It sure is nice to be boating again! Wind flowing through the bridge, dolphins swimming in our wake. Its too bad the trip was only 3 days!
At the end of the last blog we were in Jensen Beach waiting for the new windows for Sun Cat. They were supposed to arrive on Thursday (after a lot of cajoling of the manufacturer by Lamb’s) so we drove to Jax, stopping in Daytona for a nice lunch with our friends Bruce and Ellie. The next day it was on the Hilton Head where we left our car and drove a rental back, arriving Thursday night only to find no new windows. The truck that was supposed to deliver them had driven right by and they were now in Georgia. The folks at lamb’s then tracked them down and went to the depot themselves Friday noon to get them.
I should note here that timing was getting critical. The boat was not insured in Florida after 6/15 and that Friday was 6/11. If we’d had to wait until Monday (6/14) we might not have made it.
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| Anchorage at the Wahoo River |
In any event, the windows were installed Friday afternoon and we were able to leave on Saturday morning, spending the first night on anchor at Cumberland Island. The next day the tides were wrong for hitting the shallow spots on the Ga. ICW so we elected to run outside from St Simons island to Sappello inlet. It was a good run except that it was very warm (over 100 degrees), so even outside it was not cool. We found out later the ocean temperature was 85 degrees! We spent that night anchored on the Wahoo River which is another of our favorite anchorages. The picture to right is the anchorage at Wahoo.
The following day we were up early and made it to Hilton Head in the afternoon. We got the boat secured and I told the dock attendant we would be up to check in the next day. We’d had enough of the heat and were headed for the pool!
It was very warm all the time we were at Hilton Head. We got in some swimming and biking and beach walks but the time went by too quickly and the following Wednesday we painted our way out of the boat and headed north again by car. The destination this time was Jean’s high school reunion in Vermont that Saturday. We chose to go up I-81 versus I-95 to see something different and were rewarded by a much more scenic drive through the mountains. We also saw something we’d never seen before when the car registered an outside temperature of 104 degrees on our way through Charlotte,NC. We picked out hotels with pools. On that Friday night we stayed in Albany and had dinner with Greg and Bill Gardiner and their wives. They are longtime friends from my childhood.
That Saturday, we had lunch with Jean’s niece and her boyfriend and then went to the reunion which was fairly well attended by folks who were now from all over the country. Jean had a good time connecting with her classmates, many of whom she had not seen for over 30 years. We hope to see some of them again. We stayed that night at a condo with one of her classmates.
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| Bill's boat moored of their home on Lake Champlain |
The next day we were off to Lake Champlain where we spent 2 days with Gold Loopers Bill and Jill from Transition at their home on the lake. While we were there, we took a trip to a nautical history museum that Bill used to be on the Board of and took a ride on the lake in one of the several classic wooden boats owned by Bill. The boat is in the picture sitting in front of their house. Then we headed west again to visit Tim and Jan from Lamb Chop.
We helped Tim and Jan celebrate Canada Day which included an evening boat ride with one of their friends for fireworks. It was a bit thrilling to skim over the lake at 40 knots in the dark but we had a good time and a great view of the show. We also took a trip to Toronto to see downtown. The trip up the CN tower provided a wonderful view of the city and Tim pointed out some of the landmarks and places he had worked. The tall ships were in so we walked along the docks and viewed the ships as well.
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| Toronto Harbor from CN Tower |
That weekend, the four of us drove to Penetang, Ontario (Georgian Bay, Lake Huron) where we visited with Ron and Janice on OB2 and John and Pat from Gypsy Time.
Coming back to Maine, we were over two hours getting across the International Bridge but made up for that with a nice dinner in Clayton New York with George and Jane from Time Out and Lee and Carol from Carol Ann. We arrived back in Maine the next day in time to have dinner with son Steve and Christine. We had driven 60 hours and over 2900 miles since leaving Hilton Head.
The next three weeks were basically spent emptying and cleaning the house. The process took much longer than I ever expected. We took many trips to Steve’s with stuff to store or to use. We had an auctioneer come and take a truckload of stuff away. We had a two day yard sale, we had a bookseller come, we had piano movers come and we had the Salvation Army come. Everyone except the bookseller took stuff away. Throughout this process, Steve, Christine and son Bill were a tremendous help. We couldn’t have finished it without them. I’m pleased to say we are all finished and the house is ready for its new owners.
We also took time to have a bit of fun. We had dinner with friends Larry and Cathy and Horace and Barbara, did a cookout at Fort Williams park with Steve & Christine, did a sailboat race, spent a weekend with Bill, had dinner with our neighbors, Rick & Pat and Dan & Merideth, and sailed to Peaks Island for dinner one night.
Yesterday, we started a short sailing vacation on Trader. The first day was 33 miles in light wind to Boothbay and today was 40 plus miles in as much wind as we wanted to Perry’s Creek, which is an anchorage on Vinalhaven Island in Penobscot Bay. We had expected to meet a group from the yacht club here but instead of Centerboard Yacht Club we found another CYC, the Camden Yacht Club.
As I said at the start of this, its great to be boating again. We had a good sailing day today, seeing dolphins and seals and enjoying a warm sunny day although the wind was a bit strong.
Enjoying a Maine sail.
Steve and Jean
