Cape May to Annapolis
September 8, 2013
Today was a butt kicker. We awoke at 0445 and got underway at 0530. It took a bit to sail east and around the shoals that protect Cape May, NJ before resuming the proper track basically north. In fact, we think it adds about 4 miles to the trip up the Delaware River to the C&D Canal. Again, the trick was to time the departure so that we caught the flood tide upriver. The flood turns to ebb and that is good for west bounders in the C&D. We hit it as planned, thanks to Eldridge Tides predictions and that current carried well into the Chesapeake. It was not until the very end of our day that we hit a foul current. The result was our longest distance ever that was not an overnighter. We managed to drop anchor in Annapolis outer harbor at 2145 making the 121.7 nautical mile trip in 15 hours and 59 minutes. That is our all time best. We actually managed to do an average of 7.9 knots. Of course we were motor sailing but that comes close to hull speed. As we sailed past Chesapeake City, the usual stop for such, we were doing almost 9 knots and could not bring ourselves to let that go.
With this, our last stop before making port in Solomons Island, Maryland, we will spend our last night aboard in a temporary stop. The cruise of 2013 ends tomorrow. We have a great deal of work to do before leaving Why Knot but we will take care of her as she did for us during the past four fantastic months. We are only starting to think about the nature of the cruise of 2014. We hope it will be longer.