The morning came with a lovely sky – more like a brisk fall day in ME – windy, nearly clear and chilly. Then it was time to move back to Staniel so we could be set up for Kathryn’s morning flight. We ended up below Thunderball Club again on a mooring we had seen there. Unfortunately that evening, hurrying around the side decks in bare feet I badly mushed - I think broke – the little toe on my left foot running it into the base of the side door unit.
The departure morning was cloudy again but calm and we all piled into the dingy to take Kathryn ashore. That turned into an adventure as her Flamingo Airlines plane never showed up. There were four of them with the 11:30 connection in Nassau on Jet Blue. Fortunately someone spoke up who knew of a local pilot that could take them. He was called, appeared quickly, was hired and off they went. We grabbed a few items form the local food stores and headed back to the boat where upon I collapsed. I was quite tired and my foot was really hurting. I headed for a nap and Mark drove us up to Compass Cay where we then parked for the next four days sitting out - you guessed it – yet another blow. While there, Mark explored while I slept, and then we went to the dock “sundowner”, meeting yet some more wonderful cruisers. I seemed better the next two days and we did walk the island a bit chekcing out their resident pet sharks.

By Friday the 5th (now March!) the weather had calmed down and we headed up to Hawksbill Cay, just a few miles north. The hike on that island turned out to be more rigorous that I was going to be able to do with my hurting toe, so we stuck to the beach which was lovely. We were the only boat there! With that done by early afternoon we decided to move again up to Shroud Cay which was again just a few miles away. There we settled down for a nice supper and lovely sunset. Then the dreaded wind against the tide started up and we had our all time worst night. WE could not seem to get the lines set up to aim the boat correctly into the surge. Even Mark moved to the salon to try to sleep.

Saturday morning I threw in the towel and mentioned that Nassau was a mere 40 miles away. Mark dropped the mooring lines and headed out. Two days in Nassau and then there was a great weather window and we decided to do the run straight to the states. It would mean a 24 hour run, and we could bail at the Berry Islands and Bimini if the weather did not hold. It was a long 24 hours, but the crossing was perfectly smooth. We cleared Customs and pulled into Fort Lauderdale at dawn on Tuesday the 9th, heading to Sylvia Lake to drop the hook and sleep. I flew out on Wednesday and am now back in Maine with my (definitely broken) toe healing when I have not pushed it too hard playing outside in the garden with some of the gorgeous weather they have been having up here. It has alternated with extremely windy, rainy weather too – it is good I am here to stem the flood in the basement which did not use to leak. In the meantime Mark spent a few days getting parts from the huge West Marine in Fort Lauderdale and doing some repairs. His son, Jonathan flew down and they spent a week starting north. Unfortunately, Jonathan had to leave and Mark is now doing a solo trek, making his way north. He has done some on the inside and has gone outside on clam days and is currently somewhere in southern Georgia enjoying the Lowland countryside. He sent his log along.

Mark’s entries
3/20, Saturday – Looks like I will being doing the log now, as Joanne left for Maine from Ft Lauderdale and Jon came on board. We have been traveling together for a week. He has had a bad cold but we enjoyed ourselves anyway. We arrived in Eau Gallie, FL (mile marker 914) yesterday afternoon and went to West Marine and then a restaurant on the waterfront called Squid Lips for the happy hour. Raw oysters and a beer was a perfect end of the day. Not quite the end of the day actually. We started a project of wiring a new windlass switch at the helm so I can pilot the boat and raise the anchor in a current. That was my primary concern about being alone. We were finished at 8:30 and it worked the first time, only took 5 hours to install. We had beef stew I made at noon for supper, watched a movie and called it a day. Jon took a cab at noon and is heading for Portland and The UK on Monday. This is the start of the singlehanding part of the trip. I am anxious to see how it goes alone.
3/21, Sunday – The day started sunny and little wind. On the road at 8:00 and had little traffic all morning. It started raining around 3:00 and continued until after I anchored at 4:45 at Rockhouse creek (mm842). Developed a leak at the VHF antennae which will need to be looked after. Long day but good to get some of Florida behind me.
3/22, Monday – Back on the road at 8:20 and plan to run to Palm Coast Marina for a shorter day. Arrived at around 2:00 and took a shower. I ran into the captain form s/v Prim with whom we have crossed paths a number of times. From him I learned that the Bridge Of Lions in St. Augustine was closing that night for 5 days to remove a temporary structure. Back on the boat at 3:00 for a fast (?) run of 26 miles to Comachee Cove before the bridge closing at 8:00. Of course that was not to be the end of the story. Turning out of the marina the dingy was on a short tether and took on water. So I ended up drifting in the current sitting in the dingy bailing and no one on board Avalon. The challenges of singlehanding have begun. Made it to the marina (mm775.7) by 6:00 and took the rest of the day off. Spent Tuesday there fueling, buying groceries, taking on water and doing laundry.
3/24, Wednesday – Made a run on the outside today. No wind, no waves, no fish, the sky was mostly overcast with temps in the mid 60’s. Anchored at Jekyll Island, GA. It was a long day but made good progress. I will try to get the autopilot connected to the GPS in Brunswick GA. The autopilot was pretty fussy today and I spent hours correcting it. It is really great to be outside. The traveling is so much easier, just set the course and go. I even got to make a sandwich underway.
3/25, Thursday – Did a little work on the books today and found the name of a marine electronics tech. I want to get the GPS attached to the autopilot. Made an appointment for tomorrow at the Golden Isles Marine. Moved the boat a short hop to the marina in the afternoon.
3/26, Friday – The dock master is a very nice lady named Melissa. She stands about 5 feet tall and has a big shock of curly blonde hair and puts in a 12 hour day dragging fuel hoses down the dock over her shoulder and handling lines for boats. She even delivers guests a newspaper and muffins in the morning. Nice place. Lester Forbes showed up at 9:00, coffee in hand. Lester went into the Navy in 1960, retired in the 80’s and to this day is still doing marine electronics. We worked thru my wiring and I have a much better understanding of how it all works. Now my GPS sends data to my computer, VHF, and radar. I can input waypoints to the GPS and send them to the autopilot and the radar. I still can’t get the computer to send a route to the autopilot. It seems there is an interrupt somewhere that is causing a conflict. I used to be able to do this with the Northstar GPS, but no more. I also need a new gyro compass for the autopilot. Again, everything on a boat is broken; you just don’t know it yet. Hit the road at 1:15 and anchored in New Teakettle Creek (mm643) at 5:00.
3/27, Saturday – This morning I saw a fish jump clear of out of the water about 100 yards away. It was huge. I am guessing it was at least 4 and maybe 5 feet long. I didn’t think anything could live in this brown muddy water. Getting underway gave me a chance to try out the new windlass switch. The wind was blowing like stink and with the current I was back and forth between the helm and the anchor but I am pleased the system works well enough. The day was spent mostly winding thru the lowlands. Huge expanses of grass and a maze of rivers and streams, sometimes with the current and sometimes against. I needed to cross several sounds and all were windy and rough. The worst was Sapelo Sound. The wind was blowing 20-25 knots and my course was into the wind and waves. The seas were a short chop averaging 4 feet with a few six footers thrown in for fun. Avalon handled it without whining and in about an hour it was over. Anchored in Herb River (mm584) about 5:00, same spot as on the way down. The wind is still blowing like stink.

Note from JSW. Since then he has been to Savannah and plans to land in Charleston tomorrow (3/30).

3/20, Saturday – Looks like I will being doing the log now, as Joanne left for Maine from Ft Lauderdale and Jon came on board. We have been traveling together for a week. He has had a bad cold but we enjoyed ourselves anyway. We arrived in Eau Gallie (914) yesterday afternoon and went to West Marine and then a restaurant on the waterfront called Squid Lips for the happy hour. Raw oysters and a beer were a perfect end of the day. Not quite the end of the day actually. We started a project of wiring a new windlass switch at the helm so I can pilot the boat and raise the anchor in a current. That was my primary concern about being alone. We were finished at 8:30 and it worked the first time, only took 5 hours to install. We had beef stew I made at noon for supper, watched a movie and called it a day. Jon took a cab at noon and is heading for Portland and The UK on Monday. This is the start of the singlehanding part of the trip. I am anxious to see how it goes alone.
3/21, Sunday – The day started sunny and little wind. On the road at 8:00 and had little traffic all morning. It started raining around 3:00 and continued until after I anchored att 4:45 at Rockhouse creek (842). Developed a leak at the VHF antennae which will need to be looked after. Long day but good to get some of Florida behind me.
3/22, Monday – Back on the road at 8:20 and plan to run to Palm Coast Marina for a shorter day. Arrived at around 2:00 and took a shower. I ran into the captain form s/v Prim at which point I learned that the Bridge Of Lions in St. Augustine was closing for 5 days to remove a temporary structure. Back on the boat at 3:00 for a fast (?) run of 26 miles to Comachee Cove before the closing at 8:00. Of couuse that was not to be the end of the story. Turning out of the marina the dingy was on a short tether and took on water. So I ended up drifting in the current sitting, in the dingy bailing and no one on board Avalon. The challenges of singlehanding have begun. Made it to the marina (775.7) by 6:00 and took the rest of the day off.
3/23, Tuesday – Spent the day fueling, buying groceries, taking on water and doing laundry.
3/24, Wednesday – Made a run on the outside today. No wind, no waves, no fish, the sky was mostly overcast with temps in the mid 60’s. Anchored at Jekyll Island. It was a long day but made good progress. I will try to get the autopilot connected to the GPS in Brunswick Ga.. The autopilot was pretty fussy today and I spent hours correcting it. It is really great to be outside. The traveling is so much easier, just set the course and go. I even got to make a sandwich underway.
3/25, Thursday – Did a little work on the books today and found the name of a marine electronics tech. I want to get the GPS attached to the autopilot. Made an appointment for tomorrow at the Golden Isles Marine. Moved the boat a short hop to the marina in the afternoon.
3/26, Friday – The dock master is a very nice lady named Melissa. She stands about 5 feet tall and has a big shock of curly blonde hair and puts in a 12 hour day dragging fuel hosess down the dok over her shoulder and handling lines for boats. She even delivers guests a newspaper and muffins in the morning. Nice place. Lester Forbes showed up at 9:00, coffee in hand. Lester went into the Navy in 1960, retired in the 80’s and to this day is still doing marine electronics. We worked thru my wiring and I have a much better understanding of how it all works. Now my GPS sends data to my computer,VHF, and radar. I can input waypoints to the GPS and send them to the autopilot and the radar. I still can’t get the computer to seend a route to the autopilot. It seems there is an interrupt somewhere that is causing a conflict. I used to be able to do this with the Northstar GPS, but no more. I also need a new gyro compass for the autopilot. Again, everything on a boat is broken, you just don’t know it yet. Hit the road at 1:15. And anchored in New Teakettle Creek (643) at 5:00.
3/27, Saturday – This morning I saw a fish jump clear of out of the water about 100 yards away. It was huge. I am guessing it was at least 4 and maybe 5 feet long. I din’t think anything could live in this brown muddy water. Getting underway gave me a chance to try out the new windlass switch. The wind was blowing like stink and with the current I was back and forth between the helm and the anchor but I am pleased the system works well enough. The day was spent mostly winding thru the lowlands. Huge expanses of grass and a maze of rivers and streams, sometimes with the current and sometimes against. I needed to cross several sounds and all were windy and rough. The worst was Sapelo Sound. The wind was blowing 20-25 knots and my course was into the wind and waves. The seas were a short chop averaging 4 feet with a few six footers thrown in for fun. Avalon handled it without whining and in about an hour it was over. Anchored in Herb River (584) about 5:00 , same spot as on the way down. The wind is still blowing like stink.

Black Point Settlement to Georgetown

2010-02-14T17:18:00.007-05:00

Ship’s Log – January 29, Black Point Settlement – Georgetown, February 14, 2010

Great Guana Island was a different shape from the other islands – long and thin - and locating good snorkeling was a bit more challenging, but we set out on our mission and even though it was a long dingy ride down the west side of the island we did find some nice snorkeling. Being a larger island there was little current which was a nice change. Black Point was a larger community (a couple of hundred?) so there were two restaurants! We caught the happy hour at one and the barbeque dinner at the other – though the wait for dinner was in Bahamian time – about an hour and a half to feed all 20 of us who had gone to the barbeque.
Alas we bid adieu to our traveling companions of the past month, Ultra and Seas the Day, as we had a weather window and needed to move south. The first day we took the “inside” route – the route on the Banks side of the islands and went as far as we could with depth and tide allowing. Found a nice anchorage for the night all by ourselves. The next morning we hit the tide just right to go out the cut into Exumas Sound and rode the rest of the way to Georgetown in the deep water of the Sound in very nice seas. One of the sayings that we picked up along the way was that “everything on the boat is broken; you just don’t know it yet.” One of those items showed itself. The Autopilot quit about two hours outside of Georgetown. It’s been a long stretch of things all working so something was bound to happen. Could have been worse!
We pulled into the Elizabeth Harbor area of Georgetown on January 31 and were a bit overwhelmed so we picked the first available spot to drop a hook and just chilled. It turned out to be quite a good spot close to Stocking Island and some lovely beaches. Monday the 1st Mark went to work on the autopilot and then we took the dingy to town. It is a long ride across the harbor to Georgetown and if there is any chop it becomes a very wet ride too. We did that ride a few times over the next week checking out the town. To get into town you pass under a SMALL bridge (one boat wide) and come into a pond that has a dock. The dock is attached to the Exumas Market which is the best grocery store we have seen since FL. They also provide free water (via a hose) on the dock which is about the best advertising they could buy. The water is all R/O (reverse osmosis from seawater) but that means it is clean. We located the internet store in a small - VERY small building – and later found out you can get free Wifi at the Exumas Markets……..occasionally. You have a better chance of only slightly more consistent connection at the pay place up the street. The town is very unsophisticated but everyone is friendly.

Further work on the autopilot was not fruitful so for the time being it has been abandoned. Friday the 5th we moved to a cove (Kidd cove) right by town so that we could sit out a “blow” coming and also pick up our very first guests. Tom and Suzi Parks came down from Boston to escape the cold and got here for the first “storm” with rain that we have had since Bimini. Sunday we moved back to Monument Beach at Stocking Is. And as it was too windy to play in the water we went to shore and hiked up to the monument and around the island. It is a gorgeous island and amazingly, unlike the others there is no trash. I suspect the cruisers know a good thing and take care to keep it clean, but it may be the way of the currents and where the trash boats dump at sea, too. Monday we made an attempt to find some snorkeling but it does not seem to be very good down here. It was nice to be in the water though. On our return trip from the snorkel attempt I heard a funny sound and Mark discovered a leak in the coolant system. Back to Monument Beach and he and Tom got that repaired. Tom did get some more swimming in after working up a good sweat on repair jobs. Another move back over to Kidd Cove again in preparation for yet another blow in two days. Since we were there we rented car to explore the island. There is not much to see. The existence here is sparse. You can’t farm anything – the ground is limestone rock. The main industry is tourism and that is mostly cruisers. We saw only one functioning resort (a Sandals and it was lovely) but all the others were defunct. We did find a nice spot for lunch and a liquor store that actually was stocked with wine that did not break the bank. Now we can have wine with our dinners again!

As the 2nd storm was approaching we heard our old friends on Ultra and Seas the Day on the radio. They were approaching Georgetown and standing by outside to let the bad weather pass before entering the harbor. After the weather passed through we decided to join them over at Sand Dollar Beach, an area just south on Monument Beach that we had not yet explored. It was fun catching up. On Thursday the 11th they decided to move to a more secure anchorage because of yet another front coming through but we decided to stick it out there at Sand Dollar. In the meantime we went ashore there and did some exploring. The east side beach was gorgeous. We have also just been chilling out with tropical beverages, reading books, cooking and dancing in the aisles, small as they are.
Friday we 12th with the seas and wind starting to build we made another trek ashore and played in the surf and sand on the east side to the island then went over to “Chat and Chill”, the nerve center of the activities on Stocking Island, to check it out. With the “storm” coming things were quite on the island, but we imbibed in some local beverage and then had a very wet ride back to the boat. We made a delicious dinner and the boys finally beat us in cribbage (only because they pegged out first- we have left them in the dust for the previous games) and we hunkered in for the pending “storm”. It was a long night and we probably did get 40 knots of wind with some rain but all in all it wasn’t as bad as predicted. I did sleep in the pilot house – less noise and Mark toughed it out below with the bow slamming down on every wave. The guests did pretty well, tucked into the salon cabin. Saturday morning we moved the boat over to the “Chat and Chill/ Volleyball Beach” area thinking that we could pick up where we left off, but the Norther’ was still being blustery, cloudy and quite cool. After some exploring ashore we repaired to the boat with another island beverage and our books to relax out the remaining evening of our guests stay. We’ve had a great week and they have been amazingly accommodating for less than perfect conditions. We moved back to Kidd Cove on Sunday morning to be able to get them ashore and not so wet and they will carry letters – unpublished as yet blog copies - this to our few friends who don’t have email. For us, we’ll repair to Monument Beach, continue on some repairs, get reorganized and start the trek slowly north. The next guest, my sister Kathryn, arrives in about 8 days and we plan to meet her in the mid area of the island chain and continue exploring the area around Staniel, Compass and Cambridge Cays – and maybe a few others.
Happy Valentine’s Day!

Introduction to the Exumas

2010-01-28T13:20:00.009-05:00

Ship’s Log – January 21, 2010 – Nassau, New Providence, Bahamas to
January 28, 1010 – Great Guana Cay, Exumas, Bahamas

After a brief check of the weather with the other travelers at the dock in Nassau, we dropped lines early to be able to get onto the fuel dock to fill up before a big line of other boats all headed out. Then we were off and it was a lovely day – light wind and fine traveling. An armada of boats was departing from Nassau Harbor for all courses of the compass as they all spread out for their various destinations. The crossing was on the banks again averaging about 10 feet under our keel the whole way.
Our destination was Norman’s Cay (pronounced Key). We truly had no idea what to expect. For the first timers, of which we are one, every day is new; fun, trying, exhausting, exhilarating, irritating, rewarding, but always a new adventure. We came around the corner into Norman’s Cay and there were our new acquaintances on Ultra and Seas the Day along with Fidelio from Bimini. Anchoring here was a bit of a challenge as the area for actual anchoring was not large, in a huge area most of which was too shallow, and the current was strong. It took a few tries but we got a secure hook. Ultra and Seas were just processing their fresh catch of conch into fritters and salad and invited us to join them. Later that afternoon we did catch a good sized fish that was turned into bait and cat food for the cat on Ultra. Mark is “Sailor’s” best friend now.

That night we had the pants scared off of us. It was the day of the terrible earthquake in Haiti of which we were unaware. VHF radio is an amazing thing. It is basically an open party line with some rules for use to keep things from being chaotic, but the word about the earthquake flew amongst the cruisers. However the word that we got was TSUNAMI WARNING! Boy did the radios light up then. Seas the Day had access to CNN and Jan, aboard that boat opened her mike so we could all listen to the news as it was coming in. It sounded absolutely terrible. Fortunately for us, the earthquake was not the kind that produces tsunamis. A big relief as we are only about 350 miles from Haiti.

That group of cruisers did leave the next day but we were all headed to the Warderick Wells, Exumas Land and Sea Park over the next couple of days and knew we would catch up then. Little did we know then that we would spend the next several weeks traveling together and having a grand time. We stayed at Norman’s Cay to check things out however I found it a bit disappointing to my taste as it was still too cold to swim and the shallows made it hard to get to any of the beaches or other fishing area. So the following day we pulled out and headed to Warderick Wells. Somewhere along the parallel of 24° 24”, we must have crossed the magic line. We turned the corner into the Emerald Rock mooring field and it was absolutely just like you imagine from all the pictures. The island, the unbelievable aqua blue water, the sand beaches – paradise. Finally! It took 128 days to get here!

We did have a grand time there. The water was so inviting that even though it was still a bit chilly we donned our wet suits and went in. Afterwards we dingied over to check in at the Park Headquarters to pay for our mooring. What a view they had from their raised elevation and for extra fun they have a tame flock of Banaquats that would eat sugar out of one’s hand. One of the area hikes is to the top of Boo Boo Hill where one is allowed to leave a piece of driftwood with your boat’s name on it. During one of the evenings the Park sponsored was a bonfire. Along with myself, JoAnne on Ultra we met two other Joanne’s, though they were the Quebec French spelling of Johanne. Over the several days that we stayed there and at another site in the park called Cambridge Cay, we took advantage of a number of the hiking trails and the snorkeling sites. The hiking trails are rugged in that the islands are made of limestone and soil as we know it is nonexistent. At Cambridge the water was even warmer! We are unfortunately seeing the ravages of global warming as the reefs are in bad shape with much of the coral dead. Fortunately there was still some good coral and I just hope it can hang on. Where there is no coral, there are no fish.

After 6 days of spectacular weather and scenery in the park, it was time to keep moving. We went a whole 5 miles. What a change from the 50 mile days. We anchored in the lee of Pipe Cay and had another spectacular day of snorkeling…..and fishing – now that we are out of the park (it is a no take zone in the park). Dinner was on Ultra with the Spadefish that the guys speared, several conch and a few other things we threw together.

Once again the weather was supposed to change. A weather change down here is more just where the wind is coming from and rarely includes rain. The islands are quite dry and considered arid. The island geology and fauna reflects that. They are tropical arid, not tropical lush. The latest anchorage change was more challenging. Another mere 5 miles but very confusing. We went quite slowly and the other two boats hung back while we poked our heads into the anchorage off wild Tamarind Cay. Once we gave the ok they came in too. We all ended up doing an anchor reset at low tide which of course was just as it was getting dark – never at two in the afternoon! But, it all settled down and we woke up this morning to what looks like another perfect day in paradise. A few days there with some good snorkeling and conch harvesting and then a few days across the way on Thomas Cay. The snorkeling was not good there but the uninhabited island offered some interesting trails, rock formations and trash. The other sad part of the islands is the tremendous amount of trash that washes up on the ocean side beaches. It looks like several boats have regurgitated entire contents. It seems that cruisers try to pick it up and at least collect it in areas, but then disposing of it is hard – pay per bag down here And not just a dollar. It is also endless. Some folks have had some humor in their groupings of trash and it does present interesting scavenging.

Another move south of a few miles and we were at area of the infamous Staniel Cay. This is where the James Bond movie, “Thunderball” was filmed in 1964! The grotto of the cave used in the movie is there and open to explore but we did not make it on this pass. We had been in some great swim-in caves up in the park. Alas, this area is also depressed. Two of the three marinas were closed, the only restaurant is at the Staniel Cay Marina (we partook only of beverages while using the internet). They do have four – count them, four grocery stores. Each one is about 100 square feet with quite the eclectic selection of items and it would also depend on when you arrived after the mail / delivery boat.

About every two or three evenings we have been sharing meals with Seas the Day (Mark and Jan) and Ultra (Bill and Joanne) taking turns as to whom is inspired by what. We have also been able to assist each other in boat and cooking projects and it is fun heading out to hike and snorkel in a group. Mark on Seas the Day takes their dog to shore every day and has had great success finding trails on the islands. We probably do wander farther on the water than we would alone knowing that there are two dingies and that we girls keep an eye out on each other. So far the guys have managed not to spear anything but fish and they have been few and far between. Although we have had no problem getting conch (and Mark and I are both getting better at diving down for fish and conch) it does seem that the area is fished out – very few fish and we have not seen one lobster outside of the Park. Did I mention though that the water is delightfully warm? Still cool enough to wear the wet suit, but at least you don’t gag when you jump in.

The wind has been persistent from the east now and we are again moving, this time to the Black Point Settlement on Great Guana Cay where we will get some good protection. We are looking for a good travel day to make the jump to Georgetown and are once again in a holding pattern for that. Hopefully we get one soon as our first guests arrive there in 8 days!

Miami, Crossing, Bimini and Nassau

2010-01-11T12:49:00.011-05:00

Ship’s Log – December 31, 2009 – Miami, FL to

January 11, 1010 - Nassau, Bahamas

Indeed Friday it will be for the crossing. We moved out to an anchorage Thursday night the 31st to be nearer the cut and to be able to leave after dark and not disturb anyone – of course everyone was up for New Year’s anyway. It was a gorgeous day and we had a great view of the Miami skyline. There were lots of folks playing in the water and getting into the celebratory mood. That made our pre departure nap a challenge, but we set the alarm for 9:30 and were anchor up by 9:45. Thank goodness for chart plotters and radar. Finding the navigational aids with all the city lights was a challenge. Government Cut was quite sloppy and only calmed down a bit after we got outside. The auto pilot was engaged and off we went. We both stayed on duty until midnight to celebrate the New Year under a Blue Moon on our first crossing of the Gulf Stream together. After that we took turns staying on watch and sleeping. I would have liked for a smoother crossing but I am assured that in regards to the Gulf Stream it was a 9 out of 10!

We arrived a bit early at the Bimini Harbor entrance and had to drive in circles to wait for sun up. The entrance was indeed small and a challenge but the water color is now that stunning blue and crystal clear so that we can see the bottom streaming under us. No one was answering the VHF at the marina at 7:30 am so we just tied up and went to sleep. Every now and then Mark would get up and head to customs and immigration and finally was able to get us registered at about 10am. There were four other boats at the marina – it is a really small marina – about 12 slips and the first person that saw us immediately invited us to a pot luck dinner that evening. Before prepping for dinner we took a walk around the town. It seems very sad and depressed. Everything was in disrepair, trash all over the place, lots of vacant building and for sale signs. On the windward side of the island the wind was howling at about 35 – 40 kts. , but we were well protected on the lee side. Back at the boat I threw together some leftover rice and beans and added some “trinity” and spices to it. It was a group of 5 couples – all of the cruisers at this marina. One group – Mike and DeAnn on Fidelio out did themselves with baked ham, stuffing and green beans. There was also artichoke / cheese / olive dip, salad and two desserts. Just as we were about to dig into the spread a squall line passed and the skies opened up. We were the closest boat so with a nod from Mark, we all bolted to our boat and got all the food in. Everyone then scurried to their own boats to close down. It was a wall of cold water blasting out of the sky and I think the inside of our boat got washed too. By the time everyone recovered and made their way back to our boat is was over and we were able to spread out into the cockpit. It turned out that they had all crossed within the previous 24 hours of us. We packed up at about 6:30 and had time for one more nap before the local Junkanoo started at 8pm. It is New Year’s Day after all! The economy may be depressed but they put on a great little Junkanoo parade. Costumes, kids dancing, drum band, local brass band – lots of noise and festivities. The entire island was there for the parade. When they got to one end of the street they turned around and went the other way. All that hard work – they well should make the best of it. Afterwards, some of the local ladies had food for sale and we had some of the conch fritters. They were excellent and we even were able to get a Kalik beer to wash them down with. Finally we crashed at about 9:15. I know that even as the Junkanoo headed down the street again, I was asleep before I was half way through the thought of reaching for my earplugs. It was quite a Crossing / New Years Day.

The next few days were spent discussion the weather – we were “stuck” there until the wind let up – getting to know our fellow boaters and checking out the island. It did come to life once regular life set back in, though I understand it is a mere shadow of its former self. We partook of the local conch delicacies, did some of our own fishing in the harbor, and took a trip to South Bimini (a 4 minute ferry crossing) to visit the Shark Institute. Though located in very simple facilities it is one of the premiere facilities in the world studying sharks with lemon sharks in particular. Seven of us had gone over to see them and we then all traipsed out to their holding pens in the water to see the sharks up close. We had one more picnic / chart party and then we got a break in the weather. The sailors took off on Wednesday and we left the following morning, Thursday the 7th along with the 8 or so anchored boats.

The little harbor entrance was again tricky but no problems and we were outside. We went South a bit to Turtle Rocks and then we turned east onto the Banks. The Banks are this great shallow sea that covers much of the area around the Bahamian Islands. It is bazaar to have 8 – 10 feet for the next 55 miles or so. The sky was overcast and the winds calmed down to 5 knots. We took turns standing on the bow and just looking at the bottom go by. Not much in the way of fish, much to Mark’s disappointment. Several of the sailboats went straight thru to Nassau but the remainder converged with us at the “Northwest Shoal” west of Chub Cay. We arrived at about 4:30 and they straggled in over the next 4 hours. It was just a bit unusual to be anchored out in the middle of nowhere. The shoal is underwater so it looks like you are in the middle of the ocean but we were off the travel path and it was nice to have company and a grouping of anchor lights for the night. The sunset that night was quite spectacular with nothing but the sky and the sea.

Sunrise was also amazing as we got underway at 6:30am. Several sailors had already pulled out and there was quite a line of them on the way to Nassau. About an hour after we left we went from 10 feet to 1000 feet in about 5 minutes. The Banks are interrupted by great bodies of VERY deep water and today’s “sail” would be all in DEEP water. We heard one of the sailboats on the VHF radio exclaiming that he has never seen it as calm as we have today. Fine by me! Mark has his fishing lines out but so far it looks like chicken for supper. We checked into Nassau at @ 3pm driving past the cruise ship dock with four huge ships to get to our marina that once again is not nearly as glowing as the ads, but it will be secure for the next upcoming blow. The farther we get the fewer cleats there are; we tie to pilings and they are fixed. Fortunately the tide is only about 3 feet so the line adjusting isn’t too bad. Had not wanted to go Nassau, but I guess it is like the airlines in that it is a hub and everything seems to have to go through there. When we studied the charts we understood. You can go around but it is really out of the way.

We’ll spend the next few days figuring out how to get Wifi – probably the Starbucks across the street. Our Mifi card does not seem to be getting the job done. Mark ran out of Bahamian phone minutes having a discussion with Verizon and needs to replenish, but my phone is still on US / Verizon / $2.00 a minute. One day was spent checking out the tourist area of town. I honestly don’t get it. The largest cruise ships in the world head here and it’s just not that great here. The squall came through and the winds have been howling at 35 – 40 kts. So we hang tight , lay low a bit, do boat chores, check out the area and study the weather. Looks like Tuesday departure, about 50 miles and then the pot of gold – the Exumas chain of islands begins.

Stuart, FL - Key Biscayne, FL

2009-12-30T14:39:00.010-05:00

Ship’s Log – December 16 – Stuart, FL to December 30, Miami, FL

12/16 – 18, Our three days in Stuart were marked with much rain and wind. Mark struggled with the mooring ball and our lines. We got ashore inbetween showers and explored the downtown area and walked out to the shopping mall area to get a few things.

Finally on the Saturday the 19th, though it was windy it was finally sunny, we headed to the dock to do pumpout, get water and hit the road, turned right back onto the Magenta line and headed south. There were several bridges, most of which we were able to “skinny” under. The scenery ran from wildlife areas to modest homes on the water to very grand homes with even larger boats.

We did a 35 mile day and pulled into Lake Worth at about 1:30. LW is a nice body of water just off the ICW surrounded by homes, high rises and mongo boats and regular cruising boats at anchor. I spent the afternoon finally redoing the food inventory so we might have a clue as to what we have and where it is. Mark chilled with a cigar and book. The wind finally abated at about 4pm but came up again during the night so the night was a bit noisy but not too bad.

The next day also was a straight forward day – ditch, bridges, some wild areas, lots of homes and then dropped a hook in “Lake Boca Raton”. We were treated to a highly decorated catamaran for hire driving around with a party onboard.

Monday the 21st – Halleluiah, I took a few minutes to work out the bridge schedule and figured that we needed to be at the first bridge – about 3 minutes away – for the 8:40 opening. I knew I got it right when a 100 footer jumped out of his slip in front of us and then another behind us. Eight bridges and very little waiting time at any. Actually we did skinny under the last two and then we went into Sylvia Lake a Fort Lauderdale, a lake-like body of water off the ICW, again surrounded by million dollar homes. Dropped the hook at about noon.

One of the BIG guys!

We were right by a 7 foot bridge (more like 5) that when the tide was low we could get under with the dingy which cut the trip across the waterway to town quite a bit. Other times we had to go around the island. The first trip was around and then to a dingy dock in town; $10 unless you dined so we had lunch and then Bluewater Books – the mecca of boating information.

Jupiter Inlet Lighthouse Bridge and Pelicans

Since it appeared that our weather window that we had hoped for would not appear we decided to stay put for the next couple of days. Local rules have us in question as to whether or not we will be harassed by the authorities, but most of the other boats seem to be staying put too. The anchoring laws just changed down here to the benefit (amazingly) of cruisers and according to our literature was not yet being routinely applied. Since publication was awhile ago, the authorities seem to have worked it out as it has not been an issue. Again a morning catching up on paperwork while Mark cleaned the hull which was still sporting its brown mustache from all the brown water of the Carolinas and Georgia. After lunch we took the dingy and headed up the

New River to explore the downtown area. Wednesday we spent some time revamping our thought process as it appears we may be “here” awhile before being able to cross. Went back up the river and had a beer intown and explored the riverfront. All lined with interesting homes, some pricy, others not. Very Venice like.

Sylvia Lake

New River Decorations

The Little Bridge!

Thursday the 24th we decided to head to Miami. Nice day –10 bridges and about 22 miles, made mental and paper notes of the other anchorages on the way. We pulled into our chosen anchorage area at about noon which is just north of the Venetian Causeway right by the island of Miami Beach. It was a bit exposed but fine for the night. We headed ashore at a nearby boat ramp / dock and walked around a bit. Stopped into the Publix which was jammed with people and food, being the day before Christmas. Picked up only a few things as we did not bring the back packs. Then we discovered a canal across the street that lead back to where we were anchored. After getting back to the dingy we went and checked it out to discover that it followed Dade Ave. almost the whole way across the island and went right by the Publix. Next trip to the store will be that way.

Back at the boat we had we sung in the current and were really close to shore and some apartments so we moved out more into the middle and reset. Then we continued with our Christmas Eve dinner of grilled pork chops and black beans and rice with a nice bottle of Pinot Noir.

It did end up being a noisy night with the wind and some noise from the apartments and I did not sleep well. The anchorage is a bit open. In the morning we took the dingy and checked out a more protected area that I had seen on the chart. We went back and got the big boat and moved into the new area called Sunset Lake. It was again amongst lovely homes (just discovered that one sold for $9.75 million!), is back behind some islands, and is more protected from the predicted north wind. Then having earlier done some restaurant research we dingied back to the dock, called a cab, waited through a rain shower and headed to Miami South Beach to a Cuban Restaurant – Puerto Sauga for our Christmas dinner. It was very full of people – always a good sign – in a family like atmosphere with every ethnic group represented and the food was very good. We were very pleased with our choice. After dinner we walked out to the main drag on Ocean Ave. The street was jammed as far as one could see with people dining in street cafes, strolling playing volleyball (in bikinis of course) and lounging all over the huge beach. The weather had cleared up and it was now in the 80s. We joined the strolling out onto the beach and then worked our way back up Ocean Ave, Collins Ave, to Espanola Ave and the Lincoln Street Mall. Quite a sight! Back at the boat we crashed from our long walk and full bellies, resting for awhile before calling friends and family to wish everyone a Merry Christmas.

Sunset Lake

We are now pretty much on hold looking for the correct set of wind direction and speed and a 3 day opening with that to make our crossing to the Bahamas. Hopefully we’ll get something close to that. In the meantime (Saturday) Mark worked on reapplying a coat of varnish to the cap rail, I dubbed on log / blog. After lunch we headed back to town to check out the Lincoln Rd. area. It is a 5 block section that has been turned into a pedestrian mall with shops and restaurants all with outdoor seating. Glad we had eaten as the food looked great but it was very pricy. Finally some restaurants as good as Portland. A big sight is an area of palm trees that had a large population of parakeets. Maybe Portland should enclose Congress Street and turn it into a covered promenade (skip the parakeets).

Sunday – Looks like the window of opportunity for crossing is close but not quite. Thought we might hit one on Wednesday. Good weather direction, long enough window – too much wind. May be another one in a few more days. So what to do now? Mark is doing the 2nd coat of varnish. I researched the area for another anchorage. Looks like it is more of the same, but before moving we did head ashore this time taking the bus south and walking back. Monday the 28th we did move to another area and we are now at Crandon Marina on Key Biscayne – a Miami Dade Municipal Marina. We did fuel up and pumpout and got to our slip. No cable and no wifi. A great disappointment – (spoiled?). The docks were new and good. The slip was tight and we are on top of the sport fisher next to us – didn’t seem to bother him when he showed up the next day. Also – very Spanish here – may need that Spanish for Cruisers that Mark got at the Annapolis Boat show. The bathroom and laundry are a bit of a hike – I’ll get my exercise. The upside was that the commercial boats at the back side of the marina are selling fresh fish off the backs of their boats. They have cutting tables all set up and Mark picked up some mahi-mahi. Wow – a bit different right off the boat – it was yummy. Tuesday we spent the day prepping the boat (cleaning inside and out, figuring out the bus schedule for last run to the store, etc.) in order to be able to go as soon as the window appears. Could be Friday now or maybe not until next week. It is not a great passage mileage wise, but can be the nastiest if not done carefully. So we wait – at least we are not having a nor’easter!!!!

South Beach!

Palm Coast to Stuart, FL

2009-12-16T15:55:00.024-05:00

Ship’s Log – November 26 Palm Coast, FL to December 16, Stuart, FL

Two weeks in ME flew by with much visiting and catching up with friends and family and I was able to get the gardens put to bed. It was fun to get my hands in the dirt for awhile.

Another week was spent in Palm Coast while Al and Mark did a lot more work on the engine. It is a small and very sweet marina with very friendly liveaboards, no matter the size of their boat - like that giant one in front of us.

I spent some of that time ferrying to the grocery store on a bicycle to start the provisioning process and dug out the piano to work on some arrangements. One evening we were glued to the TV (cable in all the marinas now) watching the tornado warnings and the weather map as a nasty front passed through – side show from Ida. Our last evening we were treated to the local Parade of Lighted Boats. I got out our lights so we could get decked out and we got set up with lights and hats.

We left Palm Coast on Saturday the 5th and spent three nights on the hook going down the coast: New Smyrna, Titusville and Eau Gallie. The area just after New Smyrna was lagoon-ish; a shallow area with lots of small islands. The wildlife was spectacular with dolphins and birds – herons, pelicans, osprey, terns and gulls . We saw more dolphins that day than I think I have seen my entire life. They swam all around the boat, rode and leapt in our wake beside the boat and would periodically turn to look up at us. It was so amazing. The weather was a bit rainy but it was warm and smelled so nice.

Our next stop was the Vero Beach Municipal Marina, a place with a mission. Our friends from S. Portland, Joel and Becky have a place here in Vero (they were not there right) and they have friends from Maine whom we have met with them over the years at various functions who were there. Those friends, Bob and Mariele Schaedel lent us their 2nd car which was a huge help, while we were in Vero and we spent the better part of two days (Thursday and Friday morning) doing the BIG provision to carry us through the big part of the trip to the Bahamas where a roll of TP or a boat part is LOTS more $. That would include paper products, beer and wine, canned goods, condiments, parts and piece for the boat, new snorkel masks, etc.

From there we moved 15 miles south to Fort Pierce. The boat has now gone full circle. Fort Pierce is where we purchased the boat and we were at the home of the previous owners of the boat, Nels and Suzanne Hallstrom and their five – count them – five Chihuahuas.

They were awfully cute and had

amazingly different personalities.

Mark has Madeline and I am holding Carlton. Suzanne rescued him as he tried to cross Route 1!

Their home is on the water in Faber Cove and we stayed in their slip. They also lent us their 2nd car so we could get all the stuff that we either forgot or couldn’t find.

We had dinner with a third acquaintance, Carl Smith on Friday night. Carl (from Saco) is taking all the recordings of the PSO and digitizing them to be “rereleased”. Quite an interesting project and he is having a grand time with it. Back at home the PSO Magic of Christmas was in full swing and not being present to defend myself I seem to be getting the blame for starting the red socks tradition – so I sent them a photo of red socks in FL. Saturday night we had dinner with our hosts and another couple, staying up well past our bedtime having a grand time. Those few days were warm and rainy but Sunday cleared out and the temperature rose quickly to 84 degrees necessitating setting up our aft cockpit shade covering which is working out very well. We ended up spending a few extra days in Fort Pierce as we were waiting around for a delivery. The chart program that we bought for the Bahamas would not properly load onto the computer and I had spent hours with the tech guy on the phone Wednesday. He said he would put a new disk in the mail to us that would be in Fort Pierce on Friday….NOT. Tracking says Monday – so, shucks, we’ll just have to wait.

The program did arrive late Monday and is still being a problem but at least we can run it from the disk. Nels and Suzanne suggested a cookout so we combined forces and had another fun dinner on their patio. I just love outdoor dining.

After a few more chores and some laundry we reluctantly departed Tuesday, late morning and did a short day down to Stuart, FL. We headed up the St. Lucie River to a very nice anchorage where we could actually get a mooring and it was only $10 a night. Bargain!

Hilton Head, GA to Palm Coast, FL

2009-11-11T15:39:00.010-05:00

Ship’s Log – November 1 - Hilton Head, GA to November 11 - Palm Coast, FL

11/1, Sunday – Mark decided that we needed to hook up a real propane tank to the grill as it is using too many of the small cylinders. After a yummy breakfast at the marina complex (outside dining) we jumped back in the car. The West Marine and Walmart are well disguised in Hilton Head zoning but all parts were obtained. We found one of the public beach accesses and walked down to find a very wide (at low tide) long, lovely beach. We walked around for awhile and then back to the car to check out the south end of the island. They charge $5 to get past the gate for the southern part of the island. We almost blew it off but decided to check out how the other half lives. We finally decided that it is merely a deterrent to keep the riff-raff out. It is gorgeous down here. We guesstimated thousands of homes all extremely neat and tidy. Cars or bicycles – no golf carts. We ended at the marina complex that has the red and white striped light house that is featured in all the publicity for HH. The marina area has shops and restaurants – all playing the same music and all with the same sales.

11/2, Monday - Best night’s sleep I’ve had the entire trip. I picked up some Benadryl yesterday. The next leg we have to time everything to the tides – not hitting certain areas at low tide as they have shoaled over and Georgia has not dredged in years. Other states are at least making the attempt but it hasn’t been part of their budget. Lunch at the restaurant at the marina complex, water the boat, adjust the head fittings again and off the dock at low tide at 1:45ish. The ride started out gray but got nicer down the line. The bridge that we were timing turned out to be fine at 24 feet and we were 22 – just squeaked under. We went through the town of Thunderbolt which has a marina / boat building place owned by Hinckley – located in Maine and they were building some 100+ footers there. Pulled into Herb Creek right after Thunderbolt along with a few other boats and dropped a hook, again in the marshes. The current was not too bad – we are getting used to it.

11/3, Tuesday – Got going about 8am – needed to time the tide again – some skinny spots ahead. On our way out we passed a very loaded shrimp boat. We did so well on the tide / speed that we kept on going to Duplin Creek and pulled in behind “Diamond Girl”. They had been in front of us most of the day and had forewarned us of a few issues in the water. Dropped a hook there again in the marshes and after a long day we enjoyed the very lovely evening. The days have been breezy and about 70 degrees with the evenings cooling down to the mid fifty’s.

11/4, Wednesday – followed “Diamond Girl” and after just a short day we dropped off at Jekyll Island. We got there on a decent tide in order to be able to dock – on the face again. Jekyll is a different feel from Hilton Head. The marina is more quaint – and somewhat dated, but nice. They had loaner bicycles at the marina. Mark picked out two that had decent seats and still had grips on their handlebars. After getting some air in the tires, we took off to see the “cottages” from the golden area of the extremely wealthy. They have been beautifully restored and the entire complex is open for touring. We merely peeked into windows. We explored some more but as our butts were not used to bicycle seats we soon headed back.

11/5, Thursday – We made plans for the courtesy car to take us to the golf course for an afternoon game. We warmed up at the range and played 9 holes – we were the only folks there. We could have played every hole twice except that we started at 3pm and forgot that it gets dark now before 6! The deer were coming out to examine our play. After dinner Mark went up to hear the band at the marina restaurant – the Wharf Rats and I joined him later. They were three hippies planting for tips. Not great but they were having a great time.

11/6, Friday – off the dock at about 8am to take advantage of the slack tide. Another short day. A 30 mile run to Fernandina, FL. Woo-hoo we’re in FL. Crossing the first sound tested my stomach as the wind and tide were very much opposing. Once back behind the islands it was better. We had hoped to get a mooring (some of the few down here) but they were full so we dropped a hook across the way in Bells Creek. The dingy got dropped in and we went to town for lunch and a walkabout. There are large paper mills on either side with a cute historical downtown district in-between. Back at the boat our new friends from “Diamond Girl” Bud and Elaine had caught up with us and stopped by and invited us over for drinks. A good time was had and we ended up feeling our way back to the boat in the dark – thinking that we would have returned before dark we neglected to take a flashlight or to leave lights on in the boat. There were several other boats moored nearby with anchor lights on. That helped as they hadn’t been there earlier.

11/7, Saturday – Set the alarm for 7 for an 8 departure o keep with the rising tide. Sunny warm day, nice ride and we were headed for the St. Augustine anchorage as the marina $ are going up. We passed many homes on the waterway, some with interesting docks. We managed to show up at the Bridge of Lions in St. Augustine just at 2:57 for the 3:00 opening. There were stacked up there. Probably half a dozen boats in front of us and more behind. We found a spot in the “southern” anchorage. It is in the river in a wider area, but still quite the current. We stayed put on the boat to keep an eye on it and just did boat work and relaxed.

11/8, Sunday – Just before lunch we got the dingy launched and headed to the marina and town. Armed with a map, we wandered around for awhile admiring the Spanish architecture and the outdoor living. We love that – the outdoor living. A local brew pub enticed us for lunch and then we headed to the Lightner Museum. It has an interesting history and its collection is unique to its owner which was then was donated to the city. In the collection seems to be some family history? After the museum we wandered down St. George Street (like Exchange Street but longer and even more touristy) and ended up at the Fort. Part of the National Park System, it is the oldest, undefeated fort in the US. It only ever changed flags by treaty. They had an interesting demonstration of canon firing. The canons could accurately reach as far away as three miles. Quite amazing. An outdoor restaurant enticed us for a martini and before heading back to the boat we checked out another “Eagle” in the harbor. Eagle is the make of our boat – there are not many of them and it is the first one we have seen.

11/9, Monday – I did some postcards and took the dingy in to mail them. When I got back in the dingy I looked up to see that the sky had suddenly turned very dark in the distance. It was a race to see which would get to the boat first – the rain or me. I won by a nose. We let the shower pass us by before heading out. There were several issues on the plate today. Hurricane Ida was pressing closer and we hoped to get far enough south to get out of her way. We had also been debating the idea of heading to Maine for awhile before making the crossing and Mark wanted to have some things checked out on the boat that would require parking somewhere for a week or so. Bud and Elaine on “Diamond Girl” had recommended a marina, a diver and a mechanic. Some phone calls enroute and it all started falling into place. The ride was again at high tide, we managed to skinny under one bridge that was 25 feet (the tender did not respond to calls from me and as it turns out for others too), and we got through a particular shoaled inlet with no problems. Doing it at high tide really makes a big difference. Then down another stretch of ditch part in the marsh and part lined with homes and we pulled into Palm Coast Marina. It is off the highway as it were, out of the waterway and current. I got the boat rigged for landing but had to scramble when the landing was for pilings and not floating docks. The diver was on premise waiting for us. He and his crew spent some time working with Mark on issues under the boat and eventually pulled the prop to have it worked on. In the meantime I started the laundry and took a shower – ah – lots of water. Mark hooked up the cable and we vegged the night away.

11/10, Tuesday – Mark started right in on some sanding and prep work for varnishing. “Ida” had come ashore on the Gulf Coast and we were only expecting a small hit from the most remote outer bands. We just hung around all day but another big decision was that we decided on a two week run to Maine - Friday to Friday and we spent some time planning that. I did break a barrier today – I got the violin out. It’s been 5 months; I think the longest I have gone without playing. She was a bit peeved with me – two strings loose, one broken and one holding it all together. It was fun to play for about a half hour. Mark’s mechanic came and they discussed things to be worked on while we were away. Otherwise again a vegge night. Did absolutely nothing worthwhile. It was great.

11/11, Wednesday – They predicted more “Ida” rain today, but nothing has come of it and it is warm and partly cloudy. Mark is varnishing coat one. We did get ourselves off the boat for a walk around the premises and we plan to drop the dingy and check out the canals in the area. The canals are manmade with home sites and you can park your boat in your back yard. Attractive as it seems, I have come to realize that we do have the best cruising grounds in Maine. South of New England the boating requires getting to an inlet and then out onto the ocean so unless you like to sail out and back or go fishing or get from point A to point B, it’s not the kind of boating I care for. As we are doing the “point A to B” trip that part works and there are tons of folks doing that here. I forgot the other kind – lots of folks living on their boats.

This will be the last posting for awhile as we are headed back to Maine for two weeks before continuing south and making the crossing. Finding a secure and reasonably priced marina with access to good contractors all fell into place and we grabbed it.

Myrtle Beach to Hilton Head

2009-11-01T20:29:00.006-05:00

Ship’s Log, October 31, 2009

10/22, Thursday – It’s dark at 7am. We set the alarm for just before sunrise and as it came up we pulled out (along with all of the sail boats) and headed into the cut to the Cape Fear River. The cut looked just like that – slashed right out of the hill side. Good name for the Cape Fear River. Immediately on the right going downstream is the largest military munitions holding area in the US. For as safe as I felt in Norfolk, I couldn’t wait to get out of this area. Then it was back into the Ditch. We decided to call a break after a number of days on the hook and pulled in to the Myrtle Beach Yacht Club just over the South Carolina line.

10/23, Friday – slept in and then gathered forces for the day. We took advantage of the rental car on premise. It turned out to be a terrible clunker, but it did work. We located all the necessary retail establishments required (Home Depot, Wal-Mart, Food Lion and package store) and headed out with our list. After shopping next on the agenda was the driving range and then we played 9 holes at the adjacent club – Little River Eastport. What a hoot – it was a perfect day, warm with a light breeze and $22 per person with a cart. I had played terribly at the driving range but did work out some kinks and played pretty decently on the course. Since it was 5:30 when we finished we decided to go in search of dinner. Following out noses, we headed back down to the river. There were three local fish houses vying for our patronage and in between was a casino boat preparing to load and take folks out over the 3 mile limit – or maybe they can gamble in SC. The menu was a bit scary, heavy on fried, but we landed on sharing a plate of grilled shrimp and the local white fish called Trigger Fish. The plate came with hush puppies, French fries and deep fried corn on the cob. The corn was unfortunately very good.

10/24, Saturday – Today would be a combination of more retail (Bed, Bath and Beyond, and Dick’s and then a tour of Myrtle Beach starting with Myrtle Beach State Park. It was great that they could carve off a big chunk – it was several miles long, keeping it from the high rises that dominate the landscape in this area. They also have a huge fish pier very well set up with cutting and cleaning tables, signs with size limits and running water – probably salt. From there we took the local route about 10 miles worth, back north to the marina. One could easily get great deals at this time of year at the resorts. The prices were unbelievable and there were
lots of vacancies.

10/25, Sunday - We got off the dock at 8:30 or so to a nice day now passing behind all the retail that we had seen from the road. All the bridges were high enough to get under except one - the only remaining pontoon bridge on the ICW. We couldn’t make the hourly passing at noon and were preparing to wait it out. A new bridge is being built to replace it and a construction barge from the other side needed to come through. The
bridge tender was not going to let him though – no-sir-ee. About 10 minutes later there was an announcement on the radio saying that the bridge would be opening and the rest of us would also be allowed to pass. Someone made a phone call! After lunch we entered the Wacamaw River. Folks had told us that this was the most beautiful section and indeed it was. It was also suggested that we make a small side trip through Prince Creek. It was gorgeous with the trees showing some color, the Spanish moss, lots of turtles and…. a blue alligator? We continued back in the Wacamaw and turned into Thoroughfare Creek to anchor up for the evening. Nice quiet place. We put a trip line out as advised. It seems more trouble than it is worth but I guess if you snag it would be better than diving.
10/26, Monday - For once I slept and the anchor line kept Mark up. He usually sleeps through anything. As always the trip line was annoying to pull up but at least it was not tangled under the boat. We passed another trawler later in the day that had theirs tangled on their stabilizer. We headed out in mist and light rain but flew down the rest of the river at 9.5 knots (@10.8mph). Great, as we planned a 70 mile day. It remained drizzly and gray all day. Depressing. We anchored at Big Marsh Island. It was right by a non navigable inlet and was really quite exposed. Probably would have been lovely had it been nice out but it wierded me out a bit.

10/27, Tuesday – Still dreary and we had gotten the anchor in a bit tight to the “island” so hit bottom getting it up. Fortunately the tide was rising. Charleston was next but was very unappealing in the fog and rain so we went on through the Elliot Cut to the St. John’s Yacht Harbor Marine where we fueled and decided to call it a day. Mark made his list, called a cab and headed to West Marine to get a new antennae for our VHF. We have been having problems with it. Hey – nothing has been broken for weeks. I did a big boat clean, laundry and shower in their extremely nice facility, though the marina itself was not as scenic. Mark came up with some coaxial cable and was able to hook us up to the marina cable. We spent the rest of the evening channel surfing and watching the …..tornado warnings for our area! The dismal weather had turned into quite the storm system. Fortunately we were able to tell from the radar that the storm had passed us and we went to bed.

10/28, Wednesday – Mark woke up when the skies opened up and got the hatches closed. I had my earplugs in thinking we were past the weather and hoping that a cell would not fire up and hadn’t heard a thing. We got off the dock at @ 8:30, no small challenge in a river. The air did smell nice – summer air. In putting away the lines I realized that somehow during the night a fender went missing. The bad weather from the night before had me feeling off and I napped a bit. The ride was otherwise lovely. The next stop was to be the Beaufort Intown Marina so we would have easy access to shore. Also hearing that being on the outside of the docks was not good we requested an inside space. Once tied up we installed the new antennae which entailed pulling the boat halfway apart to run the new cable. After that we headed ashore for dinner.

10/29, Thursday – Gorgeous summer day. We got the courtesy car for an hour and drove a loop that took us through Lady’s Island, Port Royal and back to back to Beaufort by way of the grocery and West M. to pick up a fender to replace the one that disappeared. It is much lovelier here in Beaufort than we have seen. After dropping the car we ran into friends we had met earlier. They were coming up the dock and we quickly decided that a reciprocal beverage on our boat and dinner would be in order. They were headed out and we also were going to do the walk about checking out the town starting with the waterfront which was amazingly beautiful. They did a wonderful job with it. Also amazing were the antebellum homes. Many went back to Civil War era and were quite just stunning. For me the most amazing were the huge Water Oaks with all the Spanish moss. I smelled some Gardenia along the way but could not find the actual plants. After our walk we had some boat work to do then our boat friends came over. It was Halloween so on our way to dinner we caught the end of the town celebration with all the local area merchants doing trick or treat with the kids. Unfortunately the down side of being in the town marina in the evening was that there was a restaurant nearby that had a loud band that played until 11 or so both nights that we were there. It wreaked havoc with my sleep and attitude.

10/30, Friday – Departure was a bit of a challenge. This river thing is for the birds and the inside dock position went against us. Current and tide against us – Mark misjudged and we ended up sideways. Fortunately all the other boats had departed and we only did damage to a concrete pillar (can hardly see the nick on our fortunately massive rub-rail) and our egos. Also the day was overcast and rather yucky. We only had a short ride to Hilton Head, and not having slept well, I took a quick nap. That helped but after we got tied up at Palmetto Marine, Mark worked out a car rental and dealt with that and I went back to sleep for several hours. That helped a lot.

10/31, Saturday – Dawned…foggy! The fog left the sky and my brain by mid morning and we headed out to get an overview of the infamous Hilton Head and to find a golf course – there are only 20 or 30 here. Some time at the range to warm up and then we had a grand time playing…terribly. We each got some good shots in and just had fun. The whole southern thing with the Spanish Oaks, palm trees, ponds and warm air was just spectacular and of course Mr. Alligator was sitting behind one island on the outskirts of the 9th hole! We had picked up some groceries and decided to cook on the boat for dinner. Some more exploring is on the agenda for tomorrow and then we tackle the area of the ICW that has not been dredged for years.

And we get another hour of sleep tonight!

Norfolk, VA to Carolina Beach, NC

2009-10-22T10:01:00.008-04:00

Ship’s Log, October 22, 2009

From Wed. the 14th of Oct. in Norfolk, VA to Wed. the 21st in Carolina Beach, NC

10/14, Wednesday - Norfolk, Dismal Swamp - The lovely weather ended all too quickly. We were the only boat crossing the bay in the wee hours under very gray skies, but upon entering the Elizabeth River there were suddenly several tugs and barges, large military vessels and other military presence, and sailboats under power all moving this way and that. Then there are the bridges and locks. New bridges are built to a height of 65 feet above high tide but there are many older bridges still around. The ICW was built to accommodate boats so the remaining bridges needed to be swing, bascule or other types of opening bridges. Our height is 22 feet and alas, most of the remaining bridges fall in the 19 foot category so we have to ask them to open or wait for their schedule. We had several bridges to negotiate but they all opened on request and then a quick turn to the right and we were on the Dismal Swamp. A few miles in and we approached the first lock (scheduled) to wait with a few other boats. Once in one often makes friends with the next boat in the lock as you are now spending some quality time together. The boat in front of us was Skinwalker, a Marine Trader 49 with liveaboards, Wayne and Lynn Flatt. They recommended a lovely anchorage behind Goat Island after our second lock and invited us to raft up and have cocktails. The cocktails were great fun and we chatted for hours. They were very friendly and helpful, inviting us to tag along if we wished for the next few days.

10/15, Thursday to Elizabeth City– the previous day was just a bit too long to make it the whole way to Elizabeth City. Being rafted up we had to coordinate our departure time for the morning which was a gray, dreary, misty and a very mysterious day. The two boats negotiated the last 12 miles to E.C. where they opted for the free dock (no facilities) and since it was looking like several bad days we chose Pelican Marina (the only other place in town and unfortunately across the river) with a price of $35 a night including everything even the laundry facilities. The down side was the teensy amount of dock by the boat. We were now waiting for our opportunity to cross Albemarle Sound. It rained for two days but the wind never really raised its ugly head. This gave us time to catch up with boat chores, groceries, etc.

10/16, Friday – Still in Elizabeth City we had rain in the morning then took the dingy across and had a stroll around a very sad little town. With more rain and darkness approaching we turned down an invitation from Skinwalker for dinner and ended the day on our side of the river at the marina with cocktails with Dale and Anatha on their PDQ 34 sailing cat Mongoose Magic, followed by an early evening for an early departure.

10/17, Saturday - Albemerle Sound and the Pungo River - After several conversations at 6:40am about the weather we decided to brave the forces and were off the dock at 7am, in the dark. It was to be a long day – 70 some miles. Skinwalker was sitting out the river waiting while we battled our way out of the slip in the dark. There was a peek at the rising sun, the wind still promising falsely, still overcast and rainy but got we got across the Albermarle Sound before the wind did materialize. Then it was up the Alligator River and through the Pungo Canal both of which had dreadful scenery of scrab brush and ugly tres. We rafted up again at the other end of the canal in the Pungo River having a dinner of soup (Lynn) and salad (me) w/ Lynn and Wayne on Skinwalker. We have all thrown in the towel and are running our heat. It’s cold and miserable! Coulda stayed home for this.

10/18, Sunday, Pungo to Oriental / Greens Creek – 8am NNW at 10 – 15 to go up, cold – 45 degrees, still overcast but fairly protected routes. Gray, dismal and lumpy and depressing. Ran with the heat on much of the day and pulled in to Oriental following Skinwalker into Greens Creek. We dropped our hook between the set of “green’s” so we could dink to “town”. They went on in further up and decided to stay warm in their boat. We did go in dressed in all the layers we could muster and walked all 10 blocks. It was yet another sad town trying to be, but we did stop in at the Toucan Restaurant for early Sunday supper as it were. We are in the land of R. J. Reynolds. Smoking allowed. The hostess tried to seat us right next to the bar and I bolted for the other end of the room. Even so we still reeked of smoke afterwards. The food was nominal and we were watching some football team playing in the snow. Cold ride back to the boat and turned the heat back on.

10/19, Monday – Oriental to Beaufort - Folks that did not make the break from Annapolis when we did are still stuck there. Bill Knud, the guy whose boat went on the loose in Annapolis had invited us to visit and we thought about making the side trip to Washington, NC to do that but he was one of those still in Annapolis. The crew of Skinwalker have had it with the cold and decided to bogie on south. The sun was out and though it was still cold, it certainly made attitudes better – particularly mine. We went to Beaufort, a short ride, 25 miles, and the scenery was starting to be prettier. We dropped our hook in Town Creek on the back side of Beaufort. The book has a lovely photo of Beaufort showing lots of boats anchored off of town. We dingied over and found them all on moorings in a ripping current. Though our anchorage was less lovely, it was much safer. Again another town covered in an hour though cuter and probably more lively in the summer. I am really starting to be displeased with the book descriptions. Promises, promises.

10/20, Tuesday - Beaufort to Mile Hammock, Camp Lejeune. The wind died overnight and we quickly got get back on the ICW. The ride down was lovely as we are finally seeing the outer banks, dunes, marshes, pelicans and even a few porpoise in the canals. The homes are interesting. Many built right on the water (just try that in Maine!). One had the longest ramp to its dock over acres of shallow water, that I have ever seen. No shortage of money in this part of the state. Mile Hammock is actually in Camp Lejeune but cruisers are allowed to anchor there in its basin just off the ICW. We were the only power boat with about a dozen sailing vessels in the anchorage. We had a lovely golden, orange Carolina sunset – all to the background sounds of the military boys practice landing Blackhawks about ½ mile away and the booms and percussive sounds of Howitzers firing bouncing off the boat. After dark there were definitely some mystery boats on the ICW. Fortunately it all ended @9:30.

10/21, Wednesday - to Carolina Beach – the day of restricted bridges. As I mentioned earlier, some bridges open on request, some have schedules and they don’t budge a second one way or the other. If you miss it, too bad. Wait….and try not to run into anyone or anything while you all mull about in the water. Well we overslept a bit so we messed up our first bridge time. Not to be daunted as it was a beautiful day we dropped a hook and had a nice wait – lovely morning. The next bridge though we decided we could not make in time so, we backed down and cruised in very slowly. Had we boogied we might have made it – hard to tell. Our math showed otherwise, but it almost looked as if we could have. Then the third one was a real pain. No way we could make the 5 miles in ½ hour (we run at about 7.5 – 8 miles an hour) so taking our time we still had to wait an extra hour in a ripping current because of their timing. Dropped the hook right in the middle of the channel to wait and was it ever a challenge to pick up in the current that was running along with half a dozen boats that had arrived and were also milling around. Another 12 miles and we pulled into the resort area of Carolina Beach which just happens to have a natural anchorage in the middle of it. Condos and homes surround us but we are in a peaceful spot along with all of our sailboat “friends” from Mile Hammock who did the same leg of the journey today. And it is warm again!

Annapolis to Mile 0

2009-10-13T17:56:00.005-04:00

10/10, Saturday – Fuel, water, trash and waste were the morning chores in prep for leaving Annapolis, even in the middle of the boat show. A grand time had by all, but time to move on. The ride out turned into a dreary, overcast, lumpy ride to Dunn Cove; a spot on the Eastern Shore recommended by the guide books. We took the “short cut” through Knapps Narrows which included a lift bridge. We were a bit behind the previous set of boats so the tender needed to let it down for traffic. Just about when we were getting blown onto the pilings he put it up for us to pass on through. The channel heading out was quite skinny – we kept visiting that 1.9 feet below the keel number that I hate seeing! Dunn Cove is supposedly a very busy place in the summer. We shared it that evening with birds, fish and finally one more boat. The new anchor and windlass are working beautifully.

10/11, Sunday – Yesterdays’ lumps were grandly rewarded by a spectacular ride to the Solomon’s. Light NW wind and full sun. And we got two fish on but alas, lost both. We have to learn the trick of keeping them when they leap out of the water. From the way they didn’t fight we believe they were good sized strippers. We pulled into Solomon’s and got a hook down at @ 2:30. Mark got us right into the last available spot in the anchorage which only held about 8 boats. There was plenty of space elsewhere on the other creek, good reference for another time. The guy in the boat next to us was just getting back on his boat and told us that the local museum was having “free day”. Since we were parked right in front of the museum we jumped in the dingy and checked it out. It was very small town fair and quite sweet. The museum itself is a maritime museum and all about Chesapeake boats, the oyster industry and the local ecology. There was a tent set up for kids to build little boats and there must have been 15 tables with parent and kids hammering to their hearts content. Everyone was walking around with their prizes. A small town band was entertaining everyone with all the great pops classics and there were booths with artists selling paintings, jewelry (always tempting for me) and various crafts. So many talented people out there. The Lion’s Club was selling oyster sandwiches but they were sold out which disappointed Mark greatly. However the Kettle Popcorn booth couldn’t make it fast enough. I thought it was a bit silly, but it was good.

10/12, Monday – On the departure from Solomon’s it was really tempting to turn back as it was again lumpy. The Solomon’s is a few miles up the Pawtuxet River and we decided to give it to the mouth. The river did have the down current against the wind. I took a pill and we pushed on through. Again a bit of a dreary day and I went to “my room” to cope while Mark had a grand time at the helm and indeed once we got outside it did get better even though the wind was from the east and on the beam. By noon we seemed to be driving south of it and it had laid down quite a bit. Looking at the long range forecast we decided to suck it up and do a long day about 50 miles, to Jackson Creek at Deltaville, VA. Yes, VA. We have crossed the Mason Dixon Line. The VA line is on the west shore of the Potomac – not down the middle. No wonder NH keeps making grabs at the shipyard. Jackson Creek has an amazing entrance. The channel goes to within what looks like 10 feet and looking like you will drive right up onto someone’s beach before turning and going in to the creek. As usual the creek is much smaller than those lovely wide angel photos in the chart books, but we went to the “end of the line” dropped our hook and still several more boats came in behind us. We enjoyed a quiet evening listening to the Beatles on our Ipod (through speakers) and retired early preparing to be hunkered in for a day or two due to high winds.

10/13, Tuesday – We woke up to…..fog! It was light and quickly dissipated. Meanwhile we heard there was the dreaded “S” word back at home. We made breakfast and were getting settled in for the duration. I turned on the computer and as is my habit went straight to the weather. It was still predicting the high winds and with even higher winds for 5 or so days afterwards. But there was no wind. We decided to make a run for it knowing that if it did come up it would be on our stern – a much more favorable angle and if we could get to Hampton Roads 40 or so miles away we would then be inside. So we gulped down our coffee, pulled up the anchor and headed out. What a glorious day it turned out to be. The wind never materialized and it was a lovely ride down even allowing some onboard work. We chose an anchorage up the Hampton River and are just past the bridge – again shallow but deep enough. The local municipal dingy dock had lovely facilities for showering so we took advantage of them. We have not yet seen all the mega commercial and military traffic but will get that tomorrow. For now just enjoying 75 degrees on the aft deck and wearing shorts. Looks like we had better enjoy it as the reports are for a Nor’easter to sit off the coast for the next week. At least we are inside! For you non- boaters, inside refers to protection from the land! Tomorrow – Mile 0 – the official start of the ICW.

Wildwood, NJ to Annapolis, MD

2009-10-09T10:37:00.008-04:00

Ship’s Log, October 9, 2009

From Monday the 28th of Sept. in Cape May, NJ to Friday, Oct 9, in Annapolis, MD

9/28, Underway at dawn to go the last 7 miles out past Cape May and the canal to the Delaware River. Back into the big water at 7:30 and a long day ahead. We had the SW wind that was to get to 10 – 15 gusts to 20 and we were going north. Shoulda taken my motion sickness tabs. Somehow we messed up tide and current and ended up slogging at 6.5 for HOURS. 48 miles run to the Delaware and Chesapeake Canal. Meds finally kicked in and we practiced our surfing technique running down the faces of the 4 foot waves. What looked like the Flying Dutchman, turned out to be a lovely and large square rigger that went past us and he made a good target to follow upriver. When we reached the C. and D. Canal there was still 12 more miles to our stopping point. On the canal the sky quickly turned ominous and I urged Mark to put pedal to metal and burn some fuel. We pulled into a lovely inlet just off the canal called Chesapeake City at 4:45, dropped the anchor, the skies broke loose with a very strong torrential squall and the anchor dragged. I went back out to man the anchor, was drenched in seconds, Mark motored forward and we got it reset. I got first dibs in the shower! The remainder of the evening was delightful. Lovely sunset and quiet night.

9/29, Tuesday – A lazy morning except that we decided the anchor was still not holding well. Several more tries and a move to another area and we were once again set. Time for a larger piece of hardware. Mark went online and ordered a Manson anchor from Hamilton Marine in Portland to be delivered to his sister Joanne in Annapolis (really Eastport). That evening my niece Christine and her boyfriend Steven drove down from Newark, DE where they live and work, to meet us for dinner.

9/30, Wednesday – Avalon was the last boat out but we had the tide with us and into the Chesapeake we went. The C. is a big bay, not that wide but with lots of creeks and it is quite shallow. I picked out three possible anchorages in Middle River about 40 miles away. We got to the area @ 2:30 went up the river and into a side creek called Hog Pen. The write up was glowing but the reality was disappointing. Right away we were once again in 2 feet of water. Our nerves still frayed from NJ, we carefully worked our way out dragging through the mud the whole way. On to the second spot, Frog Mortar Creek. It had just a few more feet but we would have to have dropped hook right in the channel. The challenge is that the creeks are lined with small marinas on narrow channels all with lots of boats. Back out again. The center of Middle River actually has a marked channel so we decided to follow it to its end right by an airport, a small wooded area on one side and a small park on the other. Amazingly after three tries and the windlass misbehaving again, we got a very comfortable spot to stay.

10/1, Thursday – Beautiful morning. Quiet, still water and the leaves are just starting to turn here. We then saw lots of crabbers at work. They fish with lines draped between two buoys. Shorter lines about two feet long were dangled from that line spaced apart by 6 feet or so with bait attached. The crabs would latch onto the bait and as the crabber pulled the line into the boat he would just scoop up the crabs with a net. They fished that way and with pots – miniature versions of lobster pots. Finally we had the tide with us. 8+ knots the whole way to Annapolis. Our luck held and we were able to pick up one of the City moorings in Back Cove for $30 a night. Back Cove as are all the creeks around here is unbelievable. The boats are packed in so tightly that it is a wonder anyone can move about. They are between pilings with only a really skinny dock between every other set of poles. We had lunch, checked in, made arrangements to meet Joanne and her partner Brandy for dinner and Mark headed out with the dingy on his errands to get parts to repair the windlass. I stayed behind to rest – not. Ended up doing lots of paperwork, paying bills, follow-up emails and log catching-up-on. Mark got back with his parts and pieces and started in on the windlass. Not going well. He broke the drill bit trying to get out a broken bolt. Dinner saved us which was at Joanne’s with friends Meg and Ben. A grand time had by all, Mark got information to deal with the windlass part and we headed back to the boat.

10/2, Friday – Mark was up and out via dingy to go to a nearby boatyard to see if they could repair the windlass but the man there sent Mark to a place about 15 miles away. Joanne lent us her second car, a Miata and he headed out on his mission. That also did not go well. In the process Mark discovered a crack in the unit. Back he came and onto the internet we went. It turned out that the cost to replace the top part of the unit was the same as a whole new one, so the new one was ordered with arrival set for the following Tuesday. At 4:45, they called back to say that the credit card was declined. The bank didn’t like all those odd purchases from odd places and we had to assure them that we were indeed making those purchases. Unfortunately now we missed the shipping and it would now not arrive until Wednesday. So we hunkered in for a fun filled several days.

10/3, Saturday – Shucks we’re just going to have to play and have fun. We took the dingy to Annapolis, tied up at the head of “Ego Alley” and had a nice walk around town. Portland could use a similar place in its new plans for the waterfront. It was a beautiful day in the 70’s and turned out to be the day of the Navy / Marines game. We were honored with a “fly-by” of the Blue Angles. I’m sure it was just for us! Joanne was off on business but her friends Meg and Ben invited us to dinner at their place. They live just around the corner here in Eastport, also an easy walk. Our deal was that we dingied over to Brandy’s boat, tied up to it – it was on an end slip – and walked the two blocks to whomever’s home – they were all 2 blocks away. They in turn were all living in their alternate quarters as their main homes were rented out to Boat Show people. Everyone around here rents their homes and attached apartments. October is the moneymaker around here and everyone is set up to rent out. Joanne and Brandy got back early and joined us for another rollicking evening.

10/4, Sunday – Another beautiful day. We went back to Ego Alley and stocked up on veggies at the farmers market held there each Sunday. Then we strolled over to the Naval Academy campus. A showing of a photo ID and we were in. We looked all around the Visitor’s Center which had several nice displays of the history of the US Navy, historic battles, the uniforms over the years, the space capsule of Alan Shepherd (an Academy grad) and then there was the Rhode’s Scholar plaque of Academy grads with Ron Bancroft, class of 1965, Cumberland (ME) resident and big supporter of the PSO. We also peeked into the chapel – happened to be the end of Sunday service and the Mariner’s Hymn was playing. After getting back to the boat, Joanne and Brandy came out and we just hung out the rest of the afternoon and chilled.

10/5, Monday – We dubbed around a bit and then loaded up the golf clubs for our first day out on the course. The clubs were a bit much for the Miata so Joanne swapped cars with us so we now had her minivan. We headed about 20 minutes out of town to the Eisenhower Golf course and another lovely day for 9 holes. The first two holes were fairly awful not having swung a club for month. After that we started getting in a few (for me – more for Mark) decent swings. I did drop a 20 putt! After the game we went on a search for the Whole Foods. It was a new store in a new mall and we had the hardest time finding a) the entrance to the mall and b) the entrance to the underground parking lot. That part was nice. We could use that in Maine. However they had no bulk spices and in MD alcohol is not sold in grocery stores. Back to the boat for a quick chill-out and dress for dinner. Friends whom we have not seen in years drove down from Baltimore. We gave them the boat tour and then headed to Annapolis for dinner.

10/6, Tuesday – Up and at-em bright and early for an overcast but still comfortable day to go play tourist. We met Joanne, drove to New Carrolton to get on the train and headed to Washington D. C. First up was a wonderful botanical garden and huge green house; truly a conservatory. From there we walked up to the Capitol Building (where the Inauguration took place). It is HUGE. You don’t get a sense of it from photos. We wanted to see the visitor’s center which then allows one access to the Capitol Building, but they had tight security not allowing food, beverage and pocket knifes. Since we had all three we decided to keep that for another trip. Then it was on to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, Sculpture Garden and the Natural History Museum (where the latest Night at the Museum movie takes place). All were quite amazing. Being thoroughly pooped afterwards, we stopped for a bite and drink at the café by the sculpture garden and headed back to Annapolis. We only got onto one wrong train once, were able to switch and get going again correctly.

10/7, Wednesday – It did a light rain overnight but quickly cleared. All parts and pieces were scheduled to arrive today. Before they did we took a ride up Back Creek where we had not yet gone. Seems the Gemini Cats are made up there. Just as we got back onboard, the front of a high pressure started moving through with a vengeance. The wind was gusting to 45 and I believed it! Mark was trying to fix a door that was closing poorly and I was on the computer when we realized that the boat in anchored front of us was suddenly headed our way and just a bit quickly. Because of the high winds most boats had kept one person aboard – not this one. It then turned towards a neighbor’s boat. A loud holler to them enabled them to fend it off. Very quickly there were four dingies in the water and we worked on wrangling the boat. Mark jumped onboard to see if there was a key in the ignition (many folks leave there key for just such situations – we had a charter boat once that dragged and was saved because we had left the key in the ignition). No key but by now with its drift and our pushing it we were near some pilings and Mark was able to lasso one to stop its movement. Long story short, we got it tied up, found the owner who was setting up at the boat show and all was well. All with the wind just howling. Back aboard our boat – the installation of the new windlass was still being a challenge. The through bolts were not long enough and Mark had to go in search of a 5 inch hole saw to modify the backing plate.

10/8, Thursday – Annapolis Sail Boat Show Day! One of Joanne’s tenants gave her two passes for us to go to VIP Day. We love that. Typically fewer people and you can actually move around. The wind was back to normal and it was again a spectacular day. We had fun, purchased a few parts and pieces and ogled lots of new catamarans. Back at our boat the remainder of the windlass was successfully installed and tried out. It works! And it works well! Dinner tonight was with Joanne and Brandy at their yacht club which overlooks the harbor to Annapolis. They are headed out of town so we won’t see them again.

10/9, Friday – EEK! We ran out of water. That enabled us to do the math – 220 gallons of water / 15 days is almost 15 gallons a day. Doesn’t seem possible but good to know. Mark took our two 5 gallon water jugs to a dock and got them filled. We’ll make that last and we plan to head out tomorrow and will do a complete fuel and fill. Today will be some last minute provisioning, planning routes and dinner with a Portland friend who is coming down to the boat show.

CT to NYC through NJ

2009-09-27T17:07:00.010-04:00

Ship’s Log, September 27, 2009

From Saturday the 19th in CT through to Sunday the 27th in Cape May, NJ

Saturday the 19th we had a quiet evening well inside of Cold Spring Harbor and diner was on the boat. Sunday’s departure was determined by the tide. We had a glorious ride up the Long Island Sound and Down the East River. We got the tide correctly and flew down the river at 12 knots. Our usuall speed is about 8, so that is a 50% increase in speed. The boys found the best spot in the house on the bow and then we moved to the flybridge to view Lady Liberty in NY Harbor. Then it was up the Hudson River to anchor at the 79th Street Boat Basin. There were no moorings available and we are trying very hard to not pay the $$$$ for a slip. Since there were no moorings they said we could anchor and use their dingy dock and facilities for a smaller fee than mooring. Now anchoring in the Hudson is a mixed blessing. We had the most incredible views, the least expensive “hotel room” in the city, easy access to shore and a roaring current that made boat life a challenge. A Chinese Fire Drill ensued that night as our anchor did not re-bed with the tide change and we made a slow drift south. Fortunately something woke Jon up and we did a scramble to get back into place before becoming too well acquainted with the boat behind us that had been 300 yards away and was now about 5 yards away. The current and passing boats also make for quite a rock and roll situation and the speed of the water that night was such that it caused our anchor rode (now out @ 230 feet) to vibrate causing a pitch to emanate like a stringed instrument. In fact I was aware that the current was ebbing when the pitch subsided. Then I was able to get back to sleep.

Jon took us on quite the tour of the town over the next few days. Sunday evening we dined on the patio of an outdoor restaurant just across from Lincoln Center. Monday we started up at the campus of Columbia University where Jon had just taken several courses and worked our way down to Washington Square in the Village. We ended up dining in a place off Times Square. After dinner we had to pass back through Times Square again to get back to the subway. TS is now a pedestrian area and there we discovered that it was all set up with row upon row of chairs for a show on one of the giant screens above the square. On impulse we went in and sat down. It turned out to be opening night at the Met – Tosca. We figured out that we were between Acts 1 and 2 (of 3) and Act 2 started shortly. It was amazing. The huge screens, the unbelievable sound system drowning out the city sounds, the evening with perfect temperature and the whole ambiance was quite an experiene. The entire crowd exploded with Tosca after her wonderful aria. She was spectacular. It was just an amazing event with these people sitting out in Times Square enjoying life. Not waiting for the end we grabbed a cab to go back to the boat. That morning we had been able to move to a mooring so the next two nights were much less taxing. Tuesday we were feeling a bit worn out by our enthusiasm of the previous two days, but we still did much walking around and saw more, different areas of the city. It is an amazingly large place and also amazingly more friendly than the “old days”.

Wednesday we parted company with Jon and headed south under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge headed to Sandy Hook, NJ. There we met up with my brother James and his wife Gina and after giving them a boat tour had dinner ashore. Thursday it was back up and around the hook to Barnegat Bay Inlet. The tide had just changed against us but the wind was calm and with the modifications that have been made to the jetties it was an easy entrance. That green can all the way on the right is still disconcerting, though. Carefully picking our way among the reds and greens we got to the correct area for overnight anchoring. It was very hot when we arrived and Mark headed ashore to find bait. His catch was a teensy blowfish – seems they are not poisonous around here. Friday the wind was up considerably so going outside was not an option. We decided to go for the inside route. Looking at the chart we picked a place at Little Egg Harbor Inlet that looked like a decent place to anchor. We worked slowly and figured out the reds and greens – the buoy system - and then we were on the NJ ICW. It was interesting being on the inside. For the most part it became quite clear as to where one was supposed to be and it was extremely clear that if you left the channel it was basically 1 foot deep. However it also became clear that our choice of anchorage would be less than good. All that stuff that looked like land on the chart turned out to be fields of grass in the middle of the bay with absolutely no protection from the wind, which was why we were on the onside in the first place. Not only that, but for a short passage through the area of Little Egg Harbor Inlet we had the pants scared off us as we moved literally from green to green (no reds around) and the sounder was showing 2 feet. Some fast chart work showed that Atlantic City was only about 15 miles or two hours further. Even still that anchorage situation was iffy. We really were not interested in the Trump Marina. I kept plugging away at the internet and finally came up with some articles written by Gene and Katie Hamilton who write for several of the boating magazines talking about an anchorage called Rum Cove (not on the charts, but is noted as Rum Point) and is just across the inlet from Atlantic City. The entrance looks like you could skip over it from one side to the other. We could see other boats inside, so we turned in. Over the bar we went and I headed up to prep the anchor. Mark swung around the last area marked as shallow but alas it was not wide enough. I suddenly realized we were not moving. Bummer. 200 feet to go after a long day and cocktail time and we were in the mud. Thank goodness our Sea Tow is paid up. I called them and they were there in about 15 minutes. The very nice man tied to our port stern cleat, “prop washed” and pulled for about 15 minutes until with his twin 200’s blew away the mud under us and he was able to pull us free. Fortunately the only harm done was to our egos – especially since we had made it the whole way from Barnegat without touching. Well the old saying is…..

Saturday we took the dingy across the inlet to go check out Atlantic City. As there was no dingy dock we improvised and just hoped that it would be there when we got back (it was). Atlantic City remains a study of contrasts. This was not the best section of town. After several blocks we got up to Boardwalk and checked out the scene. We did wander into the Taj Mahal Casino just to see it – even had lunch there. What a completely different world and mentality. I had intended to drop a roll of quarters, but I couldn’t figure out how to do it. No one armed bandits – all push buttons.

The weather was still high winds and now the rains were coming. It poured all night but Mark finally convinced me to head out and do the next stretch to Cape May again on the inside. We still bumped bottom on that spot even though we went even wider. This next section of the NJ ICW included many more bridges and we figured out that the bridge tenders were not returning our calls because there is an issue with the radio. Always something – oh, yes and a piece broke off the windlass (the unit that pulls up the anchor and 75 feet of chain) this morning. The section today has also terrified us several times with the depth or lack of it (2 feet?!?). The marshes however are stunning. The grasses go for miles and it has been fun to watch all the bird life. Wherever there is actual land the homes are cheek to jowl, every single one with boat docks. A few more closer-than-comfort calls with the bottom and we finally pulled into “Sunset Lake” in Wildwood, just north of Cape May – one of the few areas that has more than 6 feet of water and is out of the mainstream. However, all is well. The anchor is placed there is a light breeze and the sun is coming back out.

Boston through to Western Long Island Sound

2009-09-19T13:30:00.004-04:00

Ship’s Log, September 12, 2009, Boston, MA through to Long Island Sound, CT / NY

9/12 – 9/19 – Saturday - Our new friends headed out on Saturday the 12th and called back to say that they were turning back – still big seas - but headed to one of the islands to anchor up and encouraged us to stay put yet another day. Our project for the day was that we made an attempt to get the internet, the computer and TV monitor speaking to each other. A Radio Shack and Staples up the street were helpful but it is still a work in progress. The hikes to the stores in the rain were our walks and we did do some chilling out. Sunday finally dawned quietly with better weather and after a last run to Mike's for pastries we headed out late morning in order to catch the correct tide at the Cape Cod Canal. There was a period where we saw more wildlife – a shearwater, porpoise, tuna and an ocean sunfish. It had been a lovely day but a quick downpour and a lovely rainbow greeted our entrance to Buzzards Bay. We anchored up in Onset (just at the west end of the canal) for the night. Monday, having listened to the long range forecast, we reluctantly changed our plans, bypassing Nantucket and headed for Block Island. The traveling conditions were perfect and we caught the tide and wind just right and are flying along at 8.5 knots (never thought I’d be saying that). The ride was pleasant and we dropped a hook mid-afternoon in Great Salt Pond on Block Island. We dingied around the Pond and had a beer at “The Oar” a waterfront pub that has a huge collection of decorated oars donated by many boaters over the years. Tuesday was a perfect day to take the Moped tour of the island. It is a lovely collection of homes and fields with extensive rock walls, one town as such, the ferry terminal on the east side, the pond for boaters on the west and lighthouses on both the north and south ends. Having covered the whole island by 2:30 – we decided to take advantage of the good weather and cross back over to Stoning ton, CT to check in on some boat issues. The anchorage where we could drop a hook was of course, the more exposed area behind the breakwater so when the weather did change it was rolly. Oh, well. Wednesday morning Mark got us to the dock and the guys determined that our autopilot was fine and that the windlass (the device that pulls up the anchor chain and anchor) that decided to misbehave badly as we pulled up the anchor just needed tightening. Afterwards, back to the anchorage. After a squall things died down so we headed out to put a few miles on and hopefully get to a nicer anchorage. Stonington had been a disappointment as far as a town goes. On our way we connected with Jonathan and after several calls to the UK (where he was) decided to connect in Milford on Friday when he gets back. In the meantime we were headed to Niantic Bay and up the river. As we approached our end point in the bay we realized that there were two bridges to get through. We could not raise a soul on any radio channel; we were getting stuck in the mud in the teensy approach channel and about to leave when miraculously the bascule bridge opened. We decided to turn around and head back in. The 2nd bridge was not a problem – high enough. We finally decided that the bridge must remain in the up position except when a train approaches and triggers it to go down. It was a very shallow bay and necessary to obey the channel markers. There was a big marina full of Grady Whites at the beginning, lots of moored boats and lots of homes on the shoreline. As we got farther upriver things thinned out and we found a lovely spot to drop a hook. Mark finished repairing the dingy and we had a very pleasant night. Thursday dawned as a brisk fall day. Somehow that bridge made us wait again – no trains in site so I got to practice some close quarter maneuvering under the high bridge. We headed out thinking that we had the wind and the tide in our favor, but we missed some piece of information somewhere and ploughed all the way to Milford “upstream”, thankful that it was light wind. Milford’s outer harbor was very calm and protected with the existing wind angle so we dropped a hook, watched the local evening sailboat race from the flybridge and retired. Friday we pulled into the Milford Landing Marina; a place we had stayed at on or last trip. Boat business was the order of the day. We had made an appointment with a tec guy who ultimately was unable to help us except to suggest that we purchase a Verizon Wireless Broadband card for the computer. Of course it is never that easy. Two trips to the mall and we still couldn’t get the thing working. We threw in the towel, had dinner and awaited Jon’s arrival via Amtrak. At @ 9pm we wandered up to the train (we had no idea of his actual arrival time – his cell phone was dead) and his train pulled in 10 or so minutes later. We spent some time reacquainting and then we all crashed. Saturday was a gorgeous fall day. We poked about the boat but with the intent of getting going. Jon got our Broadband going on my computer (after a few unsuccessful attempts himself) so at least we are up and running again! I got a pulled pork cooking on the Crockpot and Mark pointed the bow to Cold Spring Harbor on Long Island. All is well and we got a peek of the NY skyline on the horizon.

Hanging out in Boston

2009-09-11T17:22:00.005-04:00

Ship’s Log, September 11, 2009, Boston, MA

Our trip from Portsmouth was smooth, so much so that we pushed on to Boston. The wind was to come up and wherever we put in was going to be our home for the next several days. Coming in to Boston Harbor was interesting – big channel, big boats, big city. We poked around and finally decided to check out the only moorings we could see. The folks at Waterboat Marina have been very nice. They insisted that we come in to a slip as the winds were to be strong. We were a "small" boat, they had space and did not charge us more. How great is that? Oh – just 5 blocks to all the wonderful food in the North End. We walked and explored, went to the Aquarium, and IMAX presentation of “Star Trek” (great fun both) and grazed our way right through town. We met up with some local friends and made new boat friends also stuck here. Hopefully, weather permitting we will press on tomorrow. Many places to go and miles to cover.

D DAY!

2009-09-07T15:22:00.003-04:00

Ship’s Log – Monday, September 7, Labor Day,
Portsmouth Harbor, NH

Saturday the 5th was a crazy day of catching up on the seemingly endless list of To-Do items. Mark’s list was on / at the boat and mine was house and garden. It continued into Sunday. First item was to move the boat to the dock for easier loading – for what had not yet gone one. Every trip to the boat in the past two weeks included at least two canvass bags of stuff to go. After that load it was back to the house to pick out a pile of cloths that we actually fit into the allotted spaces on the boat. Somehow I also managed to get the refrigerator at the house emptied, shut down and loaded onto the boat. A great opportunity to clean out some of those mystery items that have been there for far too long. We gave ourselves a 4pm deadline for me to shut down the house and Mark to wrap up his projects, making some sense of the piles on the boat so that we could have some guests on to celebrate with us. Coincidentally it was also Mark’s birthday. One guest wished to hear the engine so Mark very happily turned it on only to have it not cooperate. When we had fueled on the 4th, we had shut off the fuel valves and never turned them on. Thank heavens it waited until we were tied up at the dock to run dry. Fortunately our guest was able to assist Mark in bleeding the injectors and she cranked right over. The last item then was to ferry the car back to the house, shut off the water and have a friend take me back. Of course the water valves haven’t been turned in 10 years and took some WD40 and a wrench and then I couldn’t remember if I had locked the front door. No overload here!

Monday the 7th dawned lovely but quite chilly. We pulled off the dock at @ 6:30 am, performed the Monhegan Farewell on our way past Portland Head Light and pointed her nose towards Portsmouth. I grabbed a few more hours of shut-eye as the swells were not agreeing with me. Mark poked around finding homes for belongings and putting things away. We pulled into Portsmouth Harbor just after noon, riding the end of the tide up the river. When we turned around to come back we dropped from a high of 9 knots back to 4. Quite a current here. We are currently anchored up just outside the Pepperrell Cove Yacht Club. Scored – a place to anchor. Then we are to meet Jean Alvord – friend and colleague from the PSO for dinner as she and her husband live nearby. Not bad for first day out. Hard to believe we are doing it. It does feel a little bit like dropping down the Rabbit Hole!

Count Down to Blast Off

2009-08-30T15:20:00.000-04:00

Ship’s Log – Aug 30, 2009

My, my – where has the summer gone? Oh – right – we didn’t have summer. It rained May, June and straight into July. No shortage of it in August either. They have already declared this the rainiest summer on record and that was before “Bill” and “Danny” came through.

The rain meant not being able to work on the boat until Mark threw in his hat on that one and worked on the boat in the rain anyway. He just replaced a cracked raw water strainer, got the dingy davits up and running, a new, 2nd(!) battery charger to run in parallel with the first. Yipiee we’ll actually be able to sleep a whole night without having to get up and check the charging system.

Piles are being made, lists checked and then added to. I haven’t seen the top of my desk or the dining room table for some time. Every time a trip is made to the boat, several “Bean” bags are toted along. Lawn, garden and house folks are all lined up. Students have all been set up with other teachers, Benchmark projects are being handed off, new computers are set up and running - all in preparation for BLAST OFF and that is on ONE WEEK! Yikes!

Progress through the summer

2009-08-11T11:28:00.002-04:00

Ship's Log – August 11, 2009

What a “summer”. First two months of rain – hence no shakedown time, then the company or needing to be away just about every weekend. Not that that is a bad thing – just takes time. Inbetween we keep muddling along. Mark is working on a dingy-to-boat attachment system – still has bugs to work out. More hoses and wiring have been added or redone; an additional battery charging system is in the works; new faucets and filters for the galley; the engine has been balanced; the nav computer died (of course) so it had to be replaced and of course there is some challenge in reloading all the charts, not to mention getting the routes that I had worked on; still haven’t figured out a table arrangement for the salon, but there are new deck chairs; etc., etc.

We still are planning for an early September departure!

Another boat steals Mark

2009-06-16T14:55:00.002-04:00

Ship’s Log – June 16, 2009

Wait! Wait! Mark is on the wrong boat! That is him bidding saonara as “Boheme” passes Portland Headlight. Peter Plumb the owner, is heading out on a circumnavigation of Newfoundland and hanging off the stern is Mark who is doing crew work for the first leg over to Baddeck, Nova Scotia.

Still June and maybe we'll get in the water????

2009-06-14T10:40:00.011-04:00

Ship's Log – June 14, 2009

Grrrr. Always something. A week of rain. Mark was needed back at the officeand even with Jonathan’s help things were not going to get done, so he bit the bullet and hired the yard – Great Island – to finish up the bottom. “Avalon” went back in the shed for the bottom work as the rain persisted.

They continued sanding and patching, did the barrier coat and two coats of bottom paint. Even the owner of Great Island Marina in Great Island, Maine (near Harpswell and Brunswick), Steve Rowe got in on the action with the barrier coating. Didn’t want to miss a good time!

Her new bottom paint - shiny as it will ever be.

Mark still continued to deal with the little stuff. Readjust the swim platform to set up the dingy davits, sand and varnish stuff, deal with outboards – what is it with outboard motors???? Two of them. One is now fixed and on the market. The other was declared a disaster and a new one was purchased. Should run for a year anyway.

Launch day came and went several times. Finally on June 9th the grand event happened with next to no fanfare. Just me to show up and holler “Yipiee” in the rain to the yard guys.

Here she is coming out of the shed, being lined up and backed down the boat ramp.

They tied on with the workboat to move her to the dock.

Since this point, Mark has been on to clean her up. She was some dirty! He has continued with the little things such as reinstalling the mast with new LED lights - of course they decided to not work in the upright position so that and a number of small things still need to be fixed. Then all the fluides needed changing - a most fun job. Next stop, Centerboard Yacht Club in South Portland!

And more work......

2009-05-21T19:23:00.013-04:00

Recruit family memebers to sand and paint

the spar....

Mount the life raft cradle

Buff the hull....

Dig out caulking....

Prep for bottom cleaning - soda blasting

She has a skirt!

and under that skirt ready for a new pettycoat...

Sanding and bottom paint.

Late winter and early spring prep

2009-05-05T12:25:00.011-04:00

Ship's Log – May 5, 2009

Spring is here and the stock market is up but the prep work continues. Many parts and pieces got moved, replaced, redone – what-have-you. The salon was turned into a tool shed. The generator spent a great deal of time suspended over the cockpit waiting for things that go underneath it to arrive, get sent back and come back again, and finally the day came to remove the winter wrapping.

What a big tarp! So many screws in that frame had to be taken out. How great it is to have light inside the boat again. Now we can see all the dirt that accumulated over the winter!

Waiting out the winter.

2009-03-19T14:37:00.000-04:00

Ship's Log - March 19

Mark and I knew at the end of the Down East Loop Trip that we would definitely plan to do another trip. That has evolved into the ICW (Intracoastal Waterway of the East Coast) to either the Bahamas or the Keys. The plan is the Bahamas for the winter of 09 - 10, but boating things are always fluid (ha-ha). The next part of the plan was the boat. As much as we loved the Jarvis Newman (our red boat) it did not hold enough fuel or water for a longer trip. The shopping commenced almost before we returned from the last trip in 06. We shopped Maine. We shopped New England. We shopped Annapolis and finally Florida. There we found the next boat. She is an Eagle 40 Pilothouse Trawler and she arrived via truck in Maine in April of 08. During the time - oh, she is now AVALON - we have had with her we discovered that changes needed to be made to indeed do that long distance cruising and be able to stay "on the hook". She was set up to be a marina boat and we like to anchor out. ($$$!!! for marinas though occasionally it is a necessity.)

Since Mark is recently "retired" (only needs to show up occasionally) he has been hard at work on going over the boat from stem to stern replacing hoses and wiring, adding engine fire suppression systems, setting up computer navigation, collaborating with the yard on a stern door, designing dingy attachment equipment, overseeing power systems installation upgrading, sewing new upholstery for the cushions and on and on. I am still working so have not done a whole lot except to start studying the charts.

During last summer's cruising we spent some time at the dock at Billing's Marine in Stonington.

That's the guys hard at it installing a beefier alternator. All sorts of boats were at the dock there - absolutely gorgeous to how-in-the-heck-does-that-thing-float?

This summer will be shake down cruise time and hopefully we will be able to depart @ September 1. Right now AVALON is in Harpswell at Great Island Boat Yard awaiting bottom cleaning and painting.