September 5 — Day 58 — Hyannisport to Vineyard Haven — 19 NM

 Another windless day, though we put up the small jib, sheeted in overly tightly,  to give us a few extra tenths of a knot. We needed those tenths against the very strong three knot adverse tide off East Chop, Vineyard Haven, especially because in the light wind we towed, rather than raised the dinghy. 

One thing that impressed me the last few days and today, like never before, was the number, variety and frequency of ferries traversing the waters of Woods Hole, Hyannis, Vineyard Haven and other ports on Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket.  It is almost like the waters of NYC — except that to M’s Vineyard and Nantucket there are no bridges, tunnels or other ways to get there (except by air or private boat). 

We ran east through Nantucket Sound in still water. There are long shoals running east-west in Nantucket Sound and Vineyard Sound. On the chart plotter, I “drew” a straight line from the exit from Hyannis to the entrance to Vineyard Haven but it crossed the shoals in shallow spots - less then ten feet or even six. So twice I put in a waypoint, off the direct line but near both that line and a deeper portion of the shoal. Reaching that waypoint we did a zig across the shoal in at least eleven feet of water and then a zag to the next such waypoint. The deeper spots for crossing are not marked by buoys, so without the chart plotter I would not have dared dead reckoning through such “gaps”. 

During the passage, with numerous emails back and forth between Lene and Bryan, of HeadSync, our plumber, we fixed (we hope) the water maker. Here is a  messages on its control panel after making water, suggesting it is fixed and will flush itself in five days.

We put five gallons of desalinated water into the port freshwater tank. The taste test will be during the repeat experiment tomorrow. If the water tastes good, the machine is fixed; if fixed, this will cut Newport RI from our itinerary on the way home and save big bucks because the mechanics want to work on ILENE when she is at a dock — which costs $360 per night.

In Vineyard Haven’s inverted “V” shaped harbor (analogous to the shape of Hempstead Harbor in ILENE’s home waters of Long Island Sound) we saw “Escape”. Well who could miss her 236 foot and 33 foot beam.

The helicopter on her huge foredeck was gone later in the day.

Our visit here was with Mark and Kyle, who moved here a few years ago. They brought lunch and we had a 2.5 hour day sail with them. Well “float” would be a more accurate description than sail, due to the very light wind. Last time we did this with them it was breezy and we went across Vineyard Sound and back, twice, but this time we maxed out briefly at 2.4 knots and mostly were making half a knot. And it was the hottest day of the cruise, so far, giving the impetus to a cooling dip in the sea; I never did a swim call before except with sails down.

After returning our friends to shore we wandered the shops of the village for a while. Lene got groceries but we decided to not eat in a restaurant, dinked back and had a late dinner aboard.

And here are the early and late stages of the sunset.