Days 321 through 324:

We are up bright and early and out of Stonington, past Watch Hill Light and into Block Island Sound. Steve remarks that we have been in so many sounds and starts to rattle off as many as he can remember...Hobe in FL, Altamaha, Doboy, St. Catherines, St. Simons, etc. in GA, the list goes on and on all the way up the coast. Today we will be in the last of them, Rhode Island Sound. And then there are the Bays. Buzzards Bay is coming up and then, at last, Massachusetts Bay. Somehow I think we will be wistful saying goodbye to Buzzards Bay.

We motorsail into the wind which is again coming right at us and make good time up to Point Judith, passing by Newport, preferring to go into tiny (but convenient) Sakonnet Harbor. We get one of the few town moorings and pass the night there which becomes rough and bouncy.

The next day we are out between the fish traps off Sakonnet on a windy and cold AM. It is clear, bright and beautiful, and there ahead of us in the distance is Cuttyhunk. Wow, we are really coming home!

Our familiar Buzzards Bay seems so "little" to me after Chesapeake and Delaware Bays and really the whole Atlantic coast in general. Fore sure my perspective has completely changed.

We take our turns doing our now so familiar hour on/hour off watches and power up Buzzards Bay to Marion where Chris Cunningham has gotten us a Tabor Academy mooring right next to his "Safari" for the night. We have lunch at the Beverly Yacht Club with CC Cunningham and walk around beautiful Marion. Back on the boat for chores and naps and then the Cunninghams join us for an awesome shrimp curry dinner which they brought! We have a lot of laughs and retire late saying goodbye to these good friends. They are so thrilled to have their Little Harbor 38 back in Marion after their offshore delivery and are looking forward to cruising her around their home territory.

We make our way just over to Onset Bay the next day, 7/2, and stay put there for the night as it is blowing hard out of the North. The forecast is better for the 3rd so we will make the trip home then. We are positioned here to easily hop into the Canal.

Up at the crack of dawn and into the fair Cape Cod Canal current at 6. The bloody wind is right out of the North 20 knots still, so once out into Mass Bay we are banging into it (fortunately with the tide with us). This will be a long day getting to Marblehead. It seems like everywhere we go the wind is on the nose. It has been the story of the whole winter.

Just as predicted, saying goodbye to Buzzards Bay is hard for us. Steve quips "this is our last bridge" going under the Sagamore. He estimates that we have probably been under a couple of hundred bridges!

Excited to hit the EYC dock and our mooring for the 4th and to see our family. But there is the bittersweet part of this too. Neither one of us want this to end.