Mystic, CT to Dismal Swamp

Well we made it to the Dismal Swamp located in VA and NC as it is raining today it is pretty dismal!! OK here we go.. As you can see the day we left it was pretty cold as we said good-bye to family and friends. We powered out of the Mystic River and as the railroad bridge closed behind us we wondered when we would be back this way again (and were we crazy to leave in the threat of snow flurries!!!)

Once we cleared the mooring field in Noank harbor we rolled out the jib and sailed through Wiccapisset and headed around Montauk. The seas were lumpy and the wind was howling but it was behind us....As we rounded Montauk and started down the coast of Long Island we readied the boat for night watches. OK lets say that I did prepare a few meals so that it would be easy to prepare dinner but I can tell you that a fully loaded container of chicken soup trying to be loaded into a pot while the boat is rolling from side to side is not recommended (at least by someone who is a bit out of practise) and I am sure to be cleaning up chicken soup out of crevices for months to come. The captain did have a hot meal but the first mate ended up with a bout of sea sickness and the "admiral" was wondering why her house was rolling from side to side and bits were crashing about inside. We cranked through the night. Watches were a bit out of whack as it was our first passage in a long time. We started out with 2 hour shifts and that was about all you could handle in the cold. It was cold but the night sky was spectacular!! We had one mishap in the night...Dave rescued our lazy jacks as they had come loose and were trying to rid themselves overboard.

Morning dawned....

And no matter how many times I tried to tell myself that the sky was only a little bit pink it soon became evident that it was anything but "Blood" red. We checked the weather, grib files, etc closely for the week leading up to departure and no where did it say that we would be getting strong W SW winds...we did expect some but they were supposed to light...soooo we had planned for them ... we sailed west while we could and figured if the W SW winds came they would be light and we could make up our southing. OK lets just say there are some things you should never do...count on forecasters being right (unless it is Herb) and think that you have made/making great time and might be in , after 2 nights instead of 3....the weather/wind gods don't like that!!

After the sun came up the winds filled in...you guessed it from the W SW and guess what they were not light they were 20-25k with gusts to 30k...that's OK we told ourselves they are supposed to go back to the west and then NW....right!! During the day we had some visitors...I saw a pod of about 100 dolphins...and this always brings a smile to your face even when you are still feeling not so good!! The other visitors were not so welcome...birds...I don't care if they are supposed to bring good luck, bad luck or indifferent luck I don't like them (probably saw " The Birds" one too many times) especially when they land on you!! No pictures as I was busy trying to shoo them away and Dave was catching some much needed shut eye. Well it was Halloween after all so I guess we were in need of some spookiness. We never saw the NW winds so we ended up double reefing the mainsail and slowing the boat up so we could wait the wind to come around to the NE/N. We are here to say that Echo can not only get up and move....she screams!!

Tilley made sure the drogue was ready...but we never needed it!! On Saturday evening the wind/seas finally died down so we decided to power for "awhile" to make up some westing. We had a few "moments" with the motor. During the night we had a close encounter with a freighter and had to take her out of gear and lo and behold we had no gears...it had slipped out...no problem as Dave was able to fix. Our next problem came when we finally shut down late Sunday morning...we discovered that the alternator arm had snapped a bolt..once again Dave solved the problem in record time. Have I said Echo can sail ...well when the wind finally came up out of the NE we unrolled the jib and took off...surfing down the waves and headed towards the Chesapeake Bay!! As you can see it is still cold!!

We sailed all the way into the Bay and through (over) the Bay/Tunnel bridge. We sailed up the channel sharing it with the likes of Freighters and Tugs!!

In fact we sailed the whole channel right up to about a mile from our anchorage in Hampton Roads/Mill creek.We arrived at 8:30pm!! We were glad to have the anchor down and a glass of red wine!!

The next day we headed off towards the dismal swamp.... Where we ended up with a Free Dock (we like free...thanks Skipper Bob) we were able to squeeze Echo along side!! We headed off the next morning to the next "free" dock where we will wait out some weather headed our way!!

Dave had a little help helming the boat!! More later....