Coda

Yesterday, Rosie tied up to a dock at Riverview Marina in Catskill NY where she will rest until the Champlain Canal opens, hopefully May 15.  We will spend a couple of days here getting her squared away and Cyrus will pick us up on Tuesday.

Anchor weighed at 0600 in Manesquan for trip past Manhattan.  Tide was late in turning so we fought through the Narrows and NY Harbor.

Coast Guard was maintaining a security perimeter around the USNS Comfort and pulled up alongside to shoo us away. 
Made it to Nyack where we anchored .  It's not smart to fight tides in the Hudson.  So on Thursday we left at 1500 hours to catch the tide up to Bannerman  Castle at Pollepel Island (across from Newburgh). 

Friday morning we weighed anchor at 0530 and rode the tide all the way to Catskill.  It was a very cold rainy day with snow!

I was able to wrestle the wheel away from Kathleen and keep her from heading back too the Bahamas!

I had called Riverview Marina, a funky place where we had stepped and unstepped our mast 10 years ago, a couple of weeks prior to secure a slip for Rosie.  This was just before all the NY marinas were closed and northbound transient boats panicked.

 Except for a 3 day journey back to Champlain, our journey is now over.  It came at a good time in our lives.  I wanted to transition the management of the Hinesburgh Public House to Alex.  Kathleen was extracting herself from Twice is Nice.  I was turning 75 and wanted to "not let the old man in."
We wanted to get to know Rosie better and boy did we ever!  The pandemic was not in our plans and has had an immense impact on the return voyage.  We're very glad we got a head start on the "Quebec
navy" the will be scrambling for diesel fuel and pumpouts.

What's next?  That was an innocent question before the world fell apart.  The pandemic is an opportunity to turn this country around and I expect we will be participating in that effort in some way.

What I've learned, after seven months, is that I have three beautiful, exceptional women in my life and they're all tough as nails:  Kathleen, Rosie and Lacy.  I am a very lucky man.

Rosie out.

Quick updates...

...since we're moving quickly.
Left C&D Canal and fought a current to the Delaware.  So an ebb tide on the Delaware flows across the C&D to the Chesapeake????  But once we were in the Delaware we flew down to Cape May at 9 knots. 
Some shots from Tuesday.  RR brige on the canal at 0530.  Lighthouse in the bay.  Ship John Shoal.

Went through the Cape May Canal and straight to the ocean for the 40 miles to Atlantic City.  Our longest day yet:  108 statute miles in 14 hours?
Outside (ocean vs ICW) is so superior.  Not depth fiinder harping at us.  Straight line navigation.  Not tides fighting us.
Anchored in Rum Pt, a little basin just inside the inlet.  After the day we had, we renamed the place Rum Pint.
This morning, Wednesday, chose the outside route to Manesquan despite NW winds and SE swells.  It was almost 20 miles shorter than the "ditch".Great choice.  Made it to Manesquan Inlet in 8 hours.  Anchor down.  Hope to get into the Hudson tomorrow.

And we're off!

Weather has been cruel.  We got to Summit North on Wednesday.  We'll leave tomorrow, Tuesday.
Stiff winds out of th west 25-30 knots for the first few days.  Freezing cold.  We actually saw snow flurries.  So Kathleen wanted you all to see her pajamas.

Then, when there was a window for heading down the Delaware Bay the wind down there was forecast, and actually was, 45 to 50 knots out of the south,part of the huge storm system that the whole east coast felt.

Today, the last edge of that storm passed by.  Here's Lacy and I watching the squall line approach.

She's not worried.  She knew it would pass and it did.

So we've been holed up in this funky marina/hurricane hole for 6 days.  Can you find us?

And we're off at 0530 tomorrow, hopefully riding the ebb tide and following wind to Cape May and then up to Atlantic City.

More to come.

Eerie. very eerie.

We've secured a slip in Catskill NY for the 20th to stash Rosie until the locks open, hopefully May 15.  So, with longer daylights, we'll be running long days because we know the weather is not going to be helping us.  We were held up in Norfolk for 5 days.  Now we're in the C&D canal for 3 while a gale passes over us.  We'll have to spend a day in Atlantic City.  Strong winds in the forecast.

We haven't launched the dinghy since Georgetown, SC.  Yes, Lacy will now poop on the deck but we've had a string of free docks available.  Here's Portsmouth/Norfolk.

Once sprung from there we've been making 50 and 60 mile legs.  Deltaville, Solomons, Rock Hall, C&D Canal.  We'd planned to visit the little towns on the eastern shore of the Chesapeake on the way back but we're just bookin' it.

Best stop on the way down and the way back was nephew Pat Whalen and Barbara's place in the Solomons.  Spending time with family!  Awesome!

Then on to Rock Hall and now here in the C&D Canal.  It's eerie out here.  Very eerie.  No boats.  Nobody anywhere.  Quiet.  So quiet.

So we watch the weather closely and stay far away from everyone.  We've taken on our last fuel and emptied the holding tank for the last time.  Hopefully we'll have just 6 stops between here and Catskill.on the 20th.

Norfolk too.

This is the largest military base in the world.

Why do we continue to spend hundreds of billions of dollars maintaining WWII armament while our country is struggling to hold our own against cyber and biological attacks.
I think the answer is pure corruption in our Congress.
There is an old Greek saying that a society is healthy when old men plant trees in whose shade they know they will never sit.

But we're stuck here until Sunday as the Chesapeake Bay continues to throw huge waves and winds at us.

Norfolk

So we're charging north:  Alligator River to Coinjock to Norfolk.
Part of my morning routine is to check the oil, check the belt and the coolant level
This morning the coolant level was out of sight.  Started the engine and saw a steady leak of coolant into the bilge.  Not good.  We had a window for getting to Deltaville and it closed.

I did a very bad thing.  I assumed the worst.  After an hour of investigation I said it's a blown head gasket and that's not something I'm going to fix.  So I said OK, we're done. 

But after another hour of investigation I saw that the leak continued without the engine running so it couldn't be a head gasket which would only leak under pressure.
Just like the raw water pump that I replaced in the Bahamas, this was the closed cooling system pump and I just happened to have a spare on board.  (I love you Wes Eldred!)
So I spent the day changing out the pump.  It was not an easy job.

Success.  Or we hope so.  We need to run this puppy foa while before we can claim victory.  But had I not checked the coolant level thid  morning, we could have been in big trouble in the Chesapeake as a big norther  headed our way.
As a chronic optimist, I have always assumed the best.  As a ship's captain, my job is to assume the worst and plan for it. 
So we're at a free dock in Norfolk (actually Portsmouth) and may not be able to head north until Friday or Saturday because strong northerly winds.
We will prevail!
So will you!

Oriental and more

So the second short half of the gale wind day took us to Oriental, a real boating town.
We tied up at the town free dock and endured a ton of gawkers and admirers.

You can always count on meeting great people and seeing great boats here.  This one came in a day before us direct from St Vincent, single handed.  A young Dutch sailor.  Prinsis Mia is a steel hull beast built for the several ocean crossings she's done.

I like the hand-cranked windlass.

And the cleats.

And the midship vice.

And here's the cockpit.

What a boat!

And just something to remember the deep south by as we fight our way north.  Zoom in on this flagpole.

Tonight we're in Bellhaven, tomorrow Little Alligator River.  Then we leave N Carolina.  We're bummed that the Dismal Swamp canal won't be open.  It's a ditch 60 miles long that was surveyed by George Washington.  Pretty cool  But Army Corp of Engineers are working on a lock.

In addition to the empty towns and waterways I realized today that everything is so quiet.  Even the usually chatty VHF is quiet.  It is eerie.  We heard that a lot of Canadians that are usually heading north now have left their boats and flown home before the border shuts down.

I mentioned today as we crossed mile market 860 that we are more than halfway home.  That was a mistake.  Lacy and First Mate assumed we were a lot closer that that.  But we do have 700 miles to travel to Catskill NY where we will probably leave Rosie for a few weeks until the canal opens.  And as I said earlier, the fun stops we had planned for the return trip ain't happening.  So we plunge on, watching the news and hoping wildly that Vermont will flatten the curve before the rest of the country.

Stay safe.  Stay home.  We are.

Short day

Gale force winds today so we only made it to Morehead City (near Beaufort), NC.  But once again we were able to tie up to a dock in front of a closed restaurant  (Sanitary Fish Company, since 1932).  We go great protection from the wind and shore leave for Lacy.

Spring is coming here too.  When we run out of signs of spring we'll have to slow down.

Actually we're on a pretty tight schedule to be at the top of the Hudson by April 21st so we're hoping we don't get slowed by weather.

It's impressive how everything seems to have come to a halt

Lonely trek

This picture tells the story.  We are ahead of the snowbird fleet (Quebec navy) and the waterway
is eerily quiet, which is a good thing because even in the south people are taking the virus seriously.  So we're on our way home.  230 statute miles to Virginia and the Dismal Swamp.  We typically have the waterway to ourselves.

Time to get home

Well this voyage has changed, like everything else in the world.  We're now just intent on getting back to Vermont as quickly as we can as healthy as we can.  Most of the fun things we had planned for the trip back are no longer possible.  Like baseball games in Baltimore, visit with our dear friend Captain Owen (who's 82 and not leaving the house.).  So it's head down, full speed ahead.  We may leave Rosie somewhere on the Hudson and pick her up later.

We're out of South Carolina.  8 more states to cross.  But we're following spring north.  Wisteria and young leaves along the waterway.

Last night we anchored in the Calabash Creek off the Little River Inlet.  As so happens when we anchor in a channel somewhere, we're surrounded with sights like these which were just off our stern and pretty symptomatic of where this country is right now.

Please be careful out there!

Live from the ark!

When the rains stop and things return to normal, this little ark will land on a mountain top in Vermont and we will emerge, whole and healthy.  Hope some of you are still around.

Seriously, this is crazy!  After a lot of agonizing about what a socially responsible business should do, we decided to close the Public House.  Then today the Governor decided that all restaurants are to close effective tomorrow.  We will survive!

I apologize for being so late with this post.  We're revisiting some of the sites we shared with you on the way down and I hate redundancy.  But then I realized a lot of you are locked down with nothing to look at but the idiot box.  So here are some stories and pictures from the ark

Cumberland Island is wonderful but it is rife with ticks.  Yeow!  Lacy had a bunch.

I showed you the car carrier on the hard in St Simons Sound.

Here's the back story from some locals. The Korean ship was delivering Kias to the east coast and on a tight schedule.  The ship had a problem with the ballast pumps and called in a crew of mechanics to fix it from Korea.  But the captain needed to get to Charleston and told them to work on it while underway.  As they headed out the sound the ship began to list 30 degrees.  A pilot was in command of the ship at the time and made the decision to beach it.  He's now a hero.  No lives were lost.  Just money.  They're going to cut it up in slices.

The Brunswick bridge is beautiful.

So is this craft.

This one was a little too close.

So we're anchored in Deewees Creek, just north of Charleston.  For the second night there's been no shore leave for Lacy.  Nothing but marsh for miles and miles.  But there's a neighbor one creek over.

And I was able to get the third coat of varnish on the pilot house trim.

As the world falls apart Kathleen and I really want to be home to offer whatever support we can to whomever needs it.  And yet, at our ages, we think we are pretty lucky to be self-quaranteed on Rosie.  But we are thinking about you all and how hard this must be.  We might quicken the pace of our return voyage just a teensy.

Thanks for checking in on us.  We are just about at 5000 views.  I'll try to do better with the posts.

Cumberland Island and Brunswick

We left on Sunday and stopped at Sister Creek, a free dock at a park on the St Johns River that leads up to Jacksonville.  Had a guest for dinner.  Bill on an Endeavor 37.  Good talks.

Then on to Cumberland Island.  We went up to the north end of the island into the Brickhill River and hiked over to the ocean.  It was a longer hike then we expected, about 3 miles each way, but well worth it.  We hit it at low tide.  Lacy loves to run on the beach and after the 3 mile hike she had a ton of energy for the beach.

 We walked back past the little Andrew Carnegie summer camp seeing our first signs of spring.  Azaleas!

Got back to Rosie who was sitting at low tide also.

And the bartender says "What'll it be cap'n?"

Then it's on to Brunswick Landing marina.  First slip since Bahamas.

Cumberland Island

https://photos.app.goo.gl/MDNCyivBEHd13CNW6

Update

The strategy for the way home is to wait for good weather (tail wind, sun, fair tides) and hammer it.  So from Vero we went 54 miles to Cocoa, 68 miles to Daytona and 51 miles to St Augustine averaging better than 6.5 knots.  Pretty good.

Now we're waiting out a stiff north wind and cold weather.  We'll leave Sunday.  There are 8 states to traverse before our beloved Vermont.  We'll knock off Florida on Monday.

Sitting at our mooring ball yesterday we were thrilled to see another Lord Nelson approach.  Hull #5, Miss Willoughby, owned by Beau and Mariah Hicks from Urbanna, Virginia.  Hope we get to spend some time with them before we head north.  They're hanging out here for a couple of months.  She looked real good.  Built in 1983, repowered with a 150 horse Yanmar in 2010.  Brightwork was Cetol and it actually looked pretty good.

Northward

As of today we've logged 160 days and 1900 miles on this voyage.  We have 61 days and 1500 miles to get to the top of the Hudson where Kathleen and Lacy will head back to retake possession of our house.  Rosie and my itinerary will depend on weather and canal openings.

Leaving Vero Beach tomorrow with fair winds and currents, heading to Cocoa Beach or maybe even Titusville.  The remainder of the trip will be a balance between the warmer weather in the south with a need to get north.  The trick will be to ride the sun north.

I managed to get the alternator back into a very very cramped space and it's working well. Can you find it?

Nine years ago when we did this trip we had Langworthy's, Donnelly's and Kirbachs with us for portions of the trip and other buddy-boats that were traveling in the same direction at the same speed.  For some reason, this has been a much lonelier voyage.  Maybe power boaters are less social.  But we hope to find some companions for the trip north.  Makes it more fun.

Some of you may envy our warm weather but all of you should envy Kathleen's cooking!  How about some chicken pot pie!

We did it again...

...we spent a week at one place waiting for things entirely out of our control.  When our credit cards were hacked I had new ones shipped to Riviera Beach.  After 6 days they hadn't arrived.  And there were gale force winds for two days.  Then the depth gauge stopped working.  The foot switch on the windlass stopped working.  But we're getting pretty good at chilling.

When everything was fixed and the weather was right and we convinced Mastercard to overnight our cards to Vero Beach, we finally left.  Great passage from Riviera to Vero on Monday.  58 nautical miles in 8.5 hours averaging 6.8 knots!  Tail wind and fair tides do it every time.

In Riviera Beach we chilled with some great food which is our norm.  Seafood linguini here.

I practiced on my conch/horn.

Because the sunset always has to be acknowledged.

We did anchor among the derelict boats and derelict people and were nervous about someone coming down on us in the gale.  But our trusty spanker sail did it's job.  We stayed into the wind without fishtailing and the derelicts, which seem to have been here for generations, held station.

The voltage meter was flaky on the way to Vero so now I've pulled the alternator/regulator and brought it to a local electrical wizard, which I am definitely not.

We can't tell if Lacy recognizes the places she's already "marked" as we backtrack.  But she's doing great. 

Northward! Slowly.  Follow the lilacs.