06/23/2010, Norwalk Islands, CT

I had to put this photo up. I think you all know that Lara takes most of the really good photos...

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Bill
06/23/2010, Norwalk Islands, CT

The Sheffield Light House.

After a very leisurely morning, we departed Port Jefferson on a broad reach across the sound. It is a weird feeling to just go sailing... we don't have a destination nor a time line. We are like tourists! So I took up a comfortable point of sail and looked ahead on the chart... Norwalk Islands. Sounds good. There was a nice breeze out of the NE and virtually no seas. Around 5pm we pulled in here. Pretty nice spot!

In the middle of the night, the fog must have rolled in, as the fog horn on the lighthouse started to sound. I could see stars in the sky, but nothing all around us. We woke to birds singing on the island and the far off sound of a train horn. Of course the occasional fishing boat rocked us.

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Bill
06/22/2010, Port Jefferson harbor

To get water we had to pull into the dock next to the Ferry.

If you click on the right hand column, where it says current position, you will see that we haven't moved very far! And, those of you who have done this kind of thing know how much effort it takes to get moving again, once "settled in" someplace. We have had a great time with Teri and Vera. Isobel especially has enjoyed raising a ruckus... and the sea calls us.

After collecting our "stuff" from all corners of the house (with Isobel "un-collecting") we loaded it on the boat via the Port Jefferson Launch. Then came the stowing away and final tweaks to the rig. After a short nap, we pulling into the dock for some water and, at sunset, motored to the far end of the harbor. We toasted the summer solstice and climbed into our bunks. We all slept well. The girls are still sleeping!

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Bill, sunny, 83, 10-15 knots
06/19/2010, Port Jefferson harbor

I has been maintenance time again. Yesterday i pulled down the genoa and inspected it for damage... and it has some. we are not sure how it happened. There is a rope sewn into the leading edge of the sail that feeds into a slot in the foil on the forestay. Somehow the material has been chafed.

Chafe is something we are always working to avoid. Anything rubbing on anything will destroy one of the two. Mostly we try to avoid having things touch. Many recreational sailor leave up their Lazy Jacks (a webbing of lines that help when lowering the main.), we stow ours once the main tied with sail ties, and deploy them when we are ready to lower the main. Leaving them up causes the lazy Jacks to chafe against the main sail all day long. from a previous owner, the stitching is worn in the area of the the Lazy Jacks.

Other maintenance: defrost the fridge and freezer, "tune the standing rigging, lubricate the roller furling for the Genoa... and look for things we can take off the boat!

Extra unused things are painful on a boat. Everything must have a place on the boat... and every place is valuable. Also, extra weight reduces performance, both under sail and when motoring.

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Bill
06/14/2010, Dorset, VT

Isobel helps Lara with the laundry in Dorset

We have left the boat on a mooring in Port Jefferson Harbor. After a few days with Lara's Mom and Grand mother, we drove to VT. We have spent most of the time cleaning up the house and getting it ready for Lily to move in. She arrives back in July and will be starting her Pie business up again. This forces us (in a good way) to clear out things and to deal with the piles left in dark corners!

We return to Port Jefferson Tomorrow to do projects on the boat and prepare for summer sailing in the NE. June we plan to sail around Long Island Sound, July will take us through Newport, Cape Cod and the Islands, and the second week in August through Mid September, we plan on being in Maine.

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Bill
06/09/2010, Miller Place, NY

Isobel ends up on top during a rough house session with Nana

the boat is tied to a mooring in Port Jefferson. now we are one of several hundred boats moored or anchored in the harbor. Many times we have taken the ferry across the sound and looked out at the different boats, commenting on the ones we liked the lines of, or ones that looked like offshore boats. Now, here we are, part of the scenery.

Port Jefferson is close to Lara's Mom's house, so we can do some work on the boat and she can play with Isobel some.

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Bill
06/08/2010, Long Island Sound, off Hempstead

Another sail change

We drifted off the mooring this morning in Port Washington. We finally had to motor out of Manhassett Bay even though the forecast was for 10 to 15 knots. At the point, the wind piped up to 12 and we sailed for a few hours... and the wind died and the Sound turned to a glassy surface, barely rippled. Next the wind was 10 knots and just before I put the spinnaker up... it was blowing 15, then 17, then 20. We reefed down the main... for an hour we were doing 7 or more knots with some current with us. The wind dropped to 10 knots and we shook the reefs out. Then it was 20 again and we put them back in. you get the point. It was an active day.

And you can tell by the photo that it was crystal clear and a really spectacular day on the sound. I thought about how big the sound seemed when we first entered it in the spring of 2008 when we sailed Sunrise for the first time outside of Narragansett Bay. The distances seemed huge, the weather daunting and the boat strange. Now, hey we have a short 30 miles to sail today and you can see CT across the way. We continue to dial in the boat, but we are now starting to look at more fine adjustments to the rig tune and sail track... feels good...

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Bill
06/08/2010, Long Island Sound, off Hempstead

Sailing into New York Harbor with 20 knots of wind and a knot of current with us.

Maybe it is the crystal clear June weather. Maybe it was a good night's sleep, maybe it is because we have sailed here before.... but Long Island Sound doesn't seem so big anymore! Of course the last time we were here was October, and it was not nice weather. It seemed that we were always leaving late and getting into anchorages late. Today we have 30 miles to go to Port Jefferson... and that is nothing, especially with a forecast of NW winds of 10 knots and the current with us.

In Cape May, NJ we were able to pick up a copy of Eldridge's, which provides all the tide and current information for the east coast. We realized that our old book was good through 2009... so we did the Chesapeake and Delaware Bay using Tides and Currents off the chart plotter, which we don't feel is always correct. Using the current tables, yesterday we always had the current with us across Raritan Bay, around Manhattan, up the East River and into Manhasset Bay. We were worried when we saw other boats headed out at 9 am for the same destination... They must have stopped along the way or fought the 3 knot currents in the East River.

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Bill
06/07/2010, Atlantic highlands, NJ

Isobel hangs out with the local skate board gang.

Yesterday we had a day ashore to do laundry, food shop, and hang out. Atlantic Highlands is a very nice little community and I would recommend it as a great stopover for cruisers. The village doesn't have the normal seaside T-shirt shops, instead it is a "real" town with restaurants of all sorts, a small, well stocked, local owned, marine store, and a very nice food store for provisioning.

Last night the front (Line of clouds you can see in yesterday's post) came through with all the ferocity of a winter cold front. The wind blew sustained 25 with gusts to 30, and the wind clocked from west to north. Boats dragged in the anchorage and swung wildly at anchor. We had to secure all the canvas (mostly our aging sail cover) to keep it from flogging itself to pieces (and driving us crazy). We watched two poor boats who had anchored East of the breakwater, getting rolled and bounced by the chop that came across Raritan Bay.

Today we will wait until 1:00 pm to depart. This way we can use the current to our advantage up through the Verrazano Narrows, past Manhattan and through the East River into Long Island Sound.

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Bill
06/06/2010, Atlantic highlands, NJ

The Verrazano bridge in the distance.

We departed Barnegat Inlet around 9 am amongst lots of fishing boats competing for the fish that must feed in the current... as there was a huge volume of water flowing out through the inlet. Once out and clear of the inlet the conditions were perfect for a sail north, just a few miles off the beaches of the Jersey Shore. In the morning 10 to 15 and in the afternoon, 15 to 20 on a beam reach, which is the fastest point of sail for us. All day we raced along keeping up with a couple other boats that were motoring...

And then, out of the haze, we could see the Verrazano Bridge and Far Rockaway NY! All of a sudden we are back in familiar waters after traveling 4681 nautical miles...

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