Getting Colder...

 

This weekend we were determined to get down to Rock Hall on Friday.  For some time now we have been getting ready to make the trip on Friday evening only to have it fall apart for some reason or another (usually related to one of our jobs).  This meant we would only leave mid-morning on Saturday which limited us a bit on how far we were able to sail.

Our hope was to get down Friday, attend to some boat chores and then maybe go somewhere special for the weekend.

It took longer than planned to get away, so we arrived just as the last light was leaving the sky.

Shortly after we settled in, I noticed the wind was picking up.  A quick check on Windy showed that there was going to be a fresh breeze overnight with gusts approaching 30.  More alarmingly the temperatures were supposed to drop down to the mid 50s.  We knew it was supposed to get cold and packed accordingly.

We did not know it would get THAT cold.  When we woke up and had breakfast, I went above and started to put out the cushions.  It was cold and raw.  I realized after placing the first two cushions, that it just would not be fun leaving in the morning.  (I had sailed colder last year, but had some time to work up to it.)  So we changed our plans and decided to have a lazy morning and go sailing after it warmed a bit.

Given the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday night, we curled up in the salon and watched RBG.

After lunch (I went and got sandwiches from the liquor store), we waited a bit and headed out when Accuweather told us it would be the warmest.  

I had a scare in that I seemed to start dragging something (boat speed slowed way down) around Gratitude Marina, but a few moments later, it must have shaken loose as things returned to normal, so we continued on.

It was wonderful sailing weather.

We have a new Green #3 buoy!  This had been a dark green covered with dark grey bird sh!t.  
The new one is much easier to see.

We got back a bit later than usual... had a really fast and unremarkable dinner and settled in to watch a movie.  Since the theme of the day was "women in law", I watched Erin Brockovich.

I don't think Vicky rememberers much of the movie.

Sunday morning was even colder - high 40s, though with less wind.  Since the weather forecast for next weekend is back to more normal September temps, we decided to just be lazy.  Vicky did her workout after breakfast (avocado toast with eggs and half a banana chip muffin) and then disappeared.  

Gives a new meaning to the term "Boat Yoga".

Really dissapeared... 

I thought she went for a shower and then never heard it go on.  When I went to check, the bathroom was empty... I went back to the aft cabin she sometimes uses for an office... nothing.  Finally after 2 or 3 minutes of really getting bewildered (surely I'd know if she left the boat), I realized that the pile of blankets in the forward cabin was a bit larger than normal.  

Found her!

So I got lost in the Sunday morning news shows and TicToc (I had to load it before it was banned), and I let her sleep.  As Noon approached, I heard stirring in the front cabin and I started making Sunday dinner... sautéed chicken breast, cornbread stuffing with gravy and steamed veggies, and a bottle of rose'.

We enjoyed it outside which meant the veggies got cold fast, but it was a nice dinner.

Once you open the bottle, you have to finish it... that meant a couple hour nap before heading home.

A Quick Day-Sail

This weekend we just did a quick day-sail on Saturday.  

Things were busy finishing up from work on Friday night and we had other plans for Sunday.  I remembered that for the past several years while we kept Seas The Day 315 in Keyport, almost all of our sailing was day trips - leaving Newark DE and heading up the NJ Turnpike, sailing and then returning.  

The wind forecast on Saturday looked fabulous (sunny and brisk - 12 to 18 knots, mostly stead with some gusts to keep life interesting), so... we did a day trip.  

We left at 10:00 AM to head down to Rock Hall, got in four to five hours on the boat and we were back home by 6:30 PM.

The photos tell the story (with a few captions added where necessary)....

The first surprise was a full tank of gas - Thanks John!

A friend from B-Dock helped me finally find my HIN (etched just under the rub rail).

We mostly did some points of sail sailing (changing my direction to force me to keep adjusting the sails - sort of like ASA-101 practice).  

Vicky was engrossed in a series of Chinese movies.

Being a bit of a nixnutz, I challenged myself by trying to put the sun from the opening in the Bimini directly on her screen each time I tacked or gybed.   I finally heard the question I was waiting for...

"Why are you going back and forth so much?"

"I have to practice, my dear."

I also tried getting Seas The Day to heel over a bit more.  I'm getting much more comfortable at 15 degrees and we even had one that went a hair over 20 degrees (I wasn't about to reach for the iPhone during that).  That last one involved some crashing sounds from down below, so we relaxed after that.  

It was just a wonderful day of sailing overall... we essentially stayed in the area north of Love Point.  After several hours, we had enough and headed back.

On the way back in, we passed this boat which I think made a cute photo.

That was pretty much it... a wonderful day!

Labor Day Weekend (Jim's family, and Judy & Greg)

Vicky gets her spinnaker deployed!

Thursday

My company gave me an extra day off on Friday of Labor Day weekend this year, so I added a day of my own to make a nice 5-day getaway.  Most of Thursday morning was spent in preparation and after a nice lunch, we headed down to Rock Hall.  Vicky had worked the night before and slept most of the way.

We arrived, unpacked and even got there in time to have some real food prepared by the Osprey Point Inn Restaurant.  (They're willing - sometimes - to do take out from the dinner menu.)  We ate dinner and I rushed out to fill the water tanks - there was a significant storm approaching.

As I filled the tanks, I could see the storm coming in.  The phone vibrated with various marine warnings, tornado warnings from across the bay and severe thunderstorm warnings.  I also noticed various people scurrying around the dock checking lines and the like.  So I doubled up the dock-lines and we hunkered down.

Water tanks are full, waste tanks are empty... a great way to start the weekend.

In the end, it was just a storm.  The tornados stayed on the west side of the bay.  Seas The Day tilted a bit due to the wind stretching out the lines, but they held and all was well.

Friday

Friday was a lazy day for us... we started to prepare to go out and then decided to just stay inside.

We did watch Mulan (the new Disney movie) on Friday night.  I thought it was pretty cool.  Vicky didn't like it as much.

(Disney's image)

Saturday

I started with a walk on Saturday, then later in the morning, Jim and Xiaosheng came aboard along with (some of) their children.  Their littlest one was light enough that I needed to go get a new small(er) life jacket.  I'll let the photos tell most of the story.

Jim is my supervisor at work, so it was great to be able to assign him tasks for a change.

Pre-teens love their iPads - even when sailing.

Learning how to drink from a bottle.

Jim's photo.

You can see that the day was wonderful.  We went sailing for a while until the motion got to Xiaosheng a bit, whereupon we headed in to anchor just off Gratitude Marina.  While at anchor, we had a nice lunch.  It was funny to watch the little one try to eat a sandwich that was almost as large as her head.

Xiaosheng's photo of lunch.

Once at anchor, fishing was the order for the afternoon.  Again, my curse held (I have never been aboard a boat that caught a fish that could be kept).  Eventually, we returned to the dock and fished for crabs at Chester River Seafood.

The little one was funny in how intensely she devoured crabmeat.

At some point, you have to give the parents a chance to eat... I seem to have this effect on all the girls I try to hold. (Xiaosheng's photo)

I had baked a berry pie in preparation for the weekend and we served it with some ice cream for dessert.  The little one made the rounds scarfing dessert from everyone who would spare some.  Vicky always is ready to spoil a child, so she was very popular.  (I ate mine before she could get to me.)

 

Since the little one had avoided a nap all day, we let her run around down below to tire her out until Mom declared that it was time to go.

Sunday

Like Saturday, Sunday morning started out with a walk for me.  This time Vicky joined me and we walked up to Gratitude and back.  We stopped at Muskrat Alley for breakfast, since it seemed in passing that they had adequate outdoor seating that was safe in this COVID summer.

I saw Vicky eyeing the apples on the tree at Osprey Point.  Here, I caught the thief in action!

On Sunday, friends Greg and Judy joined us.  

Almost as soon as we got out and set the mainsail, Vicky declared that since the wind was so light, today was the perfect day to try out our old spinnaker (from Seas The Day 315) on the new boat.

(Editorial note, during the purchase of Seas The Day 425, Vicky had declined the purchase of a new spinnaker, saying that "We only used the old one a couple of times and it would do on the new boat."  I told her that was penny wise, pound foolish since the new boat being much larger, required a bigger spinnaker to move the boat well.  She won... as always... and today was the day to try the old sail.)

To me the purpose of a furling spinnaker is that you set it up at the dock when motion is calm rather than out on the water when the bow is moving up and down, but "nevertheless, she persisted" so even though we were out in the middle of the bay, Judy and Greg got to watch us fuss our way through getting it set up and deployed.

(Greg's photo)

And she succeeded!

For comparison, here is a photo of the exact same sail on Seas The Day 315 (taken from a similar position relative to the bow).

The sail appears larger/better on the boat it is sized for
(But she does have a point... it was evidently last used in 2015)

Of course the old sail is too small... covering less than the foretriangle.  We were able to get it set, but had only enough line on the sheets to secure it in the helm winches (no extra line to adjust).  So it (sort of) worked as long as we stayed on one particular point of sail.  

I think Greg was particularly impressed with her persistence and tenacity as this played out over what seemed to be an hour.

We had a wonderful lunch that Judy prepared and served.  (She always wins for the most impressive guest spread each year.)  Unfortunately, I don't have a photo of the lunch spread, so a photo of Judy will have to suffice.

(Greg's photo)

My attempt to find a friendly boat to grab a photo of our small spinnaker failed, so after lunch we doused and stowed the spinnaker and I began to seek out other boats to argue why we should upgrade.

Here you can clearly see how much larger the spinnaker is relative to the boat.

Once we had the jib out, I noted that we had much more speed from our jib (3.6 knots out of about 5 knots of wind) than we did from the small spinnaker (about 2.5 to 2.8 knots).  Greg helped me by documenting my claim.

(Greg's photo)

We learned on the outbound leg that Gratitude Marina's pump-out facility was out of order, so fortunately, I had some tokens for Osprey's... therefore, Greg and Judy got to help in the pump-out operation.  We'll spare you the photos.

Once back at the dock, we ordered dinner from Ford's Seafood (because everything else was booked) and enjoyed it from the cockpit.

We watched some of the passing traffic.

Later we viewed the sunset from the foredeck cushion...

Finally as dusk settled, we walked Judy and Greg to their car as we did a garbage/recycling run.  I grabbed a few photos on the walk back to our dock.

Monday

There's not much to show from Monday... we lounged around inside the cabin, took numerous naps, ate some of the leftover spoils from the weekend.  Vicky had to work Monday night so I let her sleep while I took care of a few simple boat tasks, then we headed back.