Atlantic City to Cape May, anchor

Given the weather remains a total bother, we continued on the New Jersey ICW southward. 

We recalled from last year that this section, from Atlantic City to Cape May, was the worst part, with lots of skinny water and twisty routes. For some reason, this time it just didn't seem that bad. It took us a while to realize why.

First, we thought the trip was about 8 hours. It goes by many neighborhoods filled with slow zones. Turned out it was only 6, getting us here in time for naps!

Second, we had a brandy-new Corp of Engineers scan to go off of. Last time we used the sonar charts on our Navionics. This was so much better. No guess work, totally accurate.

Up and out early in the morning.

Third (and we only realized this in the last couple of miles) they'd dredged the channel. Some sections remain (or quickly became) shoaled. But mostly we had good depths. Also, it wasn't as twisty as I recalled.

To be fair, it's still skinny. This is what we see on the water...

...and this is what the charts read. Throughout the day, tho, 
we mostly had 10 ft or more. This section was thin, around 5.
But with wind and tide we never saw less than 3 feet beneath us.

Needless to say we had a good day, staying off the choppy and miserable Atlantic, and boy does it continue to be.

We finally got to Dock's Oyster House, in AC.
Had halibut with their "pommes souffle".

Not sure how long we'll be here, now. We're thinking Thursday or Friday to get up the Delaware, then it's a quick 2nd day ride back to Baltimore. Our slip is rented until Oct 5, so this should be good timing.

Too bad I've relapsed and am now sicker than I'd been since before my trip to NYC.

Coney Island to Atlantic City, marina

When people say "curse like a sailor" it's not that the sailor is a particularly bad fellow. It's more that he had a long and miserable day and, *** **** ****** *****, he's just tired. I can relate.

We were up at 5 am for a 6:15 go time, the destination was Atlantic City. After one last weather/wave check that looked really ambitious to us. We decided we'd bag at Manasquan, which was the first inlet off the Atlantic. Then we'd casually bop our way down the Jersey ICW, and anchor somewhere. Since that inlet can spicy, we delayed our departure by 2 hours so it would be near slack tide when we got there. Highwind and One Eye Dog (OED) took off at 6:15 as planned.

They warned us the water was pretty bad across the mouth of the New York Harbor, but got better once off the Jersey shore. Armed with that, he headed out.

It was pretty bad. We had 4 footers on the beam, but in 11 second periods which is the only reason we though going was doable. It did get better once we got near the shore but it in no way was good. Or reasonable. I know the water is bad when I check my watch every 5 minutes wondering how much longer.

While the waters improved once off the ocean
the weather just got worse...

...and worse...

...and worse.

That part of the journey took 3.5 hours. Once we got in the inlet, which was perfectly easy, everything was smooth, and stayed that way for the rest of the day.

Right away we started looking for where to anchor. In chatting with OED we thought there might be a chance to get up the Delaware Bay tomorrow if we made it to AC tonight. We did some calculations and realized we could do that, then make a trip up the Delaware part of a long day tomorrow. So we called a marina and made reservations.

But as the day wore on (and on, and on) we realized the bay might not be so inviting after all -- all the weather apps have mixed predictions, which tends to mean "it's going to bite." And the Atlantic was still a mess, so we'd have to take the JICW to Cape May before getting onto the Delaware, and that track will take close to 8 hours alone.

Before we pulled into the marina (around 6:30 pm), we'd decided we'll just stay here a few days and see how the weather shakes out.

It's been a long 3 weeks, and today's been a long day. With Hurricane Helene coming at us, it doesn't appear we're done with this yet, either.

UPDATE: I forget to mention the highlight of the day. Very late, only a few miles from AC, in the very dim light we saw a sailboat. It's location made us assume he was in the channel, but as we neared he appeared anchored. Weird. Through binoculars I didn't see anchor line, but they clearly weren't moving, and (now we could see) they were not in the channel. We slowed way down and Russ got on the bow, asking them if they needed help. They did... they wanted us to wake them. So we put the throttle down, bucked up the water behind us in a huge wave, and went by them. They gave us a big thumbs up as they sailed northward and on their way. That definitely made us feel a little better about the day, being in the right time at the right place -- always happy to help someone.

Port Wash to Coney Island, ball

This is a new marina for us, right next to Coney Island. It's called Miramar. We picked it because it makes a quicker jump off point to start southward, making it about 2 hours shorter than starting at Great Kills on Staten Island.

The weather is looking only marginal for my taste. But with the next hurricane, Helene, already thundering it's way up the gulf, there's an argument to "just get it done." The plan is to head south and get to (at least) Manasquan, which is the first "GET OFF THE WATER" point along the coast. If we're feeling confident, we'll go all the way to Atlantic City for the night. But we won't make that call until we're underway.

NYC in the gloom

Three of us, One Eye Dog, Highwind, and ourselves, made reservations for balls here a couple of days ago. We all immediately got positive responses ball assignments. Because they work Highwind got underway right at the crack of dawn. OED and we started later, largely because we wanted to pick up a little bit of fuel -- just to make sure we had enough to get to AC if we laid the throttles down.

When Highwind got here, tho, there was a vessel on their ball. They got reassigned, no biggie. When we got here we were re-assigned their ball. And a vessel was still on it. The launch didn't seem to believe us so came out to investigate and, lo, ball is occupied. They apologized then (and this was a new one) moved the other vessel. I found that amusing.

Moving a derelict boat from our assigned ball.

Due to rainy weather we aren't going to explore Coney Island. But I suspect we might come back.

Russ working on some bugs while passing the old Pepsi-Cola building.

The ride to Coney Island, just past the Verrazano Bridge.

Not the best. Not the worst.

Yep, still in Port Washington

Between an onslaught of hurricanes and a very stubborn low off the coast the waters off the Jersey shore remain abysmal. It's been a week since I got back from NYC, and we thought we'd need an extra day or 2 before we had a window to travel, but this has been bonkers.

Odd, the weather here's been pretty nice.
Didn't even get the rain they predicted.
But the winds out there are miserable!

Good news, though, If you have to be somewhere for 3 weeks, Port Washington gets high marks. Between a slew of excellent restaurants, convenient access to groceries and drugs stores, a free launch service, cheap mooring balls, and reasonable trip to get to the city, Port Washington remains a favorite even after an extended stay.

We are among a bunch of boaters all buckin' to get south. There have been texts, chats, and phone calls as everyone compares weather and wave information. General consensus says get to a launching point Thursday and start down the Jersey coast Friday. It won't be fun. Some of us will jump off as soon as we can (this is my tribe) at Manasquan, then take the JICW down to Atlantic City. Others will just put the throttles on the table and book it all the way to Cape May.

Today is Tuesday, and this Friday window has been stable for a while, so we're hopeful that it remains. 

But it doesn't look like it will be fun.

But neither will be waiting.

A Few Days In NYC!

I have had a plan for months to meet a Californian friend, Jennifer, in NYC. So we timed our arrival to be near the area to make that easy. From here we'd start heading south as soon as I got back to the boat. Weather, of course, has changed that. Gonna be here for maybe another week. So, I might take and other day trip to the city.

However, here are some highlights to my 3 days in NYC.

Of course, New York 'za. Village Square Pizza, Midtown
rated 4.9 on Google. It was definitely one of the best pizzas
I've had in a while. 

The New York Public Library.

Did an escape room. We escaped with 1 minute to spare!

Dungeons and Dragons! 2nd time I've seen the show.
And just as fun as the first.

If you play Asgard's Wrath II, you know what to do.

We also saw Once Upon a Mattress, a play about the Princess
and the Pea story. Very funny.

Breakfast of champions! Sesame balls and jasmine tea.
Seriously, I love New York.

Port Jefferson to Port Washington, ball

We're in a sweet spot of calm waters this week. Probably will change once the remnants of the latest hurricane, Francine, heads north.

We plan on being here a while, maybe a week. Port Washington is a cute town with easy access to NYC, it's just a 45 minute train ride. And the balls are pretty inexpensive. AND they have a pump out boat. What's not to love?

Some swans and swanlings... swanlets? Swansters?

If we had another 4 day window (which is a luxury in boating so not very likely) we could make it to Baltimore from here. Those are long days, too. We have to cross the Jersey short to head south. Any east wind makes that a "no go" typically -- you don't want the fetch of the entire Atlantic to have to deal with.

We're not in a massive hurry but things are getting a bit crowded in October. We know our slip in Baltimore is rented until Oct 5; that's not a huge inconvenience since we could put inQuest in another slip until it frees up. We do have some things we'd like to do to the boat that requires it to be hauled, like replace the thru hulls, check the bottom paint and repaint if necessary, and install new macerators on our black tanks (fun one, that!). On top of that we need to winterize the boat before we leave Baltimore. If possible we'd like to go see FLIBS (Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show), which is the last week of October.

Another placid day on LIS.

Oh, and we have a condo rental in Tampa that starts Oct 15. 

It's feeling like a busy month to me.

Port Washington. Look at all that space between boats!

Newport -> Old Saybrook -> Port Jefferson, anchor/ball

It was a tricky call after so many days of winds but we decided to make the 6 hour run from Newport to Old Saybrook on Tuesday. Good thing, too. We had a good ride. A little lumpy leaving Newport -- which always seems to be true -- but the rest of the day went from ok to excellent.

Once in Old Saybrook we tried to grab a ball in the North Cove. We've been there a couple of times already, including on the way up, but for some reason it felt more crowded. It's a very tight field. Highwind (who left Newport a number of days earlier) was on the hook in the middle of the Connecticut River. We opted to simply raft with them.

Moonlit night in Newport

Russ and I took the dinghy into town to dump some trash and recycling as well as do a little shopping.

Wednesday we got up and out quite early. Highwind has plans to stay on the north side of Long Island Sound while we're heading for the south.

Long Island Sound was almost totally flat all day long. We had an amazing trip across. Once in the bay there were any balls available for us to use. We snagged one, we took naps, then headed into town for some excellent Indian food.

Tomorrow it's onto Port Washington, where we'll be for nearly a week.

Sept 11, beeline to Port Jefferson

Peaking sun at dawn

Excellent food at Curry Club. One of our favorites places to eat.

This submarine-thing is a cruise ship tender. While in Newport
these things came in and out constantly. You can just spy
one of the cruise ships behind it and Goat Island.

Continued stay in Newport

The Breakers, summer cottage of the 
Vanderbilt family, from 1895 - 1972 when it was
sold to the Preservation Society

Due to weather and Russ fighting a cold we've extended our stay in Newport. Sadly, we haven't been able to explore town much as we didn't want to spread whatever Russ has. It isn't Covid, btw. He's taken a number of tests, all completely negative.

I have plans on meeting a friend in NYC next Monday for a couple of days. The weather looks like it will cooperate in making a beeline to Port Washington. From there it's just a 45 minute train ride into the city.

But for now we're bobbing a bit on the water, despite cloudless days and cooler temps.

Now, you can tour it. It's one of several mansions in Newport
that you can visit, but most say it's the grandest of them all.

We did an escape room (tomb themed if you couldn't tell)
with Hanna's folks, Rebecca and Keith. Russ sat out
due to his cold -- not a good idea to be in a small room with folks.

Woods Hole -> Cuttyhunk -> Newport, ball

After a lovely and quiet night near Woods Hole we planned on going to Cuttyhunk. Cuttyhunk is the western-most point on the Elizabeth Islands; After lies a stretch of open water until you hit Long Island. Well, there's a small island in between but, pfft! It's open water.

We thought we'd stay at Cuttyhunk and head to Newport in the morning. But the weather was so amazing, and that open water was like glass. Moreover, it wasn't clear how nice it would be in the morning. It wasn't going to be nice by the afternoon, and we're not fans of small weather gaps.

Hard not to run when the water looks like this.

So after some lunch and naps Russ and I headed onward to Newport.

We'd had made ball requests in Newport a couple of days ago. We were put on a waitlist. So when we arrived, given we still hadn't heard, we start looking at anchorages. Russ decided to just call the harbor master and see if anything was available. Sure enough, they had a ball. Go figure! We could even stay for 4 nights.

The mooring field in Newport. One of the biggest
we've ever stayed at.

That's what we plan to do. I've been wanting to do the hike here, and we didn't get a chance to a couple of months ago, either due to weather or timing. Fingers crossed!

Boston to Wood's Hole, anchor

This is a long one... so buckle up!

While we love Boston it was time to be moving along. The folks at Charlesgate Yacht Club are very gracious, and we're looking forward to staying with them in the future.

First everyone needed to either fuel up of pump out. Task one for the day was get across the Boston Harbor, and while Highwind fueled up (the docks are in separate locations at this fuel station), then we switched. Worked well -- pumped out, fueled up, and ready for the day.

The first 5 or 6 hours we a little choppy. Not the worst we've experienced, but it made watching for prop traps particularly fatiguing. 

Once done we got a "break" going through the Cape Cod Canal. something I was looking forward too. Especially since we had the tide with us, adding 4 knots to our speed. But the boats going the other way all felt they needed to make up the -4 knots with speed, making for massive waking. There are "no wake" signs when you enter, but clearly it's optional.

Passing Highwind on Cape Cod Bay.

The last hour or so was on Buzzard's Bay, and it was ideal. Wonderful water, blue skies, moderate temps. It was a nice end to a long 8 hour run.

We had plans on taking a ball at the marina in Woods Hole, but when we arrived there was only 1 ball available, even though we thought they reserved 2. Since we were ahead of Highwind we swapped texts and decided to anchor in the inner harbor, specifically Hadley Harbor. Hannah and David spent a night there on the trip up a couple of months ago, and raved about it. But it, too, was full. So they dropped a hook (that anchorage was also full but he eeked out a decent spot -- apparently, this is a hot spot on Labor Day Weekend), and we tied up to them.

Like we've done so many times before...

The evening dinghy ride back from dinner
in Woods Hole.

Once set we all piled into dinghies and headed to explore Woods Hole, which was hopping on this Labor Day. We needed 2 dinghies since Hannah's folks, who are boaters too, were aboard Highwind for a week.

We've always known that there might be some occasion where we'd have to do an emergency release, and odds are it wouldn't be in great conditions. Well, that time had come.

I woke to the boat bouncing around 11:30. The winds had come up significantly (20-25 knots) and we were bucking, which isn't unusual or even uncomfortable. There had been "small craft advisories" all day, so this wasn't a huge surprise. On a whim I checked my phone. David who was still up, and had been texting us about the worsening conditions. Nothing other than "I'm still monitoring" type of texts. But I remembered there was a low point near us. I went up to the helm to check our depth. Sure enough we had 2.3 feet under the keel. In bouncing conditions this didn't please me. I texted that info to David, and the decision to reset was made.

Engines on within minutes, lines were tossed and inQuest got away from Highwind. It's one thing to  maneuver in a crowded anchorage on a moonless night surrounded by rock, it's another to do that in a 20 knot blow. With Russ on the bow and the use of our spot light we got out of Highwind's way so they could reset. They hailed to come on back.

After a few minutes (staying station was NOT fun even for that short time) they hailed all good. We carefully rejoined them, another small feat but it all went well. By the way, Hannah's folks were a huge help as they had a crew of three catching lines and getting us snugged.

Engines off we all took a breath. Our depth went to 17 feet, so we were relieved. However, we managed to get closer to some other boats in the anchorage. And we didn't feel comfortable with that in these winds -- boats swing, and with 2 boats tied together we swing differently. And these winds were forecasted to last well into morning.

We all looked at charts. Outside this small anchorage was a much larger one, more exposed to the weather, but (I noticed while coming back from town) was totally empty. We picked our anchor points ahead of moving, giving each boat a destination before heading out. That helped with coordination. This time we'd drop separate hooks and discuss next steps in the morning.

Engines on again, lines tossed, and inQuest headed into the wind through the small channel, bucking while crossing the narrowest point. Yep, this could be a rough night, but at least we'd have space to swing. As we turned toward our spot we got just enough shelter that the ride calmed a bit.

Highwind and inQuest, side by side.
Alas, it wouldn't last.

We dropped our hook, which caught wonderfully, then put out a ton of rode. Next we decided to put up our dinghy (which had been attached to our hip all this time). Given the rougher water it would only keep bumping into our hull all night. Putting it up in this weather was tricky -- we both wore PFDs for the process.

But after ALL that we were finally able to rest. The night was a little bumpy but not the worst we'd experience. By the time we went to sleep it was 2 am.

So, why didn't we just do this anchorage to begin with? Because this anchorage was off the main channel. Woods Hole is what high speed ferries pass through between Newport and Martha's Vineyard or Nantucket. Their wakes finally got us up and out of bed around 7 am.

We took a walk to the Nobska Lighthouse

After breakfast we lowered the dinghy and scoped out the rest of Hadley's Bay. To our surprise there were a couple of mooring balls available in there, and it was dead calm. We dashed back to inQuest and texted Highwind.

And that's where we are spending this evening. Which is looking to be oh so much calmer than last night.