September 23 -29 — Rain, a Good Book and The Watermaker

      The story of the week has been rain. Only one clear day. The salts outing had to be adjourned. String but not unduly strong wind threatened the Harlem fleet but we were spared. Lene and I had planned a dinner with her brother and nephew, part of a plan to use up some of the required minimum restaurant bill, but the Club was closed and the road to City Island impassible except for vehicles with extra large wheels.

      I was very worried about the watermaker. It is supposed to be flushed every five days and we had been unable to do this. Such flushing, with fresh water, required the machine to turn on when a button was pushed. But pushing had no effect. It will require cleaning of its innards with both an acid and a base cleaner, before it will resume turning seawater into drinking water through reverse osmosis.  But I don’t foresee the need to make water during the period we will continue to own ILENE. The more pressing issue was the need to replace the seawater in it with pink propylene glycol antifreeze, to prevent it cracking during the winter freeze. The installer and repair firm is in Newport RI and had worked with us this summer but to no avail. I was losing sleep with worry over the fate of this expensive piece of equipment. I called many potential repairmen who turned me down for one reason or another. Finally, Lene suggested I call Ed Spalina, who had helped me with so many problems over the years. Ed is always a pleasure to work with, comes quickly when needed and charges an hourly rate so low that I always pay him a lot more than he asks. He is not a “certified” or an “authorized” repairman for Yanmar diesels, Raymarine electronics, or Spectra Ventura water makers. But with expert mechanical skills he figures out how to do it and gets the job done. He came on the same rainy day I called him and within a few hours had read the manufacturer’s manual, skipped a step, and used a manual on-off switch instead of the button. The job is done! I saw the pink antifreeze coming out of the salt water discharge into the sea with my own eyes.  The filters were removed and the body of the machine is full of antifreeze. I got a good night’s sleep. Thanks again, Ed, you are a lifesaver.

      I completed reading and wrote my book report on “The Wager” by David Grann. (He is also the author “Killers of the Flower Moon” about the murders of Native Americans who were getting wealthy because they had been placed in a reservation which was located above a rich oil deposit. A movie with a lot of big name starts will be coming out in the next few months and no doubt The Wager will also be filmed because of the huge amounts of characterization and action.)

The Wager will be discussed at by Book Group next week. It is the non fiction story of an ill fated expedition by the British Admiralty in the 1740’s to attack and capture a Spanish ship loaded with the riches the Spanish had plundered from the orient. It describes the construction fitting out, provisioning, manning, navigation, operation, and fighting of wooden ships of war in easy to read and understand chapters. Many men died in storms and of diseases, including scurvy before The Wager was shipwrecked on an island on the coast of Chile. More of the castaways died on that island, which they called Wager Island from starvation, disease etc. There was a massive “Lord of the Flies” style loss of social order. There were factions including some loyal to the Captain and others who sided with the Gunner in Mutiny. Both sides and others maintained extensive diaries which became the source materials of Historian Grann. They believed that if they made it back to England, (a lot more men died on the Island and on the way back) these diaries would prove that they were right and save their lives at the inevitable court martial. If you like sea stories, you will enjoy The Wager.

September 13 - 22 — Two Work Days, a Salt Day and A Dinner With Cruisers

 Yes. Things seem to go slower at home. There was a lot of mail to read and respond to in a mailbox that has not been opened for more than nine weeks. And unpacking and reorienting to a land based environment. For example. I am a very geolocated person; I generally have an interest in and know where I am. But upon wakening in the morning aboard, I quickly realize I’m aboard and afloat, but where is the boat this morning? It sometimes takes a few seconds for me to figure that out. And the first few mornings at home it has taken a few seconds to figure out that I’m in our apartment.

We had a productive day of cleaning part of ILENE’s interior. Swabbing the walls and ceilings with Fantastic, Chlorox, and or vinegar/water to wipe off accumulated grime. We also took off four more bags of stuff, but somehow I managed to forget to take off the foulies. Lene is an organizer and likes to throw stuff away. I appreciate her organizational skills but the hoarder in me wants to keep everything. In his “Inferno”, Dante had one of his seven concentric rings of hell reserved for both hoarders and wasters: they were buried in ice and condemned to gnaw on each others necks for eternity. Lene and I are not that bad. Lots of stuff: tools, parts, bits of wood, dowels, prods, plastic bits etc. are stored in rather large spaces behind and under the starboard settees. We did throw some stuff out but mostly organized it. Now wires, electrical tools, wire ties, butt connectors, switches and two boxes of fuses, are gathered in a heavy duty two gallon ziplock bag next to the electrical tool box, for example. And to make it easier to find things the big yellow box of flares was removed to the aft cabin freeing up real estate behind the settee. The second work day I spent some time trying to find a mechanic who can fix our water maker, without success so far, and took off the dink and outboard. The later is in the shop up in New Rochelle and the dink is deflated, trussed up, plug removed and on the seawall, tied to the big anchor so the wind can’t blow it away, awaiting the Club’s use of the fork lift to put it away for the winter.

With Lene’s conclusion that this summer was her last multi-month cruise, I had thought about selling ILENE and buying a smaller, simpler, easier to maintain boat. But no, for now we are keeping the old girl.

The old salts convened at a different time on Wednesday:  2 pm, with dinner after the sail at the club. We were underway for only two hours, and tracked eight miles, with 0.3 engine hours. The folks at the left in the dinner picture came with me, and those to the right with Dave.

Last spring I had mentioned to Jamie and Laurie, and to Jim and Winjanda that the other couple was headed up to Newfoundland. Well, as luck would have in they ended up tied on opposite sides of the same floating dock there and in talking during dinner up there quickly discovered that I was their missing link.

Jamie and Laurie, at the far end in this next photo, drive from Boston to NYC for their subscription to the NYC Ballet and we sometimes dine with them. This time they invited Jim and Winjanda as well and the six of us saw the Ballet.

Sept 12 — Day 65 — Lloyd Harbor to Eastchester Bay, City Island — 21 NM

 All good things must come to an end. Alas, our cruise is over. 3.75 hours with our Yanmar generated speed over the earth turning the light northerly winds into a close starboard reach for the main and Genoa. Ten minutes of gusts let the Yanmar rest but she had to be turned on again when the wind abated. An uneventful passage. I had to draw the blue dot on this time, at the left edge of the picture —  our home mooring. It did not get much use this summer as a guest mooring given the amount of sea growth that I had to hose off with the salt water deck each pump.

Lene did a great job of using up almost all of our remaining perishables.

I took the bus and subway to our apartment, drove back to the club through a traffic jam, loaded most everything up into sixteen bags, including one each for the kitties, got them to the launch, to the dock, to carts, to our car, and home, by 6 pm.

A bite out, a bit of grocery shopping (what else?), showers  and a good night’s sleep in our own bed.

There is a lot to do on the boat, but not for a few days. This blog will continue. Thanks for reading.

Sept 10 & 11 — Days 63 &64 — Charles Is. Anchorage to Lloyd Harbor and Lay Day There Due to Weather — 26 NM

 Underway at 8, halyard on mainsail, unzipped, hoping for wind. But the seas were calm and to get in before the forecast rains start this afternoon we motored rather than sailed. The early departure also got us a bit of fair tide before the eastbound ebb set in. But with the planned destination of Zeiglers Cove, we would be arriving around noon this Sunday and the moorings would likely be full for a lot of hours. Why not combine today’s passage with tomorrow’s and get home in one day? Less than 40 miles and we recently did 57. Yes, but I do not want to get home so soon; I want to continue to enjoy every day of this cruise, and that included tomorrow. And Lene, bless her soul, is being patient with me. We passed close by this pretty lighthouse at Stratford Point.

Then came the idea: Lloyds Harbor, the western lobe off Huntington Bay, across the Sound on Long Island. Why not! Many moorings and an anchorage area. With less than ideal weather, some will undoubtedly be available. We have been to Zeiglers many times; Lloyds only once. It is a longer passage first and a shorter final leg. So we changed course, but only about fifteen degrees to port and motored on.

But then came the problem — and it looked much blacker and denser than Lene’s photo, below; every part of the sky looked blacker than the darkest parts in the picture. The storm covered the Sound completely, from north to south — no escape. The Coast Guard broadcast a hazard warning about wind but mostly about problems that don’t concern us: flash floods and downed trees.  I secured the mainsail, and zipped it up. We took everything that should stay dry below and I donned full foulies. Lene has a weather radar app on her phone which showed it coming. I turned on the radar display of our Chart plotter, which showed us in it. And then it came — from 11 to 12:30. It was wholly inconsistent. A few minutes of 35 knot wind, another band of 25 knots , and later at 20, bury each from a different direction. And there were periods of calm or light and variable wind in between. The rain came in bands,  torrentially, but mixed with moderate, light and no rain areas. The strong winds were sometimes with the rain snd other times without.

Needless to say I got drenched but the Yanmar pulled us through it, speeded up to 2000 rpms, and the autopilot, at heightened alertness steered us straight. 

In Lloyds Harbor, by my count, there are about 225 moorings, all of them empty: to the south, west and north of us.

We took one that appeared well maintained. I stripped, dried off,  put on dry clothing,  had a lunch which included hot soup in addition to the salad, and took a nap and read. Lene watched TV. She could not watch the US Open the other day due to a feud between media companies, but was glued to internet reports on the matches, point by point, followed by highlights films and  post match press interviews. She is very enamored with Coco Gauff, and was elated by her win.

More rain during the night and the morning forecast was for thunderstorms again, though it was sunny in the morning. Lene suggested a lay day. I loved it — a bonus day for  the cruise!  We have no appointments that need be adjourned and sufficient provisions. In fact, eating them up to avoid the need to carry them home is adding to my weight.

A non sailing friend put me onto a 45 minute documentary - One Warm Line - about the mostly sea songs of the late Canadian folksinger Stan Rogers, focused on Nova Scotia. I’d never heard of him but enjoyed it.

Our extra day might not have been needed. No rain arrived here at least, until about 4:30.

Here is a satellite view of the harbor, the western part of Huntington Bay to the right, and a bit of  Long Island Sound at the top.

Sept 9 — Day 62 — Old Saybrook to Charles Island Anchorage, Milford — 34 NM

I forgot to raise the dinghy last night and when it was time to go this morning the ebbing tide insisted on an early departure.  So I quickly raised it out of the water, just hanging there, and we came out of North Cove and into the river before I raised it the rest of the way and secured it snugly. There were no waves or wind. The current in the river helped us, but most of the rest of the journey until the last hour we had a adverse tide. Towards the beginning, there was a bit of wind from the south, so I put up full sails and got our speed increased by half a knot. But later in the day the wind turned to directly behind us at the speed we were going. This meant zero apparent wind.  Yanmar did all the work. And it was hot as blazes. We wetted towels and hats and put them on to cool off.

There is a sandbar, the faint white line in the satellite photo, running from Charles Island to the mainland to the west, which creates a shelter behind the island. Milford is at the end of the inlet. It is a well restauranted and “happening” town, but the local Milford Landing Municipal Marina (which the Harlem Cruise visited several times in the past)  has joined the trend to exorbitant pricing. And with a forecast of the same “light and variable” wind that we had by day, we anchored in 13 feet of water at low with 60 feet of snubbed chain. 

There was one sailboat several hundred yards north of us (still there in the morning visible against the row of beachfront houses on the left) and three small powerboats near the island. The powerboats left at 4:30.

With our early arrival, Chef Lene (assisted by her private vegetable chopper/dishwasher) knocked herself out. I’ve avoided making this a food blog, but an exception must be made for our exceptional three pot dinner.

During the night, at about two A.M., we had a brief string wind storm. A front may have passed, dropping no rain. I got up and looked at the chart plotter in the cockpit: we had not dragged. A beautiful sunrise.

Sept 8 — Day 61 — Fishers Island to Old Saybrook CT — 19 NM

Here is a picture from yesterday’s passage of ILENE  heading west into the late afternoon sun.

Today we departed at 1:15 PM to catch favorable tide the whole way. The wind was more than yesterday, and not as accurately predicted: ten to fifteen from the south. That would have given us pretty much a beam reach. But the wind was from the south west for a close reach. When we put up sails, we had fifteen knots of wind and hence used the small jib with the main, not the Genoa.We were going along great at more than seven knots, but then the wind stopped. Yesterday, it diminished from giving us six knots, to giving us three. Today it stopped completely. We drifted. After ten minutes without steerage I turned the engine on. I lack the patience of Columbus and of racers, for whom using the engine means quitting the race. Yes, it is not about speed; “the joy is in the journey”. But drifting for any length of time when we have a destination is no fun either. After another ten minutes, the wind came back and we sailed again. On the way to North Cove we stopped at the marina’s fuel dock and filled both tanks. I have not yet calculated the latest hours per gallon ratios for the two tanks. We have certainly used the engine more on this cruise than prior ones with day long motoring passages. Here is me, wearing sun screen and trying to keep off the sun; do you recognize me?

North Cove is an old favorite for its convenience and the fact that the town maintains two moorings for free use by transients, first come first served, for up to 72 hours. We nave never used one for more than one night. The moorings in question are closest to the town dinghy/crabbing dock. I wonder why the crabs don’t learn to stay anywhere in the basin except within five feet of the dock. It makes for a very short dinghy ride, maybe 100 feet. This time, the convenience factor was magnified by Coast Guard broadcasts of trouble with the railroad bridge, a wee bit upstream. When it cannot be raised between trains, boats at upstream locations are locked in for the duration. The dock:

One time a few years ago we got stuck in the mud here and had to wait a few hours for the tide to come up to get out. They dredged a few years ago we we are leery on the way in. Lene called for local knowledge and was told to avoid coming and going at low tide. We did so, at two hours before and after high, on our way in and out. The way is between the two rows of keel boats in the center.

 Power boats with shorter drafts are moored in parallel rows further from the center. The narrow slot of water in the center of the aisle is the Connecticut River. We elected Aspen, a nice restaurant on Main Street, for dinner, our first meal off the boat after several days aboard. On the way home we saw the effect of very distant lightning: flickers of light against the clouds from bolts beyond our horizon. A strange phenomenon.

September 7— Day 60 — Cuddyhunk to Lewis Rock in West Harbor, Fishers Island — 57 NM

 Today was a great sailing day — the type we do not get enough of. Sunny, good visibility of three miles, and very moderate waves. We got underway at 9:25 and once out of the bay on the east side of Cuddyhunk where we had anchored, we sailed under full main and Genoa almost the whole way to near Lewis Rock in West Harbor on the north side of Fishers Island, where we dropped anchor at deep dusk at 7:30 pm after 10 1/4 hours underway. During those hours we ran the engine at the beginning, in the end end and for half an hour in the middle —  a total of 1.8 engine hours. This left almost 8 1/2 hours of pure sailing. Almost the whole voyage was close hauled, but we made good speed The forecast was for ten to fifteen knots from the Southwest, turning more southerly in the afternoon. That forecast ruled out Block Island which was rather due SW. so we considered two spots on Jamestown Island, next to Newport. One of them had room to anchor, but was still a bit north, which would have required southing the next day. Then there were several options in Point Judith — the Harbor of Refuge and the upstream anchorage. We headed west but our course over ground was a bit north of that, which would have resulted in a hard contact with the State of Rhode Island just east of Sakonnet. So we tacked to a southerly course — for almost an hour, going perpendicularly vis a vis our destination. The trick was to guess how far south to go. My guess initially looked wrong after we tacked back onto the Westerly course — we were not going to clear Point Judith. But I had considered the forecast of more southerly wind, and, as the wind gradually came south and allowed us to do so, one degree at a time, we changed course more to port and cleared Point Judith  and its outcropping Harbor of Refuge, handsomely. But at 3 pm, after about 24 miles of joy and three miles before Point Judith, with 24 miles to go, the wind got tired and slowed down; we were making only three knots instead of the six. We had been making.  So the engine had to be turned on and brought us back to six knots. 24/3= eight hours or an eleven pm arrival. But divided by six knots it is four hours or a seven pm. arrival. An hour later the wind turned itself back on. And we had hit Mr Eldridge’s “X” spot

fairly well, only two hours late,  and had good or neutral tide mostly the whole way. We flew into Fishers Island Sound through Watch Hill Passage at 7.5 knots.  We anchored is 18 feet of water with 70 feet of snubbed chain, secure in the lee of the Island against the predicted southerlies. 

We are the blue dot. The island is over nine miles long, giving you a sense of its nearness to Connecticut, to the north, but it is part on New York State. The ugly menacing rocks in this next picture are east of us.

This big catamaran, lighted up overly well at night, was anchored a good safe distance north of us.

The east side of the Harbor is where the Yacht Club is: