What did you do this summer?? - We followed our roots!

It was a cold morning in February of 2009, when Air Canada informed me that I would be demoted from their top tier of frequent flyers at the end of the month. In many respects it was a relief that I no longer kept a bag packed, and I was now eating more meals at home than in hotels and restaurants. My finger nails were intact, and the obsessive checking of my Blackberry had finally stopped. Seriously the phantom vibrations of imaginary messages haunted me for months after I stopped working. All good things aside however, the note from Air Canada put me into a sudden panic.

One of the hidden benefits of my work was that I accumulated huge amounts of frequent flyer miles. There were enough miles for Pat to meet me in exotic locales for the weekend and my kids always flew to and from school on dear old dad’s Aeroplan account. Now that I was getting kicked out of the frequent flyer club, the miles I still had in my account were about to become seriously devalued because non top tier Aeroplan customers have to compete for the very few reward seats, or be willing to pay 2-3 times the published number of miles to secure a seat closer to their liking. As a top tier flyer for a few more days, I could claim virtually any empty seat on an Air Canada flight so I became obsessed with the idea of spending as many miles as possible before the end of the month.

China seemed to be a logical place to go. It was far enough away to soak up a good chunk of miles, and I had a brother living in Shanghai so I had a place to land. When I considered that Pat had never been to China, despite having traveled extensively, the decision was clinched. And so as a result of a marketing e-mail from Air Canada extolling the virtues of becoming one of their second tier frequent flyers, a plan was hatched to spend the summer traveling throughout China. I would have a chance to show Pat a little of my heritage by visiting my father’s village, and the two of us would get to explore the wilds of Tibet. As an added bonus, I also decided do bring my mom along with us to act as a tour guide in the villages.

The pictures speak for themselves so I won’t waste many words describing the trip. Our itinerary was Florida to Toronto and then onwards to Shanghai. We spent a week in Shanghai resting up and playing tourist, and then we headed for Beijing, Tibet and Xian before returning to Shanghai. We stayed in Shanghai long enough to rest up from Tibet, do our laundry, complete some last minute shopping and then we headed south for Guangzhou and Kaiping. The final part of the trip was a weekend in Hong Kong, where we had a chance to play tourist for a few more days before our nearly non stop run back to Florida. I’m not sure what is more tiring, a 200 mile sail crossing of the Gulf of Maine in October, or 14 hour first class flight over the North Pole followed by another 3 hours in a commuter jet?

Anyway we are home after being out of the country for 6 weeks. We covered over 20,000 miles, using planes, trains and automobiles. We went from sea level to over 15,000 feet, and we visited places where the flies moved out because of the dirt, and we stayed in 6 star hotels. Since our return we have been holed up in Cape Coral Florida catching our breath and visiting with our friends Bob and Mary Ann whom we met in the Bahamas. They have been our saviors! Next week we will be off to help friends Richard and Connie, whom we met while going down the St. Lawrence River, deliver their Island Packet 485 home to Fort Lauderdale from the dealer in Palmetto. Pat and I are really looking forward to the trip. I just hope I don’t get boat envy and blow the RRSP for 4 or 5 more feet!!

The load of pictures in this posting is substantial. My advice is to take your time and not look at all of them in one sitting, or you might be a little overwhelmed. I apologize in advance if the albums look a little bit like a family outing, but in many respects that’s what this trip turned out to be. If you have any questions please ask.

Enjoy the pictures and have a great week!

I know I will!

Addison

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Double click on the pictures below to view the pics full frame.

Toronto to Shanghai


Shanghai Shopping and Cruising



Beijing


Solar Eclipse to Tibet


Xi'an - Land of the Terracotta Warriors and more


Guangzhou to Kaiping - Roots


Hong Kong - Home Stretch

South of the Whale - Good Friends and Fresh Fish!

The singing of the drag on my fish killer rod an reel was pure music to our ears. The combination of an ocean rated reel, a 12 in lure with massive four razor sharp hooks on it and 100 lb test made it no contest for whatever took a hit. We weren’t sure what was on the end of the line, but Pat and I had whatever it was, filleted and grilled before we even saw our catch. We developed a real appreciation for fresh fish during our crossing from Florida when I nicked my first Tuna, so naturally when the opportunity presented itself we went looking for more.

The Sea of Abaco is divided into two portions, with Whale Cay acting as the dividing line. The Whale as it is known locally is a source of wonder awe and fear for boaters in these parts because it forces any boat drawing more than 3 feet ot head out into the open Atlantic in order to transit from the Northern Half of the Sea of Abaco to the South. For this reason many boaters, even the locals tend to stay in their half of the “Sea” and not cross into the other side of town.

Because of the separation, the two halves are similar in geography but very different in character. When we left Green Turtle Cay, we crossed the Whale and wondered what the fuss was all about? Apparently during the winter months, NE winds can whip the shallows along the ocean side of the reefs into a boiling surf known as a rage. While I have seen some pretty impressive photos of rages, this time of year the only activity is caused by left over surge from storms at sea. The 4- 5 foot swells with the occasional 6 footer was no worse than the passage out of the bay of Quinte back home on a typical day.

Most of the development in the Abaco is concentrated in the Southern part. Marsh Harbour is the largest size town in the Abacos, and it provides cruisers with a convenient place to reprovision before heading back out. The town itself is rather non-descript, but it is large enough to support a well stocked supermarket and a hardware store that would rival any in the Florida Keys. The myth that the Bahamas are undeveloped and scarcity is common has its orgins in days gone by, but is no longer the caset.

It’s true that some items such as ice cream and beef are more expensive, (try $12 for a quart of ice cream) but not prohibitively so as they are also plentiful and seem to be consumed in large quantities by the locals. There are pleasant surprises like fresh snow peas at lower prices than in Florida. For anybody coming over here, it is always prudent to stock up, but the provisioning should not be viewed as a mission to Mars! The only thing I would suggest stocking up on in larger than normal quantities is Beer.

Boating supplies are readily available and for those who need parts shipped in, the Bahamian Govt. has reversed a ruling requiring duty to be charged on all boat parts. As of June 1, vessels traveling under a Bahamian cruising permit can have power train and safety items shipped in duty free, providing the shipper indicates the cruising permit number on the manifest. Of course as luck with have it, Threepenny Opera required a set of windlass parts and we received them two days before the new rulings came into play. When we tried to “negotiate” a rebate, the very pleasant Bahamian customs officer smiled and said, you win some you lose some. Thanks!

As one moves away from the center of the universe in Marsh Harbour, the level of development starts to decrease but it is very obvious that the wilderness of old is gone forever. The cruising sites have developed to suit the market which at this time of year is largely bare boat charters from the Moorings/Sunsail base out of Marsh Harbour. For a boater that comes down for a week, the anchorages are nicely spaced so that one can stay up late, sleep in, and still make it to a new destination for some water based activities, before heading ashore for the sundowner. On the subject of the sundowner, beware of the concoctions known as the Frozen Nipper or the Frozen Grabbers served from their respective establishments on Guana Cay. One of these drinks will leave you numb and two can bring on incipient Amnesia….now what was I talking about???

A visit to the Bahamas is not complete without spending some time snorkeling or diving on the multitudes of reefs. We were extremely fortunate on this trip to befriend Bob and MaryAnn from the sail boat Queen Angel. They are both fish people and are as comfortable in the water as out. Bob is a natural diver and he can hold his breath for an incredibly long period of time. He scared the heck out of me, because I was spotting him from the dinghy as he hunted a reef off of Lynard Cay, and disappeared for what seemed to be several minutes. I had visions of him bonking his head on a rock and laying unconscious underwater. I was about to muster enough nerve to go in after him, when he triumphantly surfaced with a very strange shovel nosed crustacean on the end of his Hawaiian spear. Dinner that night was freshly grilled shovel nosed crustacean. We hesitate to call it a lobster, because those crustaceans are not in season at the moment.

Time has passed incredibly quickly and our time in the Abacos is almost up. Despite a little grousing about the number of boats around and the level of development, the anchorages are still pretty nice and the gentle rocking on the hook with a cool evening breeze is still spectacular. As is often the case when we are getting ready to leave a place we like, the weather is improving and we have forgotten the two weeks of incessant rain. As we turned around and headed north from Little Harbour, we decided it was a great opportunity to score some fresh fish, so we headed outside of the reef and try our hand again at fishing. Certainly there were tons of fish in the marine parks so how difficult can it be to hook something in the open ocean?? It took most of the day to get a hit, but what a hit it was.

Pat and I worked like a well oiled machine and while I reeled, she brought the boat into a gentle turn to make it easier to bring the fish in. When I got the beast alongside, Pat fired a stream of cheap vodka into his gills and he was still alive, but at least he stopped trying to tail walk away from the boat. The fight took about 20 minutes, and within 30 minutes a 38” Cero Mackerel was posing of pictures, just before being filleted. We were to meet up with our friends Bob and MaryAnn who had elected to stay on the inside for the trip back north, so finally we were able to make a contribution for dinner.

Today we head north of the Whale. We expect to be back into Florida within the next 4-5 days and we will head up towards Punta Gorda to tie up the boat while we get ready for our trip to China. Who said retirement was slow and boring?? Stay tuned. Although we are back in travel mode, we still expect to see some interesting sites between here and the West Coast of Florida so we try and post again before we head for Toronto and the Orient.

Have a great week. I know I will.
Addison
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Marathon - The Abacos. A whole year of cruising experience in one week.

We are on the hook at the entrance to New Plymouth Harbour on the south end of Green Turtle Cay – (pronounced Key) I think I just saw a large rounded ferry boat go by loaded with pairs of animals and being steered by a white haired bearded old guy carring a shepherds crook …. Just kidding, it wasn’t Noah but given the intensity of the rain in these parts, it’s no wonder that the residents of Green Turtle Cay here in the Abacos gather rainwater in cisterns beside or under their homes as their drinking water supply. In the past 12 hours we have received almost 4 inches of rain. Oh well, the locals love the rain, because up until this week, the area has been very dry and the cisterns were running empty, forcing the residents to line up at the marinas with jerry cans to lug R/O water at $.30 per gallon.

To get into the spirit of the locals I had rigged up a funnel over the fill spout of one of our water tanks to supplement the output of our trusty water maker. When I got up this morning, the funnel had fallen over so all of the precious rainwater that could have been filling our tanks was sluicing down the deck instead of being directed into the tank as intended. Now it’s only about 3 feet from the cockpit to my starboard deck fill, and it was already pouring buckets, so I figured that I could go out there, make a quick adjustment and be back below deck in a flash. It seems that flashing was the order of the morning because just as I crawled out from under the side panel of the enclosure, a dinghy with two very wet but wide eyed tourists from a nearby charter boat came barreling out of the rain. I not sure who was more shocked, me who hadn’t expected any intelligent life form to be out in a torrential rain, or the two fools in the dinghy being mooned by a gangly chinaman.

Every person with a boat should make the pilgrimage to the Bahamas at least once in their life time. It is sort of a final exam and senior grad trip for developing all of the pilotage skills one needs to be truly comfortable on the water. In the past week, Pat and I have experienced some of the most incredible natural beauty on the planet, and we are just getting started.

What has become obvious to us is that there are many self appointed experts about sailing these waters, but in reality there are very few who have spent enough time here to provide more than just an opinion. As a devotee to the Ports Guide to Lake Ontario, I had expected other guide books to at least be equally precise if not as eloquent and entertaining as the “Ports Book” We have several Bahamas cruising guides on board and while they are in general agreement about issues like avoiding hurricanes and not running aground, none provide more than a potentially dangerous illusion of precision on how to successfully cruise the Bahamas. I guess it is sort of like raising kids, there are lots of books, even more free advice, but only you and your significant other can pick a path that works.

Navigation in the Bahamas is by sight. Your eyes are the only things that can really keep you out of trouble, or get you out of trouble if you stray into tricky waters. It takes a leap of faith to trust your instincts but after a few hours of picking through shallow water the difference between sand, grass and rock becomes pretty easy to discern. It took me a little longer to tell how deep the water is, but if in doubt I head for the softest option available! Please take that with a huge grain of salt, but it has worked for me. I have only been aground a couple of times so far, and I don’t think anything is broken!

If one develops the confidence to read the waters, the reward is something that many people will only ever fantasize about. There is something completely satisfying about picking your way through a rocky shoal and finding a secluded, protected lagoon of 100 foot horizontal visibility water, surrounded by miles of white untouched sand. Such was the scene that greeted Pat and me as we dropped the hook on Sandy Cay which is located in the middle of an area known as Double Breasted Cays in the Northern extremes of the Abacos. The guide books describe the anchorage almost as a footnote but perhaps their authors are trying to keep the best for themselves.

Our feat of the week was doing the anchor dance in +25 knot winds with a broken windlass. We had arrived at Green Turtle Cay during a pretty decent squall, so by the time we had negotiated the very narrow and shallow channel to get into the harbour, we were pretty anxious to get to hook down and take a warming shower. As it happened there was no room at the inn, because lots of other people apparently had heard the same weather forecast and had filled every open spot.

We tried valiantly to find a place where we could both set the anchor and also have enough scope to handle the even worse weather that was to come. I drove through two of the sets and Pat drove to 2 further attempts….The driver had the easiest job, because squinting and steering was much less difficult than sitting on the foredeck hauling up our 55lb Rocna and 40-60 feet of chain by hand. I wouldn’t describe hauling anchor by hand, in very tight quarters, while being lashed by high winds and rain as fun, but it is certainly unforgettable.

By the fourth attempt we had had enough so instead of expending what was left of our energy to try a fifth time, we headed back out into the open water outside of the harbour. Since we really couldn’t see where we were going, we headed for a space that didn’t have any boats in it and threw the hook in with 120 feet of rode out. It must have worked because we’ve been here for 3 days now and we’ve not moved in the constant stream of 30-40 knot squalls. Hopefully the skin will grow back on my knuckles before too long!

The operative word to truly enjoy the Bahamas is patience. I would hate to be the guy that spends thousands of hard earned $$ to come down for a week of bare boating, only to find that the weather isn’t good, or that a chosen anchorage turns out to be too crowded because every other bare boater read the same book. Doing things in a hurry, or expecting to do things in a hurry will only lead to misery down here, so we are learning to turn down the volume from even the relaxed pace of the Keys. Right now I am trying to eke out a WiFi signal so I can post this installment of the blog, but it seems, at best, to be like trying to milk a bull. You get all the right noises but when the moment of truth comes, you aren’t getting what you thought you would get. I could get in the dinghy and go into town for a free hook-up but that would mean more physical exertion than I really want to make….Well maybe if I can time it with Happy Hour over at Pineapples beach bar?? My multi-tasking habits die hard!

At the end of the day however it’s all about the sailing and discovering. Gentle day long beam reaches on emerald green water, mixed in with howling 40 knot squalls, flat seas and ocean swells all lead to a destination that suits the sailor. In the Southern Abacos, you can marina hop, or you can go from one isolated anchorage to another with about the same degree of effort. Whether you are looking for the latest in local rock bands or a deserted island with naked women on the beach…(and no I am not kidding, just check out the pictures), The Bahamas seems to have an abundance of all sorts of experiences to suit every taste.

It’s Better in the Bahamas is only a corny TV tag line until you actually get down here and see it for yourself. Now if it would only stop raining, I would go sailing! Have a great week, I know I will!

Addison

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Growing Roots!!

It was about 12:30AM on Saturday morning and I was sitting at the nav station huddled over my laptop putting the finishing touches on my pictures for the latest installment of the blog. The atmosphere was reminiscent of the all nighters that I did many many moons ago, trying to complete term papers before the already extended deadline was to expire. The circumstances surrounding the all nighters were then, as they are now, just a matter of getting the priorities straight.

Back in the day, there was always something getting in the way of sitting down and completing assignments. Listening to a friend commiserate over opposite sex woes, or gathering at the pub under the guise of a study group or maybe straying into amateur theater, all those activities seemed to be higher on the priority list than sitting down and grinding out 1500 words for Dr. Ross. These days it seems that issues like helping a friend move his boat, or going to a cool tiki bar to hear the latest in music, or serving as the harbour computer geek seems to get in the way of sitting down and telling the folks back home about what I am doing. Instead I am just doing it!

I get asked by some, who haven’t yet embraced the cruising lifestyle, about what I’m going to do when the vacation is over. The first couple of times I was asked, I would mumble some non sequiturs about letting nature run its course. The reality is that cruising is not a vacation, it is a lifestyle choice. And by making the choice we embrace the blessings of new and interesting people. New and interesting places and new and interesting sights to see. We also accept that normal everyday tasks that would take 10 minutes to accomplish in a land life, can take all day in the cruising life.

Laundry for example, often becomes an all day affair. I have to admit that the closest thing I got to doing laundry in my past life was to not miss the hamper with my underwear but these days a team effort is required to get the job done. Food shopping is yet another chore that in the cruising life has actually become a past time. When your family car is a dinghy and a pair of folding bicycles, it is really important to make a list, check it twice and make sure that what you buy us really needed.

The pay off for the seeming inconveniences is that we have had the opportunity to meet, and really get to know people from all over the world. Whether it be the result of a conversation struck up in the laundry line, or a chance meeting waiting for the propane truck to show up, friendships start much more easily than they do in the more guarded land lifestyle.

The past few months have flown by. It seems just yesterday for example that folks for PCYC (Trevor and Eva, Jane and Paul) and my friend Randy from New Brunswick came down for a visit. Yet it has been over a month since the last one went home! By the pictures in this installment of the blog, you will see that there a many more pics of the social side of cruising. From cockpit gatherings to full fledged dinner parties, the ability to create a party never ceases to amaze me. In the Daytimer, Outlook Meeting Maker world I used to live in, it was a major endeavour to get 2 people in a room, never mind 10 or 12. These days a chance meeting or a quick call on the VHF can get crowd gathered in no time at all.

We have not been to as many places as we originally planned, but we are certainly getting to know more about the places we have been. Time is governed by the events as opposed to events being governed by the amount of time available. When I sat down to write this installment of the blog, I was at a but of a loss as to what to say because we haven’t moved off of our mooring ball since Feb 1.As I reviewed the pictures however, I realized just how full the past few months have been. Tomorrow we are off to the Bahamas and the voyaging part of cruising will begin again.

Look for another installment before the next quarter is out. In the meantime enjoy the pictures and have a great week, I know I will.

Addison

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Marathon East to Marathon West

Greetings to all from Marathon! I have to apologize to our followers for not updating the blog for such a long period of time, but in our defense we have only just realized that we have been here for 2 months. We thank all who wrote, and for the stream of concerned e-mails wondering if we were still on the surface. Rest assured we are still here, and are living in a world where the saying “My how time flies when you are having fun!” is a mantra for life.

Once a cruiser reaches a particular destination, there is a tendency to stay put for a while. Everybody begins with the intention of cleaning up the boat, re-provisioning and setting off again, but there is something hypnotic about Marathon that causes people to stay much longer. It is perhaps one of the paradoxes of cruising that I have heard repeated over and over from many hardcore long term cruisers, a group in which Pat and I are still novices. So despite the fact that cruisers are adherents of a nomadic lifestyle, there is a tendency to plant roots very quickly. Certainly that was the case for Pat and me, because after arriving in Marathon Harbor on December 21 we have moved maybe a total of 12 miles. And most of those 10 miles were used to exit the harbor and take care of little household chores like flushing the holding tanks 3 miles off shore!

The mark of how long a boat has been here is by looking at the amount of sea scum that has built up on the water line of a moored or anchored boat. The fresh arrivals show up with waxed hulls, clean dinghies and clear boot stripes. The long term residents however keep their dinghies looking appropriately scruffy, so they are less theft prone and their water lines resemble a reef. Most make an effort to keep their vessels looking tidy, but there are always a few that are like the suburban neighbor who never mows his lawn, and let their vessels decay to a floating Dog Patch. The intermediate residents like Pat and me only have a thin layer of slime on the water line and the slightest hint of barnacles at the edge of the bottom paint. The bottom of our unprotected dinghy however is an entirely different story, and will require a trip to the beach with paint scrapers to get clean again.

In some respects our cruising life really only began on Feb 1 of this year. On that date, we moved onto a mooring ball in the Marathon mooring field from our fully serviced slip located behind a million dollar home on the very toni Sombrero Boulevard. We have now been on the ball for nearly 3 weeks, and during that time, we have been making our own water and electricity on our own self contained off grid island. Since our plans are to go farther a field, getting some practice in how to balance the systems to make the best use of our resources is very helpful. Between our solar panels, and a small gas generator, we are able to make water, have hot showers, watch TV, surf the internet, toast bread etc. in other words all the comforts of home provided we don’t overdo it.

The mooring field here is one of the largest in the US and holds hundreds of boats. In addition to the “official” moorings, there is also space for those who prefer to sit on their own ground tackle for free. Speaking of free, it is entirely possible to live down here for next to nothing. While every cruiser has their own sense of what “next to nothing” really means, I am convinced that there are people in the harbor who survive on only a few hundred dollars per month. For $140 per month, one can anchor in the harbor, have a place to dock their dinghy, a place to park your bicycle, free showers, and a weekly pump out of the holding tank. Food in the Keys tends to be a little pricier than it is elsewhere, Pat paid $1.20 for a single potato the other day, but with some judicious shopping a couple of hundred dollars spent on basics, supplemented by a few hours a week with a fishing rod can provide a pretty decent diet.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are many million dollar homes, with million dollar boats parked in front of them. For the uber rich crowd, Marathon offers amenities like a private 103 member golf course, an airport with plenty of parking space for your Gulfstream or Challenger, and perhaps most importantly for some, the ability to disappear into the crowd, like the Chinese emperor who dressed as a peasant to get closer to his subjects. Unless you are extremely observant it is not possible to tell the princes and paupers apart. Last night for example, a former member of the Clinton cabinet, was plucking his banjo as back-up to one of the local bar singers.

At the end of this month, we will leave Marathon for either the Everglades or we will continue down the Keys towards Key West. We are fortunate enough to have the choice and the time in which to exercise it. Several of our friends have contacted us to let us know they are heading this way, so we are looking forward to meeting as many of them as possible. I can’t promise that I will post every week like we did coming down here, but I will make an effort to be a little more diligent in providing news and pics than I have in the last month…or is it two???

Have a great week, and stay warm!

Addison

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Vero Beach to Marathon - Could this be Margaritaville???

There were 4 guys standing at the bar who were well into a couple of jugs of draft beer. They were engaged in a very animated conversation about the day of fishing they had just returned from. There were loud descriptions about the number of tuna that had surrounded their boat out on the reef, but for some reason refused to take the live baits that were offered. They stopped their rising crescendo of colorful expletives just long enough to greet a large man, wearing a sleeveless t-shirt and covered in tattoos, who had walked in carrying a small terrier like a baby in his arms. The terrier was appropriately dressed for the season in a Santa suit complete with fur trim and a tasseled hat. Accompanying Mr. Tattoo was his woman friend who was carrying a drink that she brought in with her from outside and smoking a cigarette.

On the stage a solo singer piano player with a pony tail was belting out a country rendition of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer as a man in a full Jack Sparrow pirate outfit, complete with tri-cornered hat, 2 stepped with his Pirate Jenny girlfriend. I’m pretty sure he was also wearing eye liner, but maybe it was the lighting, or maybe he just had very striking features? A couple of clean cut prep school types wearing designer board shorts and flip flops and sporting Oakley sunglasses on top of their heads were huddled together completely oblivious to their surroundings.

Pat and I had just returned from a day trip by car to Miami to pick up some solar panels and we were sitting in the aptly named Dockside bar on Tuesday evening waiting for our food to arrive. Both of us were pretty tired because we had arrived in Marathon late on Sunday evening after a 5 day nearly non-stop journey from Melbourne and then almost immediately turned around and driven back to Miami. Perhaps it was fatigue, and perhaps it was the tortoise shell cat sitting on the bar but there was something decidedly surreal about our surroundings. Could this be the fabled Margaritaville?

As his friends fussed over the dog in the Santa suit, one of the fishermen made eye contact, and he walked/staggered over to introduce himself as Tony. He shook our hand warmly and welcomed us to Marathon. He was just passing through, but he had already been there for 6 months, and he had no specific plans for leaving. It seems that he had left behind a stressful life in Chicago and was on his way to Panama aboard his 50 foot catamaran. As he started to describe his journey, our server arrived with our meals, and he politely excused himself and invited us to visit him aboard his boat when we got settled. His beer hazed speech and the Ralph Lauren shirt stained with fish guts were a stark contrast to the elegant way in which he excused himself from disturbing our meal, leaving us wondering just what he did before he became a sailor on a 50 foot cat in the Keys.

Perhaps Tony’s story is an anomaly, but judging by the number of graying pony tails sported by both men and women who are as old or older than Pat and me, I have to believe that the Keys is one of those places that can draw you in and lull you into a satisfied stupor. Perhaps it is the retirement community for aging hippies or perhaps it is the true fountain of youth, but there is something about the air in these parts that just seems to re-adjust one’s notions about time.

The pace of Marathon is a welcome change and a relief from the pace of the past week. Last week, when Pat and I left the anchorage in Vero Beach we knew we were in for a week of dawn to dusk traveling if we were to make the Keys in time for Christmas. As we were caught up in the moment, once again I neglected my rule about being in a specific place on a specific date. Now when you are underway and operating under a self imposed deadline there are two things that a sailor does not want to hear. The first thing is a very loud bang coming from the engine and nether regions of the boat, and the second is the total silence that ensues.

We were approaching St. Lucie Inlet following a channel no more than 150 feet wide that was surrounded by very shallow water. According to the charts the area we were in was very prone to shoaling due to the currents from the inlet and the main channel depths were well below the ICW controlling depth of 12 feet. Furthermore the water outside of the dredged channel was left to go native and was reported to be less than 5 feet deep. Understanding that we were in precarious waters I paid extra close attention to the channel by carefully back sighting each mark to ensure that I was not drifting out of safe water. Suddenly there was a loud bang and a shudder from below and then total silence.

I was like a deer in the headlights because the information from my instruments could not explain what had just happened. The chart plotter showed we were in the middle of the channel, the depth sounder showed close to 10 feet of water, and the speed log showed we were still moving forward at a decent clip. Pat nailed the problem right away when she yelled over that we had hit something floating in the water and that our prop was fouled. As I cursed all crab fishermen, I managed to restart the engine, but as soon as I put it into gear, it would stall so I shifted the focus of my cursing to the company that manufactured my prop line cutters. I managed, after several attempts of putting the engine into forward and reverse, to create a substantial cloud of debris that looked like a mix of tree branches and bits of canvas. The engine would run while in gear, but the vibrations that ran through the hull felt as if the engine was going to come out of its mounts.

I had visions of bent prop shafts, fried engines and broken transmissions, so I shut everything down. There was not enough wind to sail and the engine was of no help, so we allowed the boat to drift and as we moved into the shallow water off the channel Pat went forward to set the anchor. A call to Tow Boat US on the VHF and help was on the way. Within 20 minutes we had a Towboat alongside and were on our way to the Marriot Resort at Hutchinson Island where a diver would meet us and check out our problem. It turned out that I had hit a submerged construction tarpaulin like the type that is used to cover the load in a dump truck. It seemed endlessly long as I took the edge from the diver and pulled it from the water.

In the end the engine was fine and we were none the worse for wear. It cost us about 2 hours out of our schedule and $50 to cover the cost of the diver. It could have been much worse, but in retrospect what was impressive to Pat and me was that the experience we had gained over the last few months came into play, and apart from my initial surprise, we handled everything calmly and correctly like we had been doing this all of our lives. Kudos to Tow Boat US for being so responsive and many thanks go out to the staff of the Marriott for providing safe haven for sailors in distress, but in the end it was Pat and me that kept a bad situation from getting much worse.

It was a shame that we had imposed a deadline on our traveling because the next 4 days took us from anchorages in Jupiter Inlet to Fort Lauderdale and to the strangely named but beautiful Long Aresenicker before arriving in Marathon. Each of the stops could have easily been expanded into much, longer stays, but there is always next time.

We have arrived in Marathon, where we were met by Bruce and Esther of Con el Viento fame who produced last years cruising blog. Bruce has appointed himself as the unofficial dockmaster for Canadian boats, and he has gone above and beyond the call of duty to ensure that Pat and I feel comfortable and welcomed. The holidays were welcome quiet time, but a little lonely because the usual hustle and bustle of family dinners were missing this year. Still Pat managed to put together a great Turkey dinner for the two of us

This week will be dedicated to scrubbing several months of grime off of Threepenny Opera and catching up on boat chores that have been neglected for awhile. One of the best chores will be to pack away all of the cold weather clothing that we had been living in up until about three weeks ago. These days dressing up means putting on a shirt with a collar and somewhat cleaner shorts.

Marathon is extremely cruiser friendly and both Pat and I are looking forward to integrating ourselves into the community. We are prepping for the next stage of our travels, but the current plans call for a stay in Marathon until the end of January…. Who knows, maybe we will be like Tony the fisherman and we’ll find ourselves propping up the bar and introducing ourselves to next seasons fresh faced arrivals.

Have a great week. I know we will here in Margaritaville!

Addison

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St Augustine to Vero Beach via Montreal

I am warm again! After our overnight crossing from Beaufort SC, Pat and I were greeted by glorious sunshine and more importantly the real heat that comes with it. It was such a huge treat to be able to wander around the historic town of St. Augustine in shorts and a t-shirt. In fact it was the first time since we left Canada that Pat and I have been able to do so. I guess Florida is living up to its tag line of being the sunshine state. Many of the locals are still complaining about the cold, but for Pat and me anything above 55 degrees is warm and once we cross the line into the 60’s we are positively into tropical territory.

Maybe it was the heat and maybe it was because we have been town hopping on the boat but St. Augustine was one of those towns that we hated to leave. Our overnight stop turned into two, and then we added a third day just for good measure. The time that we gained by going offshore from Beaufort, was reinvested into a more quality experience in St. Augustine. It is very charming and obviously set up for a booming tourist trade, but unlike other communities that derive a good part of their livelihood from tourists, the town was not the least bit tacky. It may sound a little odd, but we were actually motivated to visit tourist attractions because they were not very touristy. And so it came to pass that we found ourselves in the Alligator Farm, the farmers market and the St. George Street pedestrian mall.

One of the other benefits of warmer weather is that we have been able to stay on the hook for several days at a time. In the real cold weather, the Espar heater draws down the batteries more than my little 80 amp alternator can replenish without running the engine an inordinately long time. When we were preparing Threepenny Opera for our cruise, I made the conscious decision to wait until we got to Florida to install solar panels but in hindsight I should have done it sooner. If I were preparing another boat for this voyage, I would definitely have my solar installed prior to departure because the lack of supplemental charging has forced us to spend more nights in marinas than I had originally planned. The savings that I would have gained by buying my solar in Florida has been more that used up on extra nights in marinas. Again hindsight is proved to be 20/20.

Threepenny Opera is actually a very good cruising boat and we proved it by leaving St. Augustine, and then staying off the grid until we reached Melbourne on our third day out. We had good anchorages in Daytona Beach and another great anchorage at my namesake Addison Point. The beauty of the last anchorage was that we were within 5 miles of the Vehicular Assembly Building, where the space shuttle is prepared for flight. It was also line of sight to the two gargantuan launch pads, so if we can figure out a way to do it, maybe we might come back up this way for the February shuttle launch. I can’t think of anything cooler than to sit on my own deck sipping on a good cabernet and watching history unfold.

It was somewhat ironic that once we reached Melbourne in, we left the boat to fly back to Canada for the annual cookie baking session with the family. While it might sound a little strange to fly several thousand miles to bake cookies nothing could be farther from the truth. One of the things that Pat and I have come to realize is that changing our lifestyle is not the same thing as changing our life. We are merely living it in a different venue and perhaps at a different pace. The importance of getting together and spending quality time together cannot be underestimated when we are out cruising and since we had not seen any family for several months, Pat and I approached the trip home with the same excitement as we did for the 4 day power weekend get aways that we used to take when we were both wage slaves. The good thing about flying home for a family get together while we are out cruising is that we did not have to fly back and go to the office on Monday morning!

As excited as we were about going home for a few days, it was still a huge shock to the system when we walked out of the airport terminal in Montreal into -13 degree temperatures. I was walking around in shorts and sandals only 5 hours earlier and now I found myself being congratulated by the local Hertz representative for being fortunate enough to get the last car that was not too frozen to rent. What the Hertz guy did not tell us was that the deadline for mandatory snow tire installation was the date I was returning the car, and since the car they had for me was to be retired from service on that date, snow tires were not installed. It did not take us long to discover that all season radials do not work very well after a week of snow, freezing rain and more snow. For once I was thankful for heavy Montreal traffic because at least I wasn’t going very fast.

Originally the ginger snap cookies and Swedish Spritz Shortbread were baked by Pat’s mom. She had passed the recipe on to Pat’s sister Ann but during the transition the hand written recipe that Pat’s mom used was torn and a couple of key ingredients were missing. It has taken us several years of reverse engineering and experimentation, plus dozens of bottles of wine and other spirits to try and discover both the missing ingredients and their correct proportions. Over the years we have produced concoctions that could rival titanium for hardness and concrete for density, but this year we finally got it right. If it weren’t for the persistence of Ann and nieces Stephanie and Karine to figure out the right formula, Pat and I would stll be buying our Swedish cookies at Ikea. Maybe it was part of Nanna Oscarson’s master plan to tear the recipe and force us to get together to figure out the mystery. In the end the cold and slippery roads only seemed to make the weekend that much better.

Pat and I are back in Florida, and it feels great. I actually put on a bathing suit for the first time and got down to the business of washing off 5 months of cruising grime from the deck of Threepenny Opera. It was not a pretty sight, and no I am not referring to me in the bathing suit. She has had a first washing to remove the big stuff, so when we get to Marathon, we will be able to get down to the business of making her shine again. Today we are rafted three abreast on a mooring ball in Vero Beach. As luck would have it our ball mates are Ken and Heidi from Rising Tide and Ron and Dawn from Dawn Treader. By this time next week we should be approaching our first stage destination of Marathon Florida. I can hear the Jimmy Buffet tunes already!!

Have a great week, I know we will.

Addison

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Charleston SC to St-Augustine FL. – Overnights…Second Time is the charm!

Traveling the ICW for Pat and me has been a front row seat to help us understand the values that makes the United States what it is today. From the secessionist manifesto of the Rhett family in the late 19th century to the ever present reminder of America’s military might (not a day goes by without seeing the Navy, Air Force, Army or Marine Corp in action); from the tacky kitsch of Myrtle Beach to the refined modern chic of Charleston; and from the crews of the multi-million dollar mega yachts to the humblest of floating homes, we have had the privilege experiencing first hand modern American history by passing up close and personal most of the original colonies.

The ICW is an amazing piece of engineering and a testament to the notion that a good idea will rise above all. To even exist, it has over the years surmounted and continues to surmount the challenges of economics, politics, geography and weather. It is the Highway 66 of the cruising community and the slice of American Civilization that is served up as one travels the system of natural rivers and man made canals, cannot be rivaled. Perhaps preserving it as a national heritage site would be a way to obtain the funding needed to adequately maintain the system?

As an added bonus, Pat and I were invited to join several other crews from the cruising community to celebrate the American Thanksgiving holiday. While we all agreed that going out for dinner was not exactly the same, the logistics of large crowds on small boats dictated that some concessions needed to be made. We are truly thankful that we have made the acquaintance of Chris and Divya from s/v Maggie M, Ron and Dawn from s/v Dawn Treader, Jim and Ann from s/v Ubiquitous, and especially to Mike and Georgie from s/v Alcyone, who made the effort to seek us out to extend the invitation.

Pat and I enjoyed the experience so much that we had an impromptu repeat of the experience aboard Threepenny Opera the following night with Bob and Debbie from the s/v Valissa with whom we had crossed the Gulf of Maine over the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend in October. If it were not for the confidence we gained from following their lead, Pat and I may not have ventured out onto the Bay of Fundy alone, and we would still be much further to the North and much colder as a result.

We had not seen Bob and Debbie since the crossing but we have often wondered where they were; so it was through pure serendipity that Debbie heard me speaking to another boat and realized we were nearby. I was equally surprised and delighted to be hailed by the long lost Valissa, but that is the way things work on the ICW. It took a stretch run in approaching darkness and rain to make the anchorage, but Pat managed to get the hook down at dusk, and cook a turkey with the trimmings by 6:30. She is a miracle worker on a boat.

Despite the richness of the cultural experience however, the ICW has a tedious side that is found in the numerous uncharted shoals, the bridges that force one to adapt to their rhythm and the tidal currents and flows that can make planning a relatively simple trip into a complex stochastic modeling exercise. Pat and I entered the ICW early in November and after almost 4 weeks of relatively short day hops we were ready to get on with the business of going south. Perhaps we were motivated by the uncharacteristically cold temperatures, or perhaps it was due to the confidence that one builds from spending the last 4 months on our boat, Pat and I decided to leave the ICW in Beaufort SC and head out into the open Atlantic for an overnight passage to Jacksonville FL.

The decision to go “offshore” was accompanied by some trepidation of course, but in discussions with other more experienced sailors the feelings are normal and very common. While only a fool will do anything unsafe, anybody, no matter how experienced who voyages away from the protection of safe harbours, can only do so with the permission of Mother Nature. We have been sent to the principal’s office more than once for not heeding her lessons, so naturally we were a little apprehensive that this time we had learned our lessons well.

No doubt there will be more advanced lessons, but for newbie cruisers like Pat and me the 135nm mile passage from Beaufort SC to the mouth of the St. Johns River, which leads to Jacksonville FL, is a great mid-term test of skills. If one passes, then longer and more complex passages are within reach, but if one needs remedial tutoring, there are many less challenging day sails on the open Atlantic that one can make to gain additional experience. Unlike our first blue water night passage, this time Pat and I were traveling solo. We were in communication while enroute with other boats via VHF and SSB but the trip planning and execution were based solely on our efforts so it was comforting to know that others were also out there with us, even though they were unseen.

In the end we went to the Palm Cove Marina in Jacksonville Beach FL because the Jacksonville Marina was under repairs. The total distance was ~140 Nm and we covered the distance in just under 23 hours. For the first 15 hours of the voyage we enjoyed perfect beam reach sailing on relatively flat seas. Our biggest challenge was to slow Threepenny Opera down so that we would not arrive before sunrise. For the last 8 hours of the trip the wind died so our challenge was to try and speed Threeepenny Opera up so that we would arrive before sunset. We finally gave up at 4:30AM and fired up the iron sails to motor the last 30 odd miles. Most importantly I managed to keep my dinner down, so I am hoping that I have started a trend for future night passages….mommy I’m a big boy now!

Today we are in St. Augustine after a very short 28 SM hop from our marina last night. We are looking forward to visiting the city, but even more importantly we are looking forward to going to Montreal in a week’s time for the annual cooking baking party that Pat’s family puts on. In the meantime we will enjoy a little more of the Florida ICW which looks a little different than the parts of the ICW further north. I think we have earned our intermediate cruising badges because Pat is busy with the charts and guides planning an overnight passage so we can get as far south as possible before we take our break.

Have a great week. I know we will!

Addison

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Morehead City to Charleston SC – The scenery is the same but we are changing!

When we prepared to go cruising the whole concept of basic necessities was very different than the concept of basic necessities now that we are underway. For Pat and me, we have been talking about our cruise for several years and interestingly most of the planning surrounded preparing the boat for the cruise. We have added all sorts of systems ranging from diesel furnaces to water makers and of course the obligatory suite of marine electronics that will allow us to send telegrams to Mars. What we have discovered however is that having a well prepared boat, is not the same thing as being prepared to go cruising.

There are things that I do today without thinking, that I would not have even dreamed about doing when I was a land dweller. A case in point, we will go very long distances for something as simple as a loaf of bread. Indeed the actual act of grocery shopping becomes an integral part of our impression of a community. For example, I would have to check my own blog to remember details about some of the earlier ports of call in our voyage, but I can recall in pretty fine detail where we bought food and the quality of the experience. For example Tadoussac is the town where we bought frozen ground veal and home made maple fudge in a little 2 cash register village supermarket, and Baltimore, despite the world class aquariums and museums is best remembered as the docks that were within walking distance of the Whole Foods Supermarket.

Although the willingness to walk great distances is a change, perhaps the biggest change for me is my desire to meet new people. Pat and I lived in the same community in Mississauga for 17 years. During that period of time, I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that I actually entered one of my neighbours homes, yet out here on our cruise visiting other floating homes and having others come to ours has been some of the highlights of the trip.

Personally I have always characterized myself as a hardcore introvert, so my idea of a good time, is a quiet evening with a good book, or an afternoon of crawling around in the bilge installing or fixing a boat bit. While I always had the ability to “work a room” as part of my career requirements, it was always just work, something you did because you had to. It has come as a complete surprise to me how quickly friendships develop and how important these new friends are to the quality of our cruising experience.

Pat and I are natural optimists so perhaps we are just seeking out more of our kind, but we both agree that however spectacular the sights we have seen, the people are what we appreciate most. It is interesting that we can maintain a cheery outlook when you consider that we tend to be surrounded by a lot of bad news these days. One would think that with negative headlines combined with lousy weather, narrow channels filled with sand bars, and the US Marines closing the ICW for maneuvers, that any sane person would be looking for a plane ticket out at the next opportunity. Of course while none of us are immune to the events of the world, there is a “je ne sais quoi” about the attitude of cruisers that seems to find the silver lining behind even the darkest cloud. The analytical side of me is trying to understand why this is happening, but the emotional side of me doesn’t really care. I’m just happy that it is happening.

We are safe and sound in Charleston SC. I have only gone aground twice this week, and in doing so I did the cruising community a service by showing other boats where not to go…note to self, fancy electronics will not replace a good set of eyes and a little common sense. Other note to self, sailing straight and moving in a straight line are not the same thing; current can cause you to drift sideways even though your heading never changes…I’m learning!

Even though we have been making steady progress towards warmer climes, the goal of sitting in a bathing suit and having a beer is still very elusive. While “chilly” is a relative term, the majority of people we have encountered this week will agree that temperatures low enough to freeze water will almost certainly qualify. There have been a few evenings when the temperatures dipped into the 20s as well as a couple of days when there were headline making snow flurries. Oh well at least there will be another generation of Carolineans that can say they have seen snow, and an older generation that can say they have seen snow before Thanksgiving….maybe that’s not exactly a silver lining, but its gotta be close!

Pat and I are debating our next move. We can either head offshore from Charleston and be in Florida by the weekend, or we can continue into the hinterlands of South Carolina and Georgia. Since Beaufort and Savannah are both cruising highlights we are in a no lose situation. Anyway you will find out our decision next week. In the meantime, we are going to stay warm, and go looking for a turkey that will fit in our oven.

So to Sylvie, Denis, Heidi, Ken, Gerie, Bill, Georgie & Mike and to all the others we spoke to on VHF and have yet to meet, thanks for making our cruise special this week. Everybody have a Happy Thanksgiving and a great week I know I will. Please keep the comments and suggestions coming!

Addison

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Elizabeth City NC to Morehead City NC – The Epiphany of quality time!

A seemingly common character- istic of the migrant sailors we have met along the way is that everybody is striving to get somewhere. The normal conversation starters when encountering a new person, is where are you from and where are you going. Names and boats enter in the conversation at some point, but usually only after the first two points have been sufficiently clarified.

While Pat and I also have specific destinations in mind, I realized this week that we are truly blessed because we don’t have to worry too much about timing. Many of our fellow travelers have a finite amount of time to cruise before they have to return to other obligations, of family or work or both. Understandably they need to “get there” so that they can enjoy their destination for as long as possible, before they revert back to being land people. Pat and I on the other hand can take as long as we like because we are already home!

On Thursday last week we were entering the upper reaches of the Pungo River from the Alligator to Pungo Rivers Canal. The canal is a narrow 20 mile long aquatic bowling alley of a waterway where a gutter ball could mean a call to the tow boat. Straight down the middle is the only marginally safe water for its entire length as even 20 feet from the centerline there are many places with only a covering of water. Even in the middle there are numerous sunken tree stumps so you often feel ghostly tendrils of something touching the bottom of the boat as you pass over. For those of us used to deeper water it is a very eerie sensation!

The forecast was for 10-15 knot SW winds with gusts to 20 and a few showers. Wave heights were forecast to be 1-2 increasing to 2-3 later in the day; all in all it seemed pretty benign. What we came to appreciate however was that in the very shallow waters of the ICW, a 15 knot wind from an unfavorable direction can have a very significant effect on water levels and wave heights. In a matter of 15 minutes the water went from relatively flat to short period teeth rattling 2 footers. Of course as we struggled with the wheel to keep the bow within 30 degrees of our heading the rain started and the buoys disappeared into the murk. Thank goodness for GPS and radar because we were able to feel our way towards the marks and stay in deep enough water to keep our keel off the bottom.

When we arrived at the River Forest Marina in Belhaven about 90 minutes later, we were met by a coterie of wet and shaking sailors who had exited the same canal earlier in the day and had experienced even worse conditions. Since the conditions were forecast to deteriorate further over the next 24 hours, we resigned ourselves to sitting tight for at least one day. The one day ended up being 3 days of fog, high winds, severe thunderstorms and tornados before we felt there was a good enough weather window to make the hops across Pamlico Sound and the Neuse River. At the end of the third day, the cabin fever amongst the migrant community was pretty evident, so by the following morning the exodus from the docks began at first light, and we were told later that by 8:00 AM the marina was deserted.

Progress and movement are synonymous, so when I sat down to write this week’s installment, I was somewhat at a loss as to what to talk about. Since the beginning of the week we had only moved from mile 51 of the ICW at Elizabeth City to mile 205 at Morehead City, which means that we have only traveled a grand total of 154 statute miles this week (~130nm). With the exception of the week we took off in Halifax earlier this autumn, the past week established a new low on the progress meter…. Or so I it seemed at first blush.

As I stewed on how to describe a scant 154 miles of waterway, Pat in her usual calm manner, started to remind me of the people we had met and the adventures that we had experienced over the past 7 days. We have been aground, caught in a blinding squall, saved a guy from drowning and shared a drink or two with new like minded friends as we baby stepped deeper into the south. Pat’s words triggered one of those flashes of the obvious where I realized that we were actually accomplishing in spades what we had set out to do when we embarked on this voyage.

For a large part of my life, my work instilled a discipline to always set and strive towards an objective. Success was defined not only by hitting the mark but also by the degree of ambition or chutzpah that was used to set the objectives in the first place. Personally I could accept that coming close, but failing to achieve an outrageously ambitious objective was better than overachieving on something I felt was ordinary. While the rewards of being “successful” are pretty obvious, there are costs that may not be as easily identified. For me one of the hidden costs has been the subconscious reflex to always set targets, and then obsessing on them, even when setting a target is not really necessary….like how many miles we are covering next week!

I’m discovering that it takes an enormous amount of discipline to focus on the now. Not to be confused with alertness and awareness of our surroundings, which is of paramount importance for safety, focusing on the now is about making the most of the present. Years ago when I was an instructor for the Dale Carnegie courses, I used to coach people on the value of making lemonade out of lemons, and yet somehow I seem to have missed my own lesson. For now I’ll concentrate less on how far we are going, and spend a little more time on reflecting about where we have come from. I’m told by more experienced cruisers that eventually I will pass a threshold of consciousness where time will be measured on a scale of weeks and months rather than days, hours and minutes….maybe that will be my next objective……..

Today we are sitting in Morehead City. The forecast is for something the locals call a Canadian Clipper to blow through here in the next 24 to 36 hours. Apparently it is a nasty dry cold front that originates in Canada and brings high winds and very low temperatures. The forecast low night is for 29 Fahrenheit which coupled with 30 knot winds should produce some interesting conditions. Pat and I are warm, dry and we have all the comforts of home including Oprah at 4:00PMso why should we be in a hurry. We’ll let you know where we end up next week, next week!

Have a great week, I know I will, even if I have to repair the head!
Addison

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Baltimore to Elizabeth City NC – In Dixieland we’ll make our stand!

The world looks different from the waters edge. Local differences seem to be more acutely punctuated when traveling by water than if the same distances were covered by land. Pat and I only covered a linear distance of ~230 miles this week, but in the 4 days that we actually traveled out of the last 9 days, we passed through very different areas. Geographically the Chesapeake appears to be fairly similar from one end to the other, but culturally there are worlds apart from the northern to the southern end.

We had just left Annapolis about 2 hours earlier on our way to Solomons Island when the VHF channel 16 crackled to life with an exchange that began with “thanks for giving me so much room A**hole” The response was only partly intelligible and even less intelligent, but Pat and I could not believe what we had heard. Initially we dismissed it as mindless ramblings from two people who had spent too many hours dragging bait around in the water. Less than an hour later another similar exchange from a different pair of bait draggers was over heard. Clearly we had stepped into the twilight zone of boating, where the common courtesies seemed to be considerably less common, and Coast Guard and FCC prescribed radio protocols were out the window.

The exchanges on the radio were an unfortunate epilogue for our stay in Annapolis. While it is terribly unfair to paint the entire community with the experiences from only 3 days first impressions, however unfortunate, are lasting. So much so that it will likely be a long time before I feel the desire to visit again. Firstly the area is a little pricey, which in itself is not a reason to avoid the area. Other areas like New York City and Baltimore were equally expensive, and we are looking forward to our next visit in both places. In Annapolis however we genuinely felt like we were sources of revenue that they would never see again, so it was time too exploit whatever they could.

At the Annapolis Yacht Basin for example, the dockmaster asked us how long our boat was and then charged us an additional 2 feet because our dinghy was hanging from the stern on davits. When I noticed what he had done, he steadfastly refused to adjust his calculation, offering instead to get out a tape measure for a more precise measurement. My argument that his dock did not get any longer to accommodate the extra length did not seem to hold any sway. It was only when we extended our stay due to weather by an additional 2 days did he relent and charge us for the actual 42 feet of our boat. I could go on about other examples, but as I said earlier 3 days is not a trend, it is only a first impression. In the end however the $6.00 will not make either of us rich or poor but it will be a very cold day before he sees Threepenny Opera back in his slips.

Fortunately we met up with John M and wife Alex for dinner in Solomons Island which changed our mood considerably. We had a great evening out, and with a little local knowledge from John, we saw a very different perspective of Maryland. So now our position has changed from we will never be back, to we will never be back in Annapolis!. Thanks John, it was great to see you guys!!

The universe has a way of evening things out. As we moved further south and into the Intra Coastal Waterway there was a dramatic change in the attitudes of the people we met. From the lockmaster at Deep Creek who provided a history lesson as the locks filled, to the volunteers at the Dismal Swamp Visitors Center, everybody was genuinely interested in making us feel welcomed. Since we have entered the famous “ditch” we have encountered nothing but the famous southern hospitality.

The highlight of this hospitality is in Elizabeth City NC. It is the only major town on the Dismal Swamp Canal route through Virginia to the Abermarle Sound area of NC, so geographically it is a logical place to stop. In other words we were a captive audience, but despite the natural advantage given by location, we were welcomed by town volunteers who waved us in and helped us tie up to free docks in the middle of town. Each slip had been donated by local businesses for the purpose of attracting boaters to stop, re-supply and to visit.

One of the greeters was a well groomed gentleman whom I saw several times during the day. At about 4:30 he stopped by Threepenny Opera to ask if we had everything we needed and if there was anything he could do to make our visit more comfortable. We chatted for a while and during the conversation it turned out that our greeter was none other than the Mayor! To apply proper perspective the town has a population of nearly 20,000 residents and is home to the largest US Coast Guard training base in the country. Without a doubt we will be back if only to experience the welcome.

The pace of travel will change now that we are in the ICW. We are no longer going point to point, but rather we can adjust our daily travel to suit our mood. Since the waterway is largely protected for the next several hundred miles, we can stop almost at will and drop the anchor to spend the night. Our initial goal of the Florida Keys is tantalizingly close, a mere 1200 miles from where we are today. Hopefully we will find more gems like Elizabeth City along the way!

Have a great week. I know I will

Addison

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New York City to Baltimore - Doth spoke the raven...

Years ago when Pat and I moved to Toronto we were appalled and intimidated by the price of local real-estate. Fixer uppers were selling for staggering amounts and anything “nice” was in the stratosphere. Shock, however severe, never lasts very long and we knew we were getting acclimated to the “big city” when we started using the terms “only” and “$300K” in the same sentence. On our current adventure we have had a déjà vu experience when it comes to marina space.

Sure I know that true cruisers are more likely to spend their time on the hook and eschew the requirements to hook up to shore power and water, but Pat and I did not set out on this trip to go camping on the water. The real cruisers can call us wimpy, but as November unfolds, we like to have hot water, central heat and wifi. While we are all about independence, neither of us have any real desire to be the poster child for self sufficiency, while scraping the icicles off of our noses. So the sign that we are overcoming sticker shock at the marinas is when we can say “its ONLY $3 per foot”.

And the $3.00 per foot seemed like a real bargain as we huddled in the salon of Threepenny Opera on Tuesday morning. Yet another cold front was coming through the New York area and this time, the forecasters were taking no chances. The gale warnings were upgraded to storm warnings and the wind gusts were predicted to exceed 40 knots. Portions of the city were without heat and light due to wind damage, and a mere 75 miles north, there was 20 inches of fresh snow on the ground. For Pat and me the predictions of dire gloom meant that we were making contingency plans to stay put for an entire week in New York.

By Wednesday however the worst of the weather had passed by, and while some residents of Queens were still without power, the weather forecasts had improved significantly. After the drubbing of the previous weekend we were understandably more than a little bit skeptical that we would actually get decent traveling conditions. The alternative to leaving however was even less desirable as staying put would mean increasing the odds that the next snowfall would not be 75 miles north. So with more than a little bit of fear and trepidation we made plans to leave our cozy, but expensive, berth in New York for the exposed weather beaten shores of New Jersey.

The coast of New Jersey from Sandy Hook, just outside of New York Harbor and as far as Cape May at the entrance to Delaware Bay, is essentially a 155 mile long sandbar. In the summer time, one can tell, from the numerous beach houses and amusement parks along the coast, that it is an extremely popular place to spend a few days roasting on the beach. In November however the roller coasters and ferris wheels are still, and the beaches are deserted. The only real signs of life, apart from the casinos of Atlantic City, are from the fishing boats that live here, and from the steady procession of pleasure boats heading south.

For a sailor this 155 mile sand bar, represents a gigantic lee shore, and it is very easy to imagine your own boat adding to the numerous wreck symbols that seem to dot the entrances to every inlet. Since the sand shifts with every Atlantic storm, the charts do not illustrate precise locations for the channel buoys. Instead of precise depths, there are notations that were likely written by lawyers, warning mariners of variable depths and channels that are constantly being redefined. In so many words the advice is go see for your self or ask somebody else who really cares. In uncertain environments like this, one discovers that sailing is like raising children. There is a ton of advice around on how to do it correctly, all of it conflicting, and potentially dire consequences if you get it wrong.

Pat and I agonized over the charts to try and solve the problem of sailing down 155 miles of coastline with limited and possibly unusable shelter due to lack of water. It appeared that we had two choices. We could bite the bullet and gird ourselves for an overnight sail, provided the weather held, or we could duck into spots like Manasquan Inlet or Barnegat Bay. If it weren’t so personal, the indecision and debate would have been comical, but since the dilemma concerned issues very close to home, the humour was lost. In the end the prospect of a freezing cold overnight passage in temperatures in the low 30’s seemed more onerous than becoming a table ornament on a sand bar, so we elected to tackle a stop at Barnegat Bay as way of breaking the trip into two daylight segments. If we did not have the unlimited towing option from Boat US, our decision might have been different.

The trip down the NJ shore and then back up Delaware Bay into the Chesapeake was marked by some of the nicest and calmest weather we have had in weeks. All of the angst was for not. Despite a few white knuckle moments when channel markers disappeared into the glare of the setting sun, and when the boat seemed to develop a mind of its own during docking in a tidal flow, the trip was pretty boring!! The highlight of the week was spending Halloween night with our friends Connie and Richard from the trawler Active Assets in a Cape May, NJ Karaoke Bar. By the fourth beer, the talent, many of them rough and gruff local fishermen, were starting to sound pretty good. It wasn’t fantasy week in Key West, but it must be experienced to be appreciated!

We are now in Baltimore, the home of Edgar Alan Poe. Our intent is to visit with friends in the area as we meander down the Chesapeake towards Norfolk VA. The temperatures are forecast to be fairly forgiving, even though the next few days will be overcast and potentially wet. By the weekend however we will be below the Mason Dixon line and officially in the South! For the now we will play tourist in Baltimore where the docks are only $2.00 a foot!

There are 3 major airports in the area so if the mood strikes to go sailing, we are only 90 minutes away. Have a great week, I know we will!

Addison
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Plymouth MA to New York City - The Big Apple - or how we avoided becoming Apple Sauce

I have been accused of not knowing what I was doing once or twice in my life. I have been accused of not knowing where I was going a few times and I have even been accused of not knowing what was going on around me. At various times the accusations may have had a smidgen of verity, but for the most part I have managed to shrug everything off as the ramblings of lesser mortals. This past weekend however I had to openly admit that I had no idea where I was, That I had only a slight notion of what I was doing, and I could only pray that I was going to be forgiven my trespasses during the latest installment of the Mother Nature’s lessons on life. Indeed this week has been a week of contrasts. Just when there was enough bad stuff happening to encourage a prolonged session of thumb sucking curled up in a fetal position, great things would happen that would cause us to stand tall and go just a little further.

At the beginning of this week we were pinned in Plymouth MA waiting for a Nor’easter to blow itself out. The weather was as cold and as miserable as we have seen to date, and Pat and I were not motivated to leave the boat, except for a quick dash out to see the fabled rock. In fact even leaving the boat was somewhat hazardous as we were out at the end of the dock system and the wind driven waves were washing over. Threepenny Opera was caked in salt spray from the 30 knot winds that blew whitecaps through the very shallow Plymouth Harbor. It wasn’t a huge hardship, but our Espar heater ran nearly full time. We were warm and snug but frustrated that we were stuck.

While the old wives tales promised good weather immediately after a Nor’easter, there was no stipulation as to how long the period of good weather would last. Mother Nature must have been a lawyer! As we were preparing to leave Plymouth on Tueday AM, the revised forecast was for another cold front to sweep through, bringing heavy rain and high winds. Since we had already experienced a little taste of down east weather, we revised our plans to clear the canal and hang an immediate right into a place called Onset Bay. It is hard to imagine a town that closes at the end of the season, but Onset Bay made Summerside PEI seem positively effervescent by comparison.

It occurred to me the other day that Pat and I have been playing a game of cosmic Frogger. Like the little animated amphibian of video game fame, we have been metaphorically negotiating a watery highway that is fraught with hazards, while similarly packed with hidden prizes. In the game of Frogger, timing is everything. There is a rhythm to the game that once mastered will advance a player by several levels. A mistake however will leave a little stain on the road and the life count goes down by one. Since we had become pretty good at timing the cold fronts, Pat and I were waiting for the appropriate gap in traffic to make a run down the length of Long Island Sound for the prize of The Big Apple. It was a shame that we ended up bypassing great sailing destinations like Newport and Mystic Seaport. Actually we stopped in Mystic for the night, but since mother nature had given us a 2 day pass, we did not want to insult her kindness by dallying and playing tourist.

By Friday night we were in Norwalk CT and well within striking distance of NYC. Perhaps it was due to the tantalizing closeness of it all, perhaps it was the frost on the boat or maybe we were just fixated on a single point oblivious of the hazards around it? Like an ill timed frogger jump across the highway, Pat and I dismissed the Gale Warnings that were effective on Saturday PM for the New York and Western Long Island Sound forecast area. I can rationalize our actions by observing that up until now the forecasts had been very precise and that the forecast conditions of 15-20 knots with gusts to 25 after 12:00 noon were becoming fairly routine conditions for “experienced” cruisers like Pat and me! But rationalization is the lament of fools.

Since the forecast was for the weather to worsen in the afternoon, we cast off from Norwalk shortly after sunrise, expecting that a 3 hour trip to City Island in the Bronx would be fairly uneventful. And uneventful it was for the first 2.5 hours of our 3 hour tour! In fact I would go so far as to say that for 2.5 hours it was totally blissful! The seas were flat, the winds were as forecast in the mid teens and coming from our port quarter. We were slicing through the water at nearly 9 knots, absolutely convinced that we were both Master and Commander!

Little did we know that the first 2.5 hours were the climb up to the apex of the roller coaster. When things started to go down hill, they went down hill very quickly! First the wind increased to 20-25 with gusts to 30. Secondly it started to rain, virtually obliterating any forward vision. Then I discovered that despite the latest in electronics I found myself on the wrong side of a mark and of course the furler would pick this exact moment to get sticky and require a winch to bring in the head sail. At times like this you really want to press the reset button and start over, but unfortunately real life ain’t like that. In the end we did not go aground, we did get the sail put away and somehow I managed to put the boat into a slip despite a +20 knot cross wind and driving rain.

When the boat was secured into the slip, Pat and I thought we had been through the worst of it. Little did we know that when Mother Nature teaches a lesson in humility, she wants to make sure her points get across. As the day wore on, the local weather channels started to hint that the convergence of cold fronts in the NYC area was going to create an intense weather phenomenon. Translated it meant that the winds were going to exceed 40 knots, the local airports were going to suspend flight operations for a time, and that thunderstorms would bring flooding and power outages. For Pat and me it meant being banged around at the dock in a way that was positively scary. At the peak of the storm the wind was 47 knots, which was 7 knots more than we saw during Hurricane Kyle.

The boat was leaping and surging in the wind driven tide to the point that we needed to wedge ourselves against the table to remain sitting in an upright position. When I looked outside I could see the rudder of the neighboring boat as it surged out of the water. At about 7:10 in the evening, after we had been hanging on for dear life for the past couple hours, a blinding flash of light followed by what I thought was a carbon arc spotlight illuminated our boat. The source of the light it turned out was a 60Kva transformer melting before our eyes, and about 10 feet from our boat.

Suffice it to say that we are now duly humbled and will repeat 100 times that we will be more conservative in our weather decisions in future. Mother Nature you got your point across!!

The trip through Hell Gate and the East River on Sunday was almost anti-climatic, although it was hard to be nonchalant about sailing past Manhattan under gloriously clear skies and relatively calm waters. We are now in Lincoln Harbor Yacht Club, which is in Weehawken NJ, directly across from the Empire State Building. It is only a 15 minute ferry ride from Manhattan, and we can catch it from the pier just at the end of the Yacht Club. Today we were wandering outside in our shirt sleeves for the first time in weeks. We are in a world class city, and we have a world class view. It doesn’t get much better than this. Our plans are to hole up here for a few days, and let our mail catch up with us. Towards the end of the week we will be off towards the New Jersey Shore …. If Mother Nature thinks it is a good idea.

Have a great week. I will think of you when I chomp down on a Carnegie Deli Super Corned Beef Sandwich!!

Addison

P.S. Let us know you are out there by subscribing to the blog. Click on the “follow this blog” link, just below our profile photo.


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Addison