It has been a while since our last post. It is not because nothing has been going on
but that we have not had a strong signal to get online to upload a post.
Final report on Newport:
We spent a morning walking the Cliff Trail. This is a public trail that winds along the
waterfront in front of some amazing mansions.
We get to share their view. Parts
of the trail are paved walkways and others are climbing over the rocks along
the shore. The problem is that once you
walk to the end of the trail you still have to walk back. It got to be a bit much but worth it. The annual Newport Folk Festival was
scheduled for the weekend. The anchorage
was filling up. I tried going over to
the fort to check that out but that is the venue for the festival and it was
not the same with all of the tents, portable toilets and stages being set up so
that I left and will come back another time.
Saturday we pulled anchor and headed out. We raised the sails and sailed down the river
and then turned east with our next destination the small island of
Cuttyhunk. Cuttyhunk is at the bottom of
the Elizabeth Islands, a chain of islands that are owned by the Forbes Family
and being held as a nature preserve. We
dropped anchor off the entrance to the harbor to spend the night. In the morning we pulled anchor and set sail
for Martha’s Vineyard.
On Sunday, the 26th, we dropped anchor in the designated anchorage outside the
harbor. The harbor is filled with mooring
balls that are more expensive to use then I care to pay. We had a short dinghy ride into the harbor
and then followed it up to where our friend’s Lee and Cheryl keep their boats. On returning from the Bahamas they started
shopping for their next boat. They are
now the proud owners of a 55 foot Fleming.
I won’t bore everyone with a detailed breakdown of our
activities, we spent eight days, but just know that we had a great time. We spent a lot of time with Lee and Cheryl;
they took us around town, introduced us to a number of their friends, and
brought us along on their new boat “Shalaylee” for a ride to Falmouth for a
provisioning run. Cori also has
relatives on Martha’s Vineyard, Pamela and Agatha, and we were able to get
together with them. They took us for a
tour of the island and gave us a lot of background. There is also a good public transit system so
we were able to take the bus around the island to visit the towns. We took the dinghy around exploring a lot of
the protected waters and were able to ride up to and under the “Dike Bridge”
made infamous by Ted Kennedy. It has
been rebuilt and has guard rails on it now.
The island is the location for the movie “Jaws” so we now need to watch
the movie.
It wasn’t all sightseeing and being tourists, we also got
some projects done. We were running low
on water so I decided it was time to fire up the watermaker. I rebuilt it prior to the winter with all new
seals and membranes but had never used it.
After several attempts to get it primed it started pumping water. We now have our own supply of water although
it is slow. Cori spent a day at Lee and
Cheryl’s with their granddaughters helping them make bracelets from some of the
shells she collected in the Island, an Arts and Crafts day. We were thinking of replacing our anchor
chain while we were in New London but decided to wait until we passed through
on the return trip. After thinking it
over I decided to switch ends since half of the chain remains in the locker
unused except in unusual conditions. I
pulled all of the chain onto the deck and the next morning we pulled the anchor
and went into the harbor to fill the water tanks. They have a raft moored in the harbor with
water plumbed to it for boats to pull up to take on water and get washed
down. While Cori filled the tanks I
swapped ends of the chain and then we gave Hi Flite a good bath. After that we went back out to anchor and get
everything ready to move on.
On Wednesday, the 5th, we pulled anchor and
motored with light winds to Woods Hole.
It is important time your transit through Woods Hole Channel due to the
severe currents, some of the strongest in the world. We arrived at slack tide, when there is the
least current, and moved through to Hadleys Harbor. We were advised to make a stop here since it
is reported to be a beautiful stopover.
At the harbor we moved further into the lee of one of the islands to a
very protected cove with about twenty moorings, free on a first come
basis. This is part of the Elizabeth Islands,
but this one has houses on it that are available to family members through some
sort of foundation. I heard several
conflicting stories. The Islands have
been owned by the Forbes Family for at least eight generations and with the
exception of this one are a nature preserve.
We planned on staying one or two days but have been here five days so
far. We were lucky when we arrived to
get a mooring since there has not been an empty one since. As soon as one is free another boat picks it
up. We have checked out the area with
both the dinghy and kayak. Our neighbor,
Patrick, told us that here are clams for the taking and he would loan me his hand
tool and show me where to search. Where
I went I didn’t find clams, although Cori did the next day, but I found a
colony, if that is what it is called, of mussels. I picked mussels until I thought I had
enough, it turned out to be just over a hundred. After Googling how to clean and cook them we
had them for dinner. The next day we
were back to show Patrick where the mussels were and he showed Cori how to find
the clams. We collected a bucket of
clams that we have made two meals of and still have some left over. While dinghying around we also found another
area to collect mussels. We also put the
9.9 motor on the dinghy and made a trip to Woods Hole. It was slack tide when we went over but we
had to fight the current coming back. I
had always heard about the currents here but now I have been able to experience
them.
It is now Monday, the 10th and we are still
here. We planned to leave this morning
and make a stopover at Cuttyhunk to go ashore but got a message from Lee and
Cheryl that they were coming over for a day or two, so we decided to stay. After the weekend the moorings started to
clear out but to be sure we tied the kayak on one to hold it for them. Good thing, because they are filling up
again.
The beauty of this trip is we have no schedule and no
itinerary. We can go where we want and
stay as long as we want. We have been
blessed with perfect weather, very few days of rain, usually overnight and the
winds are fairly constant 10-15 knots from the Southwest so we are able to do a
lot of sailing instead of motoring. We
have decided that Martha’s Vineyard will be the furthest north we go this year
and will start back south stopping at some of the places we missed along the
way.
No comments:
Post a Comment