Sunday, June 04, 2006 Cat Cay Bahamas! With Eric Jr., Jack Clark and Jared Clark onboard Devante’s Dream with Eric Langley, Sr.
Wednesday
We drove to Key West in my car (Jane was PO’d that I would not rent a van for $500 and still is as far as I know) and Eric was very sick and barfed out the window. But he was a trooper and hung in there. We arrived on Wed night and did shopping the next day and setting up.
Friday
Eric took his first Open Water Diver certification course, Jack and I and Jared dove as well. After a little hesitancy Jack did great and was real excited about more diving.
Saturday
Eric finished his open water and Jack and Jared dove. I took the morning off to setup for the passage to the Bahamas. We got back to the boat, cleaned up and departed for Bimini at 5:30 PM. 
Monday, June 05, 2006
Sailed from Cat Cay to Bimini and caught two Dolphin (Mahi-Mahi) which we cooked up for dinner along with steaks that we had to eat. The channel into Bimini is new, well marked, deep and wide. We pulled up to Seacrest Marina and cleaned the fish and got ice. It’s only $55 per night (with power) to dock so we are staying here. It’s a fisherman’s marina with small boats from Florida docked and staying at the hotel units. There is one other sailboat from Florida here. It was a Bahamian holiday so I could not get a cell phone. I’ll do that today. In the afternoon we headed out and dove on The Caverns, a site that I had the GPS coords for and had a mooring. The water was clear to 70’ and the dive was great. We hung out there for 5 hours. Jared was in the water for a long time and I made him get out. He then got sun stroke and we made him drink ice water and sit in the shade. He felt better once we got back to the dock and took a cold shower. We all cleaned up the boat and stuff and had a great dinner inside in the air conditioning! After dinner, sleep!
Thursday, June 08, 2006
We are now at Lighthouse Marina in Fresh Creek Andros (pronounced Ahndros). Here’s how we 
got here. On Tuesday the 6th I purchased a Bahamas cell phone (slow process) and we rented four dive tanks form Scuba Bimini, John was very helpful. Getting to their location was an adventure in itself. Jack commented that the channel to their dock was like going up the Amazon River, actually it was scarier! We passed multiple wrecks and decrypted docks and unfinished or gutted houses. The pictures should tell that story better than I can. Then the channel got real shallow and I even turned around to leave but I flagged a guy on a jet ski and asked him about the channel depth and he said it was fine so we went back in. We made it with 8 inches to spare under the keel. We also had our tanks filled for just $9 bucks a piece, cheap! 
All this took a while and we did not get out to the reef until 2:00 PM. I wanted to dive the Bimini Trader wreck which is in about 85’ of water. When we got on site there was no mooring ball so we had to anchor. There was a strong current which we thought would be mitigated on the botoom. When Jared and I descended down the dive line that we dropped of the stern it was not. We had to kick like crazy just to keep up with the boat. At the bottom the current was just as strong. We went into it as much as we could and the across to look at the wreck. We didn’t get on the main vessel but we did see some interesting machinery scattered around. We had to work so hard to keep position that we sucked down our air very quickly. We tried to swim back towards the boat but the current took us away. By the time we made it to the surface we were way to far to swim back. I signaled the X sign to Jack which means come get us we are too tired. It took Eric and Jack and while to get the lines in and the anchor up. Jared had his little yellow tube so he inflated that to show our position. So we got some sun while we waited in the water. We later came to find out that Jack was very concerned about our drifting but we were okay, just needing to be picked up. In hindsight we should have done the entire dive as a drift dive right off Devante’s Dream with a weighted line. Scuba Bimini later said that had trouble with the current as well.
Jack and Eric Jr. did the next dive on another reef further up along the coast of North Bimini. There was no current and it was only 45’ deep. Jack looked comfortable. When they came back up he went back down with Jared and then swam around the boat for another hour. Happy camper, er, diver. However, this all was a lot of work we had eight (8) dive tanks in Devante’s Dreams’ port locker. These all had to be moved around and setup for each dive. Eric handled most of them. Very tiring!
When we got done diving we stayed on the mooring ball were trying to decide about a night dive. However we were all beat at that point so Jack broke out the rum and cigars and we wiled away the evening watching the sun set and talking about family. Later I made bacon and French Toast English muffins (we didn’t have any bread) and then collapsed in bed, comforted by the steady drone of the generator and air conditioning on the calm seas.
Okay! Whose idea was this to stay at sea… by 1:30 AM Jack was looking for the Tums as large rollers (waves but not breaking) started to come in from the North West. However, Devante’s Dream was facing North East with the wind and current. So we got tossed from side to side like a giant pendulum. Not, I repeat, Not comfortable. As soon as the sun rose on Wednesday June 7th I started the engine and headed for the harbor. I had had enough of that, only sleeping for a couple of hours. We docked at Scuba Bimini (going past the wrecks again) and returned their tanks and refilled ours. We spoke with John again and he gave us some helpful advice for getting to Andros via the Grand Bahama Bank via North Rock, which I took to heart. The way that I was planning on going was f’ining shallow he said… you had to be there. Scuba Bimini had a giant hammerhead shark on their bar wall. I would go back there and dive with them. They are nice folks.
So… we went back to North Bimini, Scuba Bimini is on South Bimini which is only about 100 yards via water and filled up on fuel and bread and headed out for Andros at 11:30 AM. Our passage was great to start with, nice breeze and Jack and I caught two nice Barracuda which we unfortunately had to clean on the boat, getting scales everywhere and just generally making a bloody smelly mess. But it was worth it. However, the wind stayed on our nose the whole way and we were just barely able to put up the sails. The day before had been calm but now we had a head wind and some seas. We ended up having them for about 15 hours. But we made it to Andros at 7:30 Thursday June 8th none the worse for wear. We have just been chilling today. Sleeping and eating. There is a crab festival here this weekend we may do that or we may have the restaurant cook our fish for us tonight, who knows!
Saturday, June 10, 2006 0630 for Thursday June 8th and Friday June 9th Fresh Creek Andros Wow. We couldn’t have planned this expedition any better. Thursday was a down day, basically just recovering from the passage although I did clean the inside of the boat extensively and the boys washed down the outside decks. Thursday night we had the Lighthouse Marina restaurant cook our Barracuda which Jack had expertly filleted earlier on the dock. It’s messy work but we got to speak with the locals while doing so. In the afternoon Jack and I went into the kitchen and met the cook, Kimberly, and we arranged to eat at 7:30 and have her cook the fish a variety of ways. Then we chilled out with rum and Cuban cigars. At 7:30 we went into the restaurant and immediately we received our dinner plates with crab rice and slaw and a big basket of corn bread. Then the fish plate was brought out in no less than 5 minutes, loaded with fried, blackened and steamed fish. We gorged ourselves on Barracuda till we could eat no more and pronounced the blackened and fried that most liked. The blackened definitely gave you pause for more bread! Note: Later I found myself hunkering for more of the steamed Bahamian style with it’s grilled onions and tomato sauce. Very tasty.
Earlier I called over to Small Hope Bay Lodge just north of where we are docked and inquired about diving with them. They are now the only dive operation here. Mike indicated that we should be at the dock at 8:30 but when I went to order a taxi for the following morning after dinner the receptionist said they had called and could not fit us on the boat. We we’re all very discouraged about this. Yes, we can dive of DD but we only have four tanks and we don’t know the dive sites here. They are kept very secret! I called Mike to see if we could squeeze on but got his voice mail and left my number. We played some cards and went to bed. The next morning the phone rang at 7:15 AM and it was Mike, after seeing who was diving he determined that we could fit. So I woke everyone up right away and we started to scramble to get our stuff together. I ordered a taxi and sandwiches from the kitchen (awesome bacon, egg and cheese that we ate at Small Hope). We had a great taxi ride with Johnnie who seems to know everyone and everything about Andros, even telling us how much houses were selling for (a house across from the beach on a 100x100 lot could be had for $90,000). He dropped up off at Small Hope Lodge which is right on the beach and ancient by Andros standards having been built in 1965. We took our gear out to the end of the dock and loaded onto the tri-maran pontoon boat (after eating our sandwiches under the palm trees at a picnic table) and prepped our stuff.
The boat was full with about 18 divers. There was one large group of about 11 guys. One guy, Bill, a full sized Laurel Hardy was the butt of many jokes and cracked a lot of his on. He forgot his sea card for diving but they found a way to get him on board after much finagling, then he found it in his wallet. Eric Jr. took a picture of him and Moose (our dive master) with it.
We dove a relatively shallow dive for our first dive at 70’ with a sea of coral as far as the eye could see. I was glad I wore my wetsuit after watching Shawn (our other dive master) put his on, it was 80 degrees but felt a lot colder with the cloudy sky. Everyone was getting acclimated to diving after a long lay off. Then another morning dive on a shallower reef. We can in for lunch which was a buffet on the beach with sandwiches, roast pork and a great chocolate bundt cake. Our afternoon 1 tank dive was on the wreck of the Marion, a navy barge that sank 25 years ago due to overloading it’s crane. Wow! Swim under the wreck, swim through the wreck in crystal clear water. Even Jack did the swim trough. We stayed down for about 40 minutes getting pictures and smiling from ear to ear! We got back to the dock and easily dunked our equipment in fresh water and had a place to store it right at the dock, just like storing your skies at the mountain, kinda like dive in dive out. We showered with warm water. Johnnie picked us up right on time and we headed back to DD.
As we walked to the dock Jack commented that another sailboat that had arrived had a lot of dive tanks on deck. I went over a started talking to the party and ended up having a long conversation with Bob Jonas, a professor that has been coming to Andros for many years. He offered me the GPS coordinate for all the dive sites here which I copied by taking a picture of them with the digital camera, kinda like a spy. He told us stories about the divers on the island and deep diving and blue holes and intrigue. Very cool.
Then Jack and I grabbed some rum and more Cubans, attempting to offer them to Bob’s son Scott and his friend Kyle but they wouldn’t have anything to do with us, as I figured. So we sat 
on the dock at an open space to the rear of their boat and watched the sun go down talking, drinking our rum and smoking our Cubans. A black man came over and asked us if we needed cigars(he had a bag full on his hip). We told him that we had purchased a bunch of them in Bimini. He said that we could have bought them from him for what amounted to being 50% less. We invited him to sit down and talk with us which he accepted, sitting down with his legs over the edge of the dock as we were. We learned all about Alfred Jr.’s family and the cigar trade in the Bahamas. He was very personable and we shared about each others lifestyle. He was waiting for the ferry to come in from Nassau with some friends to go to the Crab fest. Oh yea, we just happened to pull in here this weekend for the biggest festival in Andros, or the Big Yard as it is called. This huge 150 mega yacht is docked right in front of us and we talk about it’s owner and money.
That night we all went to the crab fest by walking across the Fresh Creek bridge. It was only 5 bucks to get in and there were about 100 booths of food from local vendors. We got baked crab and crab rice with beets. Eric got ribs. We ate them semi-standing at the picnic tables as it was very crowded. Then Jack and I shooed the boys away to go wander around. The bands were getting ready after the national anthem was sung and the speeches made. Jack and I struck up a conversation with two nice black ladies from Nassau that helped us get strawberry daiquiris with some Rum added. While we were doing that hundreds of crabs were released into the audience and there was much screaming and running around as crabs with long claws clamored through crowd. Young girls stood screaming on the table near us like mice were under there feet and the boys chased the crabs and held them up and chased the girls with them.
Pandemonium! Then those that caught crabs, some of them one in each hand, put them into boxes and saved them to eat later. Then the music started and we swayed to the beat. We found out that as this was just the first night that tomorrow night will be on the wilder side as the crowd was trying to get into it. We left just after midnight but the music didn’t stop until 5:00 AM and then the rooster crowed! I had to get up at 6:00 today to get these words down as there is just no other time! Back out on the reef today.
Monday, June 12, 2006 0800 These are the notes for Saturday and Sunday. Saturday morning Mike called from SHBL to say that we could not dive with them that day as the boat was full. Too bad, so Jack and Jared went to get the dive gear so that we could dive off the boat. Jack called me when he got there and they said that we could dive with them in the afternoon for the Shark Dive that we had signed up for, which was scheduled for 2:00 PM, yippee! We don’t have to dive off the boat.
Eric and I (mostly I) put the dinghy together and cleaned up the boat. When Jared got back we put on the engine (total assembly time :45 minutes) and headed out for some exploring. We went up Fresh Creek which is very clear and you can always see the bottom. In some places it is 15’ deep. We went up the harbor and under the low bridge (a shame) up the creek. There were a few spots were it was 3-4’ but then got real deep again. We could see a derelict barge just up the river. There are about 8-10 houses on the left had side that are nicely maintained with lush landscaping and none on the right hand side. As we went along on there was one compound with a lot of palm tree’s, hammocks, sitting docks and such. I could see a woman (white) mowing her lawn so we dinghyed over to their dock and tied up. Jared did not bring his shoes so he could not take a walk with me on the property so I went to talk with her myself.
When she saw me walking up she stopped mowing the lawn and came towards me. We shook hands and she introduced herself, Laurie Robinson. I complimented her on her property. She said she had lived there for 18 years and that she and her husband worked at the Autec Navy base. Her grandparents are purchased the property in 1972 when they came to work on the base. She inherited it from them. Her uncle owned the lot next door. “Oh and by the way that lot is for sale. It hasn’t been listed yet or even a sign put out.” “Oh really? So the property line is here?” “Yes, it’s along the line of palm tree’s lining the driveway. It’s 1.1 acres and has those two buildings. “
Hmm. Why is it that I always find property that is not listed for sale yet? So I asked her how much he was asking for it and she said $225,000. Not bad I said and walked around a little. Laurie offered to give me her uncles number so we went over to her house and she invited me in to a very nice typical CBS Florida style home with a fireplace. She had a copy of the plot plan which she gave me and put his number on it. I thanked her and went back to where Jared was. We dinghyed back and took a nap before the Shark Dive.
Around 1300 Johnnie picked us up for the ride over to SHBL. We chatted with the guys that we dove with the day before. On this trip the owner, Jeff Birch, and his son, Jeff Jr., accompanied us and told us stories about the island and it’s history. He’s been living here since he was 4. Our Shark Dive was on a sandy bottom with some large coral heads in about 50’ of water. They tied a frozen ball of chum onto a chain. We all descended to the bottom and sat in a half circle then they lowered the chum ball. The sharks darted in and around the ball, taking big chunks as they went by. After it started we were allowed to swim around the sharks and also over the top. Very cool.
There were about 5 sharks, mostly female reef sharks. They didn’t seem too hungry but they kept at it. Eventually the chum ball broke up in the warm water and fell off the chain on the sandy bottom being chased by the sharks (this is called the “rodeo”). The ball bounced toward Bill (we also call him Bubba and he is the life of the party) and he ended up with sharks all around him and backing up into them even though the Dive Master Shawn was signaling him to come towards him. His eyes were wide as saucers! Once the chum ball was pretty much gone a few of the divers went over to where it was attached to the bottom to look for shark teeth that can fall off during the feeding. Well some of the sharks were still looking for food too and Rodney and Bill (same Bill) got tangled up with one of the sharks. Rodney was practically riding one of them and then it went right under Bill. Eric was taking pictures and video the whole time and he got some great shots of this and other scenes. Very cool dive and I felt very safe. Jack and Jared did great as well.
We taxied back to the boat with Jonnie and took a nap. Around 1800 we all took a walk to the property that Jared and I had found. The gravel road runs 400’ off and alongside the river. There was one new house (clean) and one local duplex (dumpy but not too bad) on the left. On the right along the river were well maintained and landscaped homes. Not too far in was a nice hacienda that was actually a nursery with lots of plants and lush landscaping, very pretty. More nice homes and then we got to the property. It has a huge front yard that is all landscaped with palms and various tree’s. Laurie said that her grandmother spent a lot of time of the landscaping over the 20+ years that she lived there.
Jack was stunned. You could see the river from the front yard and we walked across and over to the shoreline. It’s a natural rock wall with very deep water (crystal clear) flowing but. The wall has been cut perfectly straight by the water. There is a bit of a dock and a high ridge from which you get a nice breeze. We walked along the shore which faces North West. You get a nice sunset along the river but not too much west so that you get blasted by it. Jack asked me if he could go in with me on it. Sure man….
We went back to the boat and had cigars and rum on the dock for several hours talking and just having a ball. Jared smoked Jack’s last Monte Cristo cigar. It was good. We went to Crab Fest around 2300 for dinner and music. There were a lot of people there from Nassau that had been coming in on the ferry all day. We stayed there till about 0130 having met the guys from SHBL and the ladies that Jack and I had met the night before. Later we went with the ladies to the local’s place on the beach, Skinny’s and danced till 0330. Eric and Jack went right to the front. Later Jack said it felt like a freight train was driving through him it was so loud. He was also soaked from head to toe. Awesome sea of black humanity. There were only about 8 white people among the hundreds of blacks. We were four of them. Eric saw Jeff Jr. from the Lodge go right in through the line….. We crashed on the boat at 0415 after talking for a while. My feet were killing me from walking in my sandals, with blister on the edges and just real sore. I got up at 0700 and called the Lodge a little later to see if we could dive. I had to call Jeff on his cell phone. He said he would check and call me back.
No problem. We’re diving The Blue Hole! I rustled everyone up and got Johnnie to give us a ride. The dive boat was packed but we were all real quite having but up late but excited. We went out through moderate seas so we had to keep towards the back of the boat. Once on site we all geared up together and stayed on board. Then we all went to 20’ depth to keep together. We followed Rod into the hole through a narrow opening. It was very dramatic. We descended to around 90’ and you could look up and see light streaming through the rocks. We were in the Starlight room. Eric Jr. was taking video. I was directly behind the dive master and Eric was behind me. Everyone else was single file back to the last dive master. Shannon (another dive instructor) was taking a video as well. Eric pulled up along side me. I thought he was trying to show me something but he cut his hand across his throat. No air signal! I pulled off my Octo (spare air source) and give it to him and he started breathing threw it. I had no idea what the problem was. We stopped going forward. I signaled to ascend and asked if he was okay. He indicated he was. We made a normal slow ascent. The dive master was too far ahead to let him know that we were going up. Shannon saw us and I indicated to her that we were all right. We did a short safety stop at 20’ and then broke the surface. “F___’ing scary”.
Eric put his snorkel him and we swam on the surface back to the boat. We got back aboard and Eric sat down with his head down. Shocked and obviously contemplating life. I went over to check his regulator and was able to breathe properly. I checked his Octo and it worked as well. I turned his valve to the right as if tightening it and it tightened to the stops after just a quarter of a turn! His valve had been barely open. His tank valve setup was not a normal one. They had run out of regular tanks so Eric had a tank that supported dual tanks. The valve knob was on the right side as opposed to the left side. Evidently what happened was that he turned the valve to the rear of the tank as you normally would except that it is being tightened in that direction. Now we triple check the valve!
Sunday, June 4, 2006
The Boys on DD Summer 2006 - June 6
Thursday, December 29, 2005
Annapolis to Key West - Fall/Winter 2005
Devante’s Dream arrived at Key West Thursday December 29th at 12:30 PM. Eric Sr., Jane, Eric Jr and Elizabeth Langley were on board after an overnight passage from Miami Beach having departed the previous day at 3:00 PM. We had a foul (against us) wind and current (but thankfully clear skies and no rain) just about the whole way, eventually facing 20 knots on the nose and 4 to 6 foot seas for the last five hours. Yuck! We had to motor that entire segment of the passage.
We had begun our portion of the delivery at Cape Canaveral on Tuesday December 26 at 0745. An offshore wind of 10-15 knots was called for in the forecast which meant that the waves would somewhat lessened as we were sticking close to the Florida coast to stay out of the Gulf Stream. The day started with flat calm seas and DD motoring out of Port Canaveral past the Disney cruise ships gleaming in the rising sun on a crisp clear (read cold) winter day. Elizabeth and Jane liked
the calm seas. But before long the wind kicked in and we raised the sails. 10 knots, 15 knots, 20 knots, higher gusts. “Eric (to my son Eric Jr.) do you think we should reef the main?” “No we’re doing fine”, he flatly replied. Then 25 knots steady for quite a while.I tried my hand at hand steering the boat and took the auto-helm off. We immediately headed to wind under a heavy weather helm. I put the auto-helm back on and reefed the head sail three notches. A little while later I let everyone know that I was going to head to wind and reef the main. It was then that we realized that the seas had gotten quite a bit bigger as I started the motor to head into the wind and lower the main to the first reefing point.
Bearing off the weather the helm was much better. We ran at about 120 degrees off the wind in just about a perfect following sea. We were surfing! Once in a while I checked the peak wind gust and boat speed readings; 35 knots and 8.5 knots respectively. We’re making great time. I ran the watches for most of the day while Eric Jr. and Elizabeth slept.
That evening we broke into two hour watches. Jane got the 0100 to 0300 watch. She glanced over her shoulder at the following seas and said to herself, “Oh my. Those are really big waves. But we appear to be all right!” Everyone else was asleep at the time. She did a great job for her first overnight watch at sea!
When I took my watch and checked the max speeds we had had 9.1 knots of boat speed through the water and 40.5 knots of peak winds. Wow, this might have been more than we bargained for but we were doing fine. That was a special passage for me. I was able to watch the sun set, the moon rise and then the sunrise. We made Miami Beach in just over 25 hours at 0930 covering about 180 miles.
Devante’s Dream started her passage to Key West from Annapolis MD. Here’s some notes from the other segments of the passage.
My father, Captain Elbert Errol Langley II, passed away on Saturday December 3rd at 7:10 PM. I was holding his hand. I had spent the previous few weeks visiting him regularly and the last few days at his bedside so I was unable to set a departure date from Annapolis for Devante’s Dream, which was originally planned for October 11th. Eventually I determined to have a friend of mine, Paul Warner, who I race with on Lake Lanier in GA, skipper the passage without me.
Since Devante’s Dream left Annapolis Sunday December 4th at 5:00 PM it took a total of 25 days to get to Key West. The passage was started by Paul Warner, Bob Bumgardner and Kevin Sullivan. Paul and Bob are both from GA and longtime friends, Kevin Sullivan was a local crew member added from a local Maryland crew listing.
Snow was in the forecast so they started with a night passage to try and get ahead of the storm. They were doing well until Kevin Sullivan was on watch at 0500 and Devante’s Dream was driven into Smith’s Point shoal, hard and fast in the mud. While Paul and Bob were trying get free from the mud Kevin was down below calling for a tow boat! Later he was trying to get the dinghy off the deck so he could row to shore! Then, when the tow boat arrived, Kevin tried to jump on the tow boat with all of his gear, in other words abandoning the ship and his crewmates. Needless to say the tow boat captain would not allow him to do this until they had at least tried to free the boat from the shoal.This was impossible as the tide had gone out since the boat ran aground so the had to wait until the tide came back in, at 2:00 PM, in order to pull her off and get a tow back to the marina - in freezing rain (are you getting the gist of this?). The next day Kevin actually came back down to boat at the marina and asked to get back on board. Paul and Bob said no thanks. Kevin also sent me an email but I would not read it.
So the first 24 hours had a grounding and desertion. That left Paul and Bob to continue the passage. That meant no offshore sailing which was in the passage plan. When I found out what was happening I told Paul that I would come down to the boat after my father’s funeral which was on Friday December 9th (in a snowstorm in Hampton NH). I scheduled my flight on Saturday to go to Wilmington NC from Boston MA hoping that the boat might be able to make it there by then.
That didn’t happen as Paul and Bob had terrible weather for several days (although not all in a
row) and only made it to Oriental NC. It was just as well. I rented a car from Wilmington NC on Sunday (not Saturday because I missed my connecting flight on Saturday) and stayed at the Inn at Oriental Sunday night (very nice). Monday afternoon DD pulled into Oriental (after a pit stop on the bar at Whittaker Creek – Tow Boat US again) and we hauled her out to check for damage to the rudder prior to going to sea. The GPS and stern light were also out so we needed to get repairs anyway.The rudder had minor damage which was easily repaired. The GPS needed to be replaced and the stern light was disconnected during the installation of the generator. We had to run wiring for both of these which took several hours. Many thanks to SailCraft Marina for their excellent service! We pulled out of Oriental at 3:00 PM on Tuesday and headed out to sea via Beaufort NC inlet. We planned to sail to Cape Canaveral, hopefully in 2-3 days.
We started with a beautiful night of sailing out towards Cape Fear and Frying Pan Shoals with a northerly tail wind. Next day we had a dolphin show for two hours. Either the dolphins were trained (two of them jumped into a barrel roll at the same time) or dolphin trainers don’t have much to do. Later in the day I was listening to the VHF weather radio and was hearing words like “gale” and “9 to 11 waves” and “40 knots” forecast for the next night and I decided that we should seek shelter.
We were pretty far from shore and the best option was Charleston SC, which was in the direction we were going, but it was still 120 miles away. We should start the engine to get out of the Gulf Stream current that we were fighting a little bit. Turn the key, rrrrr, rrrrr, rrrrr. NOT STARTING! Okay, we need to sail as fast as we can towards Charleston. Oh and by the way we need to turn off all the unnecessary electronics to conserve battery power, so no coffee!
Not more than an hour or two later the weather turned nasty with biting cold north wind and whipped up seas. Since we were surfing a quartering sea the auto-helm was not working correctly. We had to manually steer and the best we could maintain was 230 – 270 while trying to steer 240.
We made it to within a few hours of Charleston and figured we’d give the engine another try. RRMMM, started right up. YES! So we motored into Charleston (although still very cold and now wet) at around 0200. Stay that night, get breakfast and wait out the weather that day and then dinner that night. Watch out for the 9.5’ tide at Charleston. We almost ending up hanging by our dock lines on the non-floating dock!
That night we decided we would keep going down the Intracoastal to Beaufort SC and then on to Savannah GA, where Bob Bumgardner’s son lives. So the next morning at dawn we cast off and headed south for the ICW entrance right next to the marina. Not ¼ mile up the river is our first bridge and he won’t open until 9:00 AM but we got lucky as a commercial tug boat was coming north bound that requested an opening, so we went through after him.
We navigated the ICW past lushly landscaped plantation style homes on the water with sweeping vistas and stately trees, absolutely smooth water but still pretty chilly at about 40 degrees. We ran on the main drag and eventually spotted a lot of dolphin, both fishing and following us. Then the waterway widened and there were beaches along the shore. Beaches? Why would there be beaches on the ICW. The answer, we were not on the ICW anymore. We missed the turn back there a while ago. It must have been that little unmarked creek bend.
We were in the St. Helena inlet! Now what? Turn around? No, that would waste time. I guess we are going to sea. Let’s get our foulies on. More dolphins and an absolutely beautiful inlet. So we ran offshore with a very light following breeze. We tried to put up sails but the boat speed was faster than the wind. We aimed for Savannah.
There are quite a few shoals off the SC and GA coast so we had to stay offshore quite a ways. It was in the afternoon when we hit the ocean so most of the passage was at night. We made landfall at the Savannah River at about 0130 and spent two hours going up the Savannah River and a section of the ICW to Thunderbolt GA. Luckily we had a fair current and made good time for the 14 miles we needed to traverse to get to the marina.
At one point we were on the ICW and looking for markers and I figured it would be a good idea to have the search light on deck. I had installed a 12 volt outlet for the light in the anchor locker so that someone could plug it in at the bow and shine the light forward. Bob hooked up the light and tested it. It was working. I asked him to shine it forward to test it. When he did there was an unlit (it was supposed to be) marker not 15 feet in front of the bow. Quick! Turn left and avoid the marker! Unreal.
Then we got a little messed up in a tricky section of the river and needed to shine the light to find the shore. Yup, that’s grass. We can’t go that way. How about we go towards the lights down the river. Okay, lets. We pulled into Thunderbolt at 0330. Why are we always pulling into port at 3AM?
The next day and for the next few days the weather was going to be bad. It was Sunday the 18th. We would not be able to depart until Tuesday. Even if we went 24/7 we would not arrive in Key West until Christmas Eve. We’re not going to make it. We’re getting off the boat. I rented a car and the three of us drove back to Atlanta, pretty dejected that we did not make Key West, but we tried hard. Paul and Bob had been on the boat for two weeks and we only made Savannah. There were a lot of down days for weather (to be expected in December) and repairs.
I spoke with Florida Yacht Charters and they arranged for a delivery captain to get on board and keep the boat moving, even if only on the ICW. Russ Snyder came on board on the 20th and made Cape Canaveral in 5 days of mostly running on the ICW. That’s were I got back on board with my family to complete the delivery.
So complete's the passage to Key West for Devante's Dream originally planned for Oct 9th throug the 23rd!
11/17/05 Update - Upgrades finished! Generator (30 amps of AC power), chart plotter at the helm, shore water hook-up, salon table to a bed conversion, dinghy motor lift and more!
11/10/05 Update - New proposed departure date is Saturday December 3rd. We're skipping the Bahamas so we can get to Key West quicker, taking the Gulf Stream counter current offshore from Beaufort to Cape Canaveral FL then skirting the coast to Key West. Estimating about 10 days to Key West from Annapolis
10/23/05 Update - Due to annual maintenance and upgrades being performed on Devante's Dream in Annapolis MD the October passage to Key West has been delayed. Good thing!
We'd have been going right into the teeth of Hurricane Wilma this week.
Devante’s Dream will make a passage from Annapolis MD to Key West FL in October of 2005 with four legs:
Annapolis MD to Beaufort NC (5 days), October 9th – 14th
Beaufort NC to Marsh Harbor Bahamas (4 days), October 15th – 18th
Marsh Harbor to Bimini Bahamas (4-7 days), October 19th – 24th
Bimini to Key West FL (2-3 days, plus 2-3 layover days), October 25th – 29th
Scheduled to be on board from Beaufort NC to Key West are Eric Langley, Paul Warner and Bob Bumgardner.
Friday, July 15, 2005
Martha's Vineyard Round The Island Race July 2005
Island Race July 2005
On Thursday July 14th Devante’s Dream was sleepily moored in Edgartown harbor on “someone’s” mooring ball. She (and her crew of three) had just completed a 375 nautical mile passage lasting just under three days; arriving at 3:00 AM (see Annapolis to Martha’s Vineyard passage notes). The next phase of the expedition was to prepare for the Martha’s Vineyard Round the Island Race hosted by the venerable Edgartown Yacht Club. Tom Cobin, Paul Reed (both of Annapolis) and Eric Langley (owner of DD) were on board.
Your author, Eric Langley, had got in his mind that he would like to race his unquestionably “configured for cruising” Jeanneau 40.3. As a testament to the configuration Paul pointedly asked upon our departure from Annapolis, “Where is all this stuff going when we race?” Meaning, we have a lot of extra gear that weighs a lot. Stuff like inflatable kayaks and grills and flat screen tv’s and such. Well, it stayed on the boat, although it didn’t matter, but we’ll get to that in a while.
After waking up and getting Paul his required morning coffee from the dinghy sized tub of Folgers coffee I called the Harbor Master on the phone to ask which mooring ball I was supposed to be on. I had a reservation for Thursday night but not for the rest of the weekend. After some delay I found out that I needed to hail them on the VHF. Once I did I found that I was to be on ball number 78, which evidently if far from where we are.
As I look around I spot the special “blue balls” that we had been looking for at 3:15 in the morning. They are right where we were looking but it was really dark. If I had been able to grab one of these we could have stayed right there. Oh well. We get the dinghy off the foredeck and attach the engine (no small feat) and I motor over towards the blue balls to check out the situation.
They are all taken. While tooling around that area I spot another Jeanneau. I talk to the skipper for a while praising our shared vessel brand and discussing the blue ball “situation”. He says that if I can get one I can stay on as long as I want. So I give him my business card and he’s my bird dog for blue mooring balls. He says he’ll call me if one opens up.
So we cast up the ball where on and head up harbor. Number 78 is tucked up next to Chappaquiddick Island next to some very nice houses. We also have a perfect view of the most ostentatious house on the harbor looking towards the west. It’s huge and has a humungous floating trampoline moored in front with a large sign that says, “Keep Off.”
One thing that has been gnawing at Tom and Paul is how tight the helm is on Devante’s Dream. I really hadn’t noticed because I didn’t have anything to compare it to. However, the helm was very tight and had also developed a recurring squeak when turned. So Tom and Paul began investigating how to loosen the steering cables. I was working on the phone downstairs trying to get a mooring ball for the rest of the race week-end and when I came back on deck they were in full attack mode.
Evidently there were four ways to get to the dual helm stations and steering cables. Two in each guest stateroom and two in each cockpit locker. However, despite removing every possible access panel and piece of equipment from all of the lockers now adjustment could be found for the cable. We could see the rotating flywheel that the cables attached to but no way to adjust them.
Eventually, after exhausting all possible options, I called the commissioning agent, Jim Lee, and asked him how we could adjust the cable. He didn’t know off the top of his head but he knew that it could be done. There was another Jeanneau 40.3 in Annapolis and he was going to go over and look at it and call me back. He did call back a few minutes later but did not have an answer. He needed to speak with someone else. Okay, we’ll wait.In the meantime I had placed a call to one of the local crew that was going to be onboard for the race and inquired if there might be any options for mooring that he would know of. He replied that he knew of one house of the harbor that did let their mooring balls out occasionally. It was Ernie Block’s (sp) house, although Ernie was now passed away these few years he said that his son may still do so. Of course Ernie Block’s (sp) house was the very large mansion on the western shore of the harbor that I could see from the cockpit seat I was occupying. After some discussion it was decided that only I would go to attempt the mooring ball crusade. Tom and Paul would remain to work on the steering.
Just prior to leaving Jim Lee call back with some interesting news. The helm steering cable adjustment is accessed by removing the emergency tiller panel cover. Inside one can see the flywheel type disk that controls the tiller. On the top of the flywheel are the bolts that control the tension. Unreal.
So… I get to dinghy over to Ernie Blocks (sp). The reader may be wondering why I keep including the (sp) next to Ernie Blocks (sp) name. Well the reason is it’s not actually spelled Block, it’s Boch. And that is a major difference, especially if you grew up in Massachusetts. Ernie ran a car dealership and his TV slogan was, “Come on down!”, which was instantly recognizable by me. Well I was “coming on down” to Ernie’s place in Edgartown but I did not find out until later that it was Ernie Boch, not Ernie Block!
I tied the dinghy to the dock that appeared to be capable of tying up five or six boats and headed up towards the house. There was a crew putting up a large white tent (for a charity event I was told) and a long walkway with driveway pavers leading up to a sweeping wide double staircase to the “back door” of the house. Glancing in the basement window I could see exercise equipment looking out over the harbor. I rang the electronic doorbell/intercom. No answer. I peeked in the window, it looked very quite inside.
Oh well, no one answering here. Maybe there is someone around the side door. I worked my way around the sweeping staircase to the side kitchen door, which was screen and the inner door was open, and knocked. The screen door made the rattling sound that screen doors make when you knock on them. I also yelled through the door, “Hellooo”. No answer. Off to the front of the house as there were people and cars milling around.
I stopped one of the cars in the driveway and the gal in it informed me that she is just setting up the charity event but that I can talk to Peter, who is driving a golf cart that she points to. After thanks I head that way. Peter must have been wondering, “Who is this guy coming towards me from the back of the house?” I introduced myself as Eric Langley, a sailor moored in harbor. “You can’t moor there,” Peter said right off. “I on one of the town mooring balls,” I clarified. “But I had heard that it might be possible to rent one of the mooring balls in front of the house,” hence the reason for my visit I informed Peter.
“Nope, no way. Ernie’s dead for two years now and she (Ernie’s widow) won’t have anything to do with it.” I explained that I was in town for the Edgartown Yacht Club Round the Island Race, hoping that some name dropping might help, and that I had a town ball for all but the week-ends of my stay. “It’s not gonna happen. She won’t even let her son or business associates use the mooring balls,” he flatly stated.
“It seems a shame that they just sit there unused,” I replied. “Yes it is but that’s the way it is,” he returned. I said that if he could check with the Mrs. that he could reach me at the number on my card and handed him my Devante’s Dream card. The card has a picture of Devante’s Dream at anchor and lists Annapolis and Key West as our hailing ports.
“Key West huh. I’ve been there,” as Peter told me about his stay in Key West and a surreptitious visit to Cuba. “You should go to Cuba,” he implores me. I told him that I suppose I could (even with the embargo and all) as I was writing a book about Key West and Cubans in the 1890’s. We talked for a while longer as he gradually warmed to our common ground, if not my plight. In parting he said he’d see what he could do. I figured I had about a 10% chance of anything happening in my favor. But it was worth visiting the house just for the experience.
Back on the boat I took the offensive with the Edgartown Harbormaster, calling them on the phone. They were very nice about it. I asked them if I could make arrangements with an owner of a private mooring ball (hypothetically speaking) could I use one (they said yes). I reiterated that I was here with the Round the Island Race (read EYC). Eventually they said that I should sit tight and they would see what they could do for me the next morning after check out. Okay, fair enough.
Now we were hungry and needed parts. So… it was off to downtown Edgartown for lunch and parts. We dinghyed (is that a word) past Ernie’s and on to the EYC dinghy dock. We ate at The Wharf (on the dance floor I later found out) and bought parts at the tiny rigging shop next to the landmark Quarterdeck clam shack. Tom got some small pulley’s to rig up a cunningham for the mail sail and I get a bunch of cut rope and a captive pinned main halyard shackle to replace the loose pinned then in use.
We also had to stop at the hardware store for some metric wrenches (French boat) to make the cable adjustments. I bought a sailors knife just like the one that my father gave me when I was on the island as a ten year old boy. It has a large awl (sharp pointed spike) and a nice rope knife. I also pick up some alligator clips for making hat a leash with. I used my new knife to make them and it worked great. The knife got tied (and then quick-release shackled) to my pant belt loop for the remainder of the voyage.
Back on the boat I helped Tom and Paul a little bit with the steering adjustment. Tom has me holding a wrench at an awkward angle in the emergency steering access panel. He’s loosening the cabling for the helm even more. Once he’s done with that and lubed just about everything that can be lubed he’s at the starboard helm (there are two, port and starboard which is very cool) throwing the wheel first left and then right; big smile. “Now that’s what a helm is supposed to feel like,” exclaims Tom. After the entire trip was over I read in the maintenance logs that the steering was noted to be tight but that there was no time to work on it. Duh! We would have delayed our departure if we had known about it!
Later on Tom is trying to get his foul weather gear shipped to the Island (might it have been nice to have it for the ocean passage?) while Paul is trying to help get Cloe get to the Island. Her plane is stuck in Richmond VA due to bad weather. Paul is supposed to pick up a rental car at the airport and pick up Cloe (and Tom’s foul weather gear) on Friday. We also have to provision the boat and rig the spinnaker (while sailing) on Friday. And I need to pick up my brother Scott who is coming on board. I make the comment that Friday looks like a logistical nightmare. It was.
Thursday afternoon we head into town again. I check in with the Edgartown Yacht Club and pick up the race packet. We’re (I’m) pretty disorganized. We don’t have a class flag. I check out the course instructions and attend the skippers meeting. It’s pretty straightforward. Go around the island and try to do it before everyone else. The weather forecast posted on the bulletin board does not look good. It keeps mentioning watch for a shortened course and not much wind. The isobars are really for apart (no wind) on the forecast charts. Paul commandeers that race instructions.
We grabbed some dinner Thursday night and did some bar hopping. However, there seem to be way too many guys at The Wharf bar. The dinghy ride back to the back is in thick fog. We’re about one mile from the Yacht Club so there is quite a bit of zigging and zagging necessary to find our mooring! We get back in time for one more Dark and Stormy and then crash for the night.
Friday morning arrives with postcard views on all sides of
Devante’s Dream. The air is clear and cool but there is very little wind. Tom and Paul take the launch into town to begin their schlepping. I have to work for quite a while with Scott on some business problems. Scott’s trying to get out of the house and down to the ferry in Falmouth, so I handle some of it. It’s been a particularly bad week of nasty problems as work but thankfully Scott has handled them while I have been on the boat. I tell him to get out of there and get on the ferry. He’s not due to get into Edgartown until 1:30 Friday afternoon.The boat is a mess. I do the best that I can in the few hours I have to try and clean up some. I talk with Tom on the phone. He ends up going to the grocery store for provisions for the race and the rest of the weekend. Cloe is still trying to get out of Richmond. If she gets in it will be on the last flight out of NY.
After we pick up Scott we headed out to rig the spinnaker. It’s asymmetrical so there is no spinnaker pole. There is a dousing sock that goes over the sail to make it easy (relatively) to deploy and take down. We take quite a bit of time to figure out how the blocks are going to be rigged and how the sock works. Eventually we get it deployed. The sail is BIG! However, there is barely a Zephyr of a breeze so we don’t really get a chance to see what she can do.After dousing the sail below decks we sail back into Edgartown Harbor. So is everyone else! It’s the EYC Annual Regatta and there are about 200 boats of all sizes heading back into the mouth of the harbor at the same time. Everything from Rhodes 19’s to Opti’s. There is one young man next to us in a 420. He has Devante’s Dream (a 40 footer) to his starboard, many boats on his port and boats ahead of him. And he is in everyone’s wake. He expertly douses his spinnaker (he still had it up!) and sails through the gauntlet with hardly a care. I bypassed the very conveniently located water dock, a floating dock with two fresh water hoses connected to the mainland, so as to save some weight for the upcoming race. Hey, water weighs over 7 lbs per gallon!
Paul is on the phone with Cloe. She is stuck in NY at the airport. She missed her connection to Martha’s Vinyard due to being delayed in Richmond. She’ll have to spend the night at the airport and then catch the first flight out in the morning. Her flight will arrive at 0800 and our race starts at 0830 so I’m not too sure how that’s going to work.
Earlier I had solicited for some local crew for the race. Joe Passafume signed on as crew and he’s invited us to his house for a cookout on Friday night. His wife, Margaret, is the race director for Edgartown Yacht Club.
After cleaning up Tom, Paul, Scott and myself dinghy into shore. We had Paul’s rental car and careened around town trying to find Joe’s house. He lives near Herring Creek Farm, which used to be the Wallace brothers compound (and where I had spent several summers while my father was captain of their yacht), so I thought I knew where I was going. There was a sign that said “Katama”, “Yes, that’s it go that way,” I yelled from the back seat barely able to even see anything from inside the tiny car. Of course that was the right way if we wanted to go to the beach (we didn’t but did find out later we could have cut across to his house) so we had to turn around and take a right at the fork and eventually do find Joe’s house.
Joe, Margaret and their daughter were very hospitable. We enjoyed Joe’s burgers and conversion. I don’t think I strayed much from the kitchen counter for the whole time that we were there. Eventually Margaret and Joe had to move us along because the race started early in the morning. Of course we needed to get some sleep as well! “Where is Scott?” No where to be found. Okay, I guess he just left. Later I think we picked him up by the dinghy after he hitched a ride back to town!
Another late night dingy ride to the boat and more fog. I’m getting better at it though, with less zigging and zagging than the night before. There’s only three of us, Tom, Scott and myself. Paul has a nice room at a B & B but no Cloe!
I set my watch (with the built-in compass) to ring at 0600. But there’s no need to as I usually arise with the sunrise streaming in from the edges of the drawn shade in my cabin. Saturday morning I arose early as usual but there was no sun and no sound. I opened my hatch and poked my head up to gather in the dawn, but there was none. I could not see the boats next to us for the thick fog that blanketed the harbor. I started the engine right away to charge the batteries and get some hot water going.
We cast off the mooring ball and made our way towards the broad channel in the harbor. Fortunately the Edgartown Harbor mooring balls are fairly far apart so we had no problem navigating around partially visible vessels. We join in a line of other vessels heading out to the race course and after a few phone calls we picked up Paul and Joe at the public dock (known formally as Memorial Wharf) on the way to the start/finish line in the outer harbor.
Leaving Edgartown Harbor through the relatively narrow channel was surreal. The thick fog and metallic surface of the water made it impossible to see in which direction we were going. For a moment I saw Edgartown light pass by in the mist on our port side and then there was only the bright white fog in all directions. Other sailboats were near us (I could hear their engines) as we slowly made our way out.
On the way out our compass started to act strangely. It appeared to be reading 180 degrees backwards! I went downstairs and checked the GPS on the laptop and the heading did not match the compass. I had to have Paul take the helm and relay instructions on which way to steer. He had no compass! I was giving him commands like, “10 degree’s to the right,” so that we could avoid the shallows in the outer harbor.
We made our way out to start/finish line and the race committee boat Miss Asia but we could not see her. There were times when we could see the ghostly figure of other sailboats. It made me recall reading about the ghost ship “The Flying Dutchman” as a child as being just able to make out the tattered sails of the ship that had no port. We drifted around for about an hour after several postpone flags were raised til about 0900, then the race committee decided that there was enough wind, now about 2-3 knots to get under way.
That meant that our start would be at 0930 as we were in the sixth fleet. As our start time approached we made a run up to the line, barely moving. Scott asks, “Is something supposed to be happening?” We all laugh. With 5 minutes to go we were at the line and attempting to turn around and run down and then back up. That took 10 minutes. Yes, we crossed the start line 5 minutes after our fleet started! But at least we were moving by then.
In the ongoing saga of getting Cloe (Paul’s friend) onboard as a race crew she had finally gotten on the island and was at the airport. Paul told us that the Edgartown Harbor Master, Charlie, was going to be giving her a ride out to the boat. Sure enough, just after we started, there was the Harbor Master’s boat coming our way. He pulled along side, Cloe jumped aboard and we now had a full crew.
We caught up with the other fleet that started before us, which is a good sign, but the fleet that started after us, the real offshore racers, blew by us in the Zephyr. They made us look like we
were standing still. Scott drove for a while and then and then we settle into Tom driving, Paul trimming the main and Cloe trimming the jib.Tom and Cloe trade some barbs over the fact that Devante’s Dreams’ lazy sheet likes to hang up in the roller block. But we’re sailing
pretty well considering. We still couldn’t see anything. Our first mark was on the other side of Cape Pogue Point, which we could not see. We’re trying to tack up to the mark and I let Tom know that there is land and sand in the direction we are going.After what seems like forever we can finally see the mark. We tack again to make it. We’re slipping. Everybody hike out on the leeward side. We can’t make the mark. After taking again (we needed to sail to Nova Scotia) and hiking out again we still can’t make the mark. We’re going so slow and the race has been so delayed that the current is now foul and going faster than we are.
Paul’s been listening to the radio and several boats have already abandoned the race. I make the call and we abandon as well after not being able to make the first mark. Bummer! Of course on the way back in the skies clear and the wind freshens (to only about 5 knots though).
We dropped of Paul, Cloe and Joe at the public dock. Scott, Tom and I anchored off of Chappy Beach for some swimming and relaxing.
Later that night we met other crew’s just returning to the Yacht Club as late as 2130! They looked beat. The race course was shortened but they still had to come all the way around the island to get back to Edgartown. Six boats in our fleet abandoned.
We’d already had our dinner so it time for some site seeing, ice cream, race talk, dancing, &c and eventually another dingy ride to the boat late at night. Saturday night was the last night on the island for Tom and Paul. It was the first clear night and the stars were out. I pulled out the glow in the dark star chart that my Dad had given me and we plotted the constellations and looked for meteors. Tom had an early flight so he nixes that last Dark & Stormy!
I can’t believe how busy I have been up to this point in time for most of the passage. I bought a book but have had no time to read it. And then I had to get ready for the “girls” (my wife, daughter and mother) to come on board for a week. No rest for the weary!
Eric Langley
Devante’s Dream
Annapolis to Martha's Vineyard passage pics
Tom Cobin gets the first watch at 0700 July 11th 2005 out of Annapolis
Let's make it so the dingy motor does not fall off.
Paul does some surgery on Eric's hat.
Paul navigates the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal aka "The Ditch"
Dinner at sea. Grilled tuna with veggies, yummy!
Daytime Dark & Stormy
We made it! 0230 AM 07/14/05
Monday, July 11, 2005
Annapolis to Martha's Vineyard passage notes
This is a summary of the high (and low) points about the passage from Annapolis to Martha's Vineyard.Onboard Devante’s Dream for the passage are Eric Langley, the owner, Paul Reed and Tom Cobin both of Annapolis.
Early Monday morning July 11th we began final preparations, clean and stow the dinghy and some last minute packing and boat prep. We shoved off at 6:44 AM with 103.7 hours on the engine. Tom took the first watch. We're running 4 hour watches during the day and then two hour watches at night from 0000 til 0600.
We motor out of the Annapolis Harbor and head up the bay. Eric cooked scrambled eggs with cheese and grilled bagels with jam. We eat breakfast together in the cockpit. There are various remarks about what the rest of the world might be doing now. There's a slight favorable current and later in the morning a little wind begins to develop so we sail for a while running 30 degrees to the C&D canal.Both Tom and Paul race a lot so they look at how to improve the sail shape of the headsail and main. The head sail was sagging and had pockets on the luff (leading edge of the sail closest to the wind) so the halyard was tightened and some other adjustments made.They wind stays decent out of the SE for a few hours so we proceed with sail only, running around 4 knots. Around 0930 the wind starts to die off so we motor sail. By 10:30 its pretty warm out. Around 11:30 it is calm so we stow the sails. However, we have a one knot favorable current so we're making 7.5 knots over the ground. I have the 1200 1600 watch.The passage up the Chesapeake Bay was uneventful and fairly hot. Earlier on we decided that we would push on through the C&D canal without stopping (hot and boring) and make for Cape May in one long run. We make one pit stop in Chesapeake City for ice at 1340 hours. Docking is fun with the current. We're fairly pumped because we are about three hours ahead of schedule. Plus the slight breeze in the canal is a little refreshing.
My shift ends in the canal at 1600 and Tom takes over. I go below for a nap. When I wake up later we’re already in the Delaware Bay. At the northeast corner of the bay sits a large nuclear power plant. We’re hugging the coast near the plant to make Cape May. There are a lot of crab pots by the power plant. Is that a good idea?
When we first got together on the boat Sunday night Tom noticed that the teak was pretty bleached out on the boat so he very kindly brought some teak oil onboard, hint, hint. Since the Delaware Bay is devoid of anything interesting to look at (other than the supertankers passing us) I take to oiling the wood. It’s very rewarding as the wood really needs it and looks a lot better. We do pass one interesting light house that looks like a Victorian mansion.
At the north end of the Delaware Bay we had a slight foul current but the nav software (which is awesome) shows currents along the route will be switching to favorable. Around 1500 we’re in a swift favorable current that we can see in the channel buoys. We’re making excellent time and expect to be in Cape May by 2100 to 2200. We have a sandwich and watch the sunset.
We have a discussion about whether or not we’ll take the Cape May canal into Cape May or go around the point. Looking at the chart we notice that the bridge height is 55’. DD’s mast is 55’6”. Just enough to clear. Going around will add about 5 miles (around another hour) to our arrival time. We’d like to do dinner ashore so that would put us in too late for that. It’s my call so I opt for the canal. Tom takes us in.
Entering the canal it’s very dark. I have the laptop on the cockpit table and have the chart zoomed in. Tom is piloting, reduced speed. As we approach the bridge Eric takes the helm (owner responsibility and all that). Thankfully we have a foul current so I can really get the forward speed of the boat to just a crawl. We are fighting with the search light cord being too short and the plug not making a good connection to the lighter outlet. Tom tries to rig the search light forward but the cord is too short.
As we approach the bridge there are green lights marking the center of the span that hang down! Not only that they have wires hanging down, the closet light has a wire on the left and the farther light has a wire hanging on the right. I have the boat just making headway as we get very close to the bridge.
“Can you tell?”
“I can’t tell!”
“Can we make it?”
I can’t tell!”
The mast is inches from the bridge. As it begins to pass under I hear a “tink, tink, tink” sound. I realize that it is the VHF antennae hitting the first girder with the motion of the boat rocking fore and aft. Hmm, we are right on the bridge support beam so let’s go forward and see what happens. The antennae scraps the bottom of the beam but the mast and windex are clearing. Tom shouts that we are drifting to the left of the channel and I adjust the boat to the right. We have to go under the bridge from left to right, kind of kiddy corner, due to the wires hanging down. The antennae scraps the I-beams each time we pass under one.
After a few tense moments passing under each I-beam we finally clear the bridge. High fives all around!
Then it’s on down the canal. There is a railroad bridge ahead that is supposed to be always open.
“Is it open?”
“It’s supposed to be open.”
Pitch black out.
“It’s open, but it’s narrow”.
“We’re clearing it.”
“Yes, we’re clearing..”
We continue on down and I check the chart again as the canal makes a 45 degree turn. Argh! Another bridge ahead. The same as the one that we just cleared; 55’ I am definitely not looking forward to passing under another bridge like that. But there it is and we’re not turning back so on we go. It looks a little better, no hanging wires this time. We enter and here the now familiar “tink, tink, tink” of the VHF antennae hitting the bridge trusses.
As we are about ½ way under the bridge a small power boat goes by and yells at us, “you are not going to make it. You’re going to rip your antennae off!.,” All the while creating a large wake that is causing Devante’s Dream to rise and fall. Great, thanks for that fine advice. Thankfully we rise on the wake in between each bridge truss and then go in the trough under each truss. Whew! That was close. More high fives.
Now it’s on to Cape May harbor. We now doubt that we’ll get dinner ashore as it is already almost 10:00PM. We’re looking for a marina but really can’t see much in the new moon darkness. The new moon should have been a warning for me, but I failed to realize it at the time.. I motor to the right out of the mouth of the canal to what the chart shows as deep enough water. We’re showing 7’ of water. More than enough for DD. I head toward what appears to be a marina but is in fact a private dockage.
On the left there appears to be an anchorage and a sailboat similar in size to DD so we decide to moor there. There are some mooring balls so we grab one. Tom and Paul note that it is the most disgusting mooring ball they have ever seen. We get on the ball and decide to make some dinner. Tom has tuna steaks in the freezer that he thaws out in the microwave. He prepare an excellent meal of pan seared tuna, sautted onions and salad. We debrief on the bridge passings, amazed that we are even here.
We’ve been under way since 6:44AM, and it’s 10:00PM, in some pretty hot weather and sticky situations. This calls for a shower. Paul is on deck yells down below that we are dragging the mooring ball! Oops, fire the engine back up again. We drop anchor in front of the other sailboat and crash for the night.
All in all we made very good time with a favorable current for all but one and half hours at the north end of Delaware Bay. If we had not spend so much time messing around in the Cape May canal and had left at 0600 we could have made Cape May’s outer harbor by 2000 or 2100 hours. Not bad progress for a day’s sailing.
Tuesday July 12, 2005
Next morning Paul is on deck first and notes that all of the other boats are facing in a different direction than we are. We’re bobbing a bit but we are definitely on the ground. Bummer. Paul belays the boat by hanging onto the boom on the port side. Tom hikes out as well. We slowly reverse (squirm by turning the helm left and right) out and head for the channel marked by triangles and squares on poles. However, we’re still running aground in the channel! More belaying and working out way out of the “channel” to what appears to be more open water.
We need diesel and water and some basic supplies before the passage to Martha’s VIneyard. The first marina we go to for fuel we run aground in. This is not working out well. We back out of there and Tom takes the helm while I go below and get the phone number for the other marina near the entrance to the Cape May canal, Utch’s. The guy I talk to says to stay near the seawall on the way in. We head that way. And run aground. The guy comes out onto the seawall and says that we need to be closer to the wall, even though we are only about 50 yards off to start with.
Finally we make it into the fuel dock and get some staples and two very important items; fly swatters. We’re inundated with house flies! Oh, and this is NJ so we are really ready to get out of there. So with our five bags of ice, fly swatters and a dinghy sized can of coffee that Paul grabbed in the store we head out of the harbor at 8:30 AM. I get the honors of navigating the harbor exit even though it’s Paul’s watch. If we run aground it’s my responsibility I guess.
Thankfully the harbor exit is less eventful than last night. I spot a nice marina for use on the way back through Cape May that will let me avoid the tricky inner harbor. I won’t be taking the Cape May canal though, next time we go outside.
I have a sinking feeling in my stomach. Being the old pilot that I am I start to think about fuel. My Cherokee Six could fly about 5.5 hours on a fuel load of fuel, way longer than most of the passengers could go without getting a potty break. Devante’s Dream will go about 36 hours on a fuel load of fuel. But we need a reserve so we can really go about 30 hours. MV is about 40 hours away on the rhumb line. We can’t make it without sailing a good bit. Besides this will be the most boring delivery in history if we motor all the way.
I pull out the charts and discuss it with Tom and Paul. Mostly Tom since he’s not driving. We look at the Jersey coast and there is not much. Barnegat Bay is the furthest north harbor that would be anywhere near our route. Reading the chart for the south side of Long Island is a hoot. The one inlet that looks navigable has a warning box on the chart the reads, “Warning (such and such Inlet) is not navigable under any seas.”
Wow, I guess we won’t be going there. Our great compromise is to cheat toward the Jersey side of the rhumb line. If the wind does not pick up at least we’ll be closer to shore. We listen to the weather and it’s calling for NE winds at 10Kts swinging to the SE over the next 24 to 36 hours. SE would be nice. That would be a nice reach up the MV. NE would not be good, right on the nose.
Being the racers that we are we’re constantly scanning for any kind of puff or breath of air, nothing for hours. There’s one other sailboat off to our west. He’s motoring. By 11:30 AM and still no wind I am looking at Barnegat or barely making Block Island. No one likes that sound of barely making Block Island.
Paul’s shift ends and I take over and wouldn’t you know it not ten minutes later the wind picks up a bit, right on the nose just like the forecast. But, it is wind. We are able to open the headsail and along with the engine work in some tacks. We’re on port tack heading out to sea so Tom and I discuss our options some more.
The wind is supposed to shift to the South East over the next 24 to 36 hours so there is no sense in heading out to sea on port tack. We’d just end up getting headed. Besides, we’d be sailing away from our possible refueling stop in Barnegat Bay. So we tack over onto starboard and wait for the wind shift. And wait, and wait.
We’re passing places like Atlantic City and Stone Harbor NJ. The wind builds to 15 to 20 knots but it’s right on the nose. We hold starboard tack and work our way up the Jersey coast. The sailing is great but not much progress. It’s also cooling a little bit. By the end of my shift at 4:00 PM we’ve only covered 28 miles. This could take a while!
Tom takes his watch and the sailing is nice. About ½ hour into his watch the wind finally begins to clock around so that we’re not following the Jersey shore and can begin to head out to sea. Sandwiches for dinner for Tom and Paul. Eric munches on a piece of turkey but trying not to eat very much. You don’t want to be below too much with the sea building. There’s a nice sunset as we prepare for the night run.
Paul has the first night shift, a regular four hour watch. We’ll be running two hour watches from 0000 to 0600 then back to regular shifts. Tom is sleeping below. He was trying to some stuff below earlier that did not involve sleeping for a while and came up looking very green. I had just come up as well, not wanting to be below unless I was sleeping.
Tom has a dream in which he and others in the dream left the ground for no apparent reason. He notes in the log that it’s odd what your mind creates to explain the pitching and rolling of the boat. On the VHF “NY Traffic” is talking to the super tankers that we can not see.
By 2300 Tom feels better and notes that the jib has been furled a little bit since sunset and the main has been eased a little. Our speed over ground is just over 6 knots and above 5 through the water. I slept through most of Paul’s watch getting ready for my midnight watch. We had the spinnaker out of it’s hole and tossed onto my bed so I am sleeping in my bunk using the spinnaker as a prop on the port side of the boat. I sleep soundly but wake up occasionally to get my bearings and check the clock. I don’t want to be late for my shift. By 2330 I am ready for my watch and let Paul off a few minutes early.
Awesome. Night sailing with a stiff breeze and some starts. By 0100 I am feeling some sprinkles so kick on the autohelm and head below to get my foulies. Gil trousers, jacket and boots. I get everything tucked in around the ankles, wrists and neck then tuck in the dodger to keep the cockpit dry. Just in time as the rain kicks in but with not big wind gusts, just some rain. I don’t nod off too much because the weather is keeping me awake. By 0145 Tom and Paul poke their heads up and ack the weather and get their stuff on.
Tom relieves me and I crash on the port (leeward) cockpit bench (with the cushion still on). Once in a while I help trim the sails or check that Tom is awake. I actually sleep pretty good all bundled up in my foulies with the harness over the top of the jacket nice and tight. I clip onto the jackline just about all the time.
The wind stays up for Tom as he takes the 0200 to 0400. Tough watch but he’s willing. He appears to have enjoyed it. At 0400 Paul relieves Tom and I head to my bunk for some real sleep. Paul reported that Tom was pretty much crashed on the leeward cockpit bench and was stepping over him to trim the sails. He didn’t seem to mind. I get up for the 0600 watch which Paul and I work together. Tom crawls below for sleep.
Paul and I try to wake Tom when we spot the dolphins but he’s dead to the world, first of the port side, just one. Then on the starboard side and the starboard bow as they began to play in Devante’s Dream’s bow wave. There are about 6 to 8 of them. One of them is very feisty, jumping out of the water and kicking his tail in our bow wake for fun, he looks like a teenager. They all accelerate and zoom across our bow like we are moving still. We can see their powerful muscles in the clear water.
I grab the camera and take some short videos. It seems that they know to only jump out of the water when I am not taking video! Then, just as quickly as they came, they are gone. Paul and I exalt in the dolphin encounter for a while. 0800 rolls around and it’s time for Tom to get back to it. Of course by then the wind is dying to we’re having to motor sail.
The next day is pretty uneventful (except for the naval gunnery exercises that we are advised to avoid on the radio, dodging fish net buoys and Paul learning to use the fuel gauge). The wind is slowly clocking around to the SE but diminishing as well. We’re running good SOG though of about 7.5 kts with 2000 rpm and help from the wind. We are able to keep the headsail up.
As the day goes along I am calculating our estimated arrival time. It appears to be in the very early morning hours of the next day. I had originally wanted to run Muskeet channel and then around Cape Pogue into Edgartown but that is not advisable at night. Even though the channel is 5 miles wide there is a very shallow shoal on the western side of the channel that you would not want to be on at night. So we aim the boat toward Gay Head Martha’s Vineyard and plan to enter via Vineyard Sound.
We have a mostly overcast sky so it’s not too hot. Late in the afternoon we have fun with knots. Tom is thinking about how to rig a cunningham on the main sail. I start watch at 1600. It’s fairly pleasant motor sailing. Paul and I see and black finned shark that Tom does not see (of course). By 1800 we can see land first the first time in over 24 hours; it’s Block Island, barely visible about 13 miles to our port. Tom makes another fabulous tuna steak dinner about 25 miles out from Gay Head and we enjoy some Dark & Stormy’s.
As we approach Gay Head darkness descends. We’re “all hands on deck” for our landfall approach. Paul has the helm. Tom is looking at flashing red and green lights. I am running the laptop navigation software on deck so that I can tell Paul where to steer. Tom has the Gay Head light in site.
We make the turn around Gay Head and head into Vineyard Sound. It’s about 1:00AM and getting misty. We can hear (and kind of see) the lobster boats heading into Menemsha. While we can navigate fine with the GPS and the light buoys we do have a problem with the unlit buoys; we can’t see them. There is one dead ahead so I tell Paul to turn right 5 degrees. Still dead ahead. Right 5 more degrees. Still dead ahead. What gives? It’s the current driving us in (it’s a favorable current but it’s still driving us into the buoy) and we have to practically turn towards land to avoid it. We still can’t see it as we go by but we know it’s there.
There is a shallow area known as Middle Ground that I want to avoid. It has some 6 foot deep areas.
We can either go inside towards the shore, which has a very narrow exit at the end near West Chop, or go outside in the main part of the sound. I elect outside and I am glad I did in a few minutes.
It’s getting very misty and the temperature is falling. Looks like fog. We put down the sails (yes we had been sailing all this time) and go on just the diesel. Not five minutes later we can’t see 50 feet. This is not good. We’re passing the lighted mark at the end of West Chop and can hear the bell but we can’t see it. It’s only 75 feet away. We slow to a crawl. We can hear an engine that seems to be coming towards us. Suddenly a bright white light is on our port bow. We blow the danger horn and the boat (a ferry out of Vineyard Haven) turns right to avoid us. “Don’t ferry’s have to run nav lights?” we all ask. The boat was just full of white lights with no red or green bow lights that we could see.
We proceed slowly as I give Paul turning instructions, “Two degree’s right, Ten degree’s right.” He has no idea where we are going but I can with the GPS chart. Paul does not look at the chart so that he can maintain his night vision. Within a few minutes the dense fog lifts and we can see for a mile or more. We motor towards Edgartown.
Coming into Edgartown Harbor Paul can see to gigantic white lights dead ahead. He thinks it is a humongous ship.
I tell him “It’s land.”
No “it’s a ship,” he says.
He must be a little punch drunk from the night navigating.
“No, it’s land Paul, I have been here before.”
It’s Chappy Beach. Of course the last time I was here there where like ten houses on the island. Evidently now there are more, with a lot of lights!
We turn to head into Edgartown Harbor. I announce that we are home free until we get into the harbor. We motor on in. As we are approaching the Edgartown lighthouse Paul says that the water looks very calm ahead. Hmm. As we get closer he says it looks like land. I reply with a “No way”, but Paul does a 360 just to be sure. Sure enough it’s a sand bar. The harbor entrance is narrower than I remember it.
We find the channel and in the inner harbor search for a mooring ball. It’s very dark and about 3:00AM. We can’t find a blue ball (even though we are right on top of them I find out the next day) and settle for using a private ball. We’re on and in Edgartown! Congrats all around then to bed.
This is the end of the Annapolis to Martha’s Vineyard passage. I trust that the reader has not found it too boring. It was quite exciting for us, believe me. I am still amazed how well the three sailors on this passage worked so well together. It was a pleasure to sail with such capable crew mates and we all agreed that we would do so again in the future. I thoroughly enjoyed that portion of the trip and looked forward to the next part, visiting Martha’s Vineyard and running the Round the Island race. More on that in the next blog.
PS Sorry this took so long to get out. It feels like I never have a spare moment onboard. What with sailing and navigating and cooking and cleaning, there is just no time! Also sorry for any typo’s, I did not have much time to proof this.
Wednesday, July 6, 2005
Martha's Vineyard Round the Island Race
We presently have five crew on board. We're looking for a few more local MV sailors. If you are interested please email eric @ networksystems.com or call 770-632-8518.
Crew list as of 07/06/05 -
- Eric Langley - Owner/Peachtree City GA
- Paul Reed - Crew/Annapolis MD
- Tom Cobin - Crew/Annapolis MD
- Joe Passafiume - Crew/Edgartown MA
- Chloe O'Rourke - Crew/San Fransico CA
- Scott Marino - Passenger/Salem MA
- TBD
- TBD
Saturday, July 2, 2005
Passage to Martha's Vineyard/Round the Island Race
Route:
Monday July 14th: We'll be transiting Chesapeake Bay to Chesapeake City (50NM +-) in the C&D Canal and laying over.
Tuesday July 15th: Chesapeake City down to Cape May NJ (60NM +-) for provisioning/refueling/eating and early evening departure.
Tuesday July 15th: From Cape May it is a 260 +- NM passage to Edgartown Harbor on Martha's Vineyard arriving on Thursday July 14th.
Friday July 15th: Lay day for exploring MV, provisioning and preparing for the Round the Island Race on Saturday.
Saturday July 16th: Round the Island Race run by the Edgartown Yacht Club. We're looking for some local crew for the race.