On the fast track South from Chesapeake City

My crew and I had hoped to make it from Staten Island to Norfolk in a single 2 night run but the forecast of heavy seas on the ocean caused us to run up Delaware Bay to the C&D canal instead.  To make up time we decided to sail the full length of Chesapeake  from Chesapeake City overnight to Norfolk.

View over our bimini on the Chesapeake

For once on our trip we had a favorable wind for our sail down the Chesapeake.  Before the sun set in the West the moon was visible in the East.

 After a sumptuous feast of Maryanne's chicken marbella we set up our night watches.  We had enough ship traffic to keep us busy on our watches while the autopilot did the heavy lifting.

Gary reported that to keep himself from being bored on his 3-6 a.m. watch, he made up imaginary ships to watch and avoid.  I guess he had a little trouble occasionally distinguishing between the shore lights and the ships.  I was happy not to know about his imaginary ship activity before I went to sleep!



While we sailed most of the day, most of the night was spent motoring to Virginia.

The good news from the city marina in downtown Norfolk was that they had plenty of room and there was a wine festival going on.  The bad news is that they charged $3.00 per foot ($120.00/night) and that they had a 2 night minimum.  I decided that Hampton, VA would be a better choice.  We stayed at the municipal marina and returned to one of my favorite little restaurants: "The Conch & Bucket."  The name sounds like the Bahamas - the food reminds me of  New Orleans.  I ordered the Jambalaya.

Symphony's Berth in Hampton, VA
NY-VA in 3 hops.

Great Kills to Chesapeake City (overnight)

We left Great Kills at 9 am and within an hour or so we began rocking and rolling.  The high winds of the last several days left some uncomfortable 4 foot ocean waves hitting us on the beam.  We put the main up but it did little to cut down on the uncomfortable side to side roll.  Gary who says he always gets sea sick the first day out proved to us that he was telling the truth.  Despite the Dramamine dosing he was hurting.  I covered him up with some blankets in the cockpit while he slept and periodically hung his head over the side.

 Our fearless autopilot steered the boat well.  The bright animated lights on buildings in Atlantic City illuminated our way for over 20 miles down the NJ coast.  We split up watches with John on from 9-12, I had the 12-3, and Gary had the 3-6 am watch.  Gary finally had recovered in time for dinner.

By 1:30 a.m. we were ready to round Cape May, the southernmost part of NJ.  I had a dilemma.  A cruiser had given me 3 waypoints that would take us zig-zagging through  potentially treacherous shallows close to Cape May.  The advantage of following the waypoints is that they would save us the 2 hours it would take us to go out to the main ship channel.  The disadvantage is that it would take us very close to shore and I wasn't sure that Superstorm Sandy hadn't changed the depths.  Two years ago when I was sailing back to LI white water was swirling past the shallows.  The white water was unnerving.

Studying the charts I found a compromise.  There was an old channel (unmarked) slightly further outside my original route that didn't take me so close to shore.  It would take a little extra time but not 2 hours - and - it wouldn't scare me to death in the dark early hours of the morning.  I found the channel and although I still had to pass fairly close to some 2 and 4 foot spots I felt a little more comfortable further away from the shore.

I compared the depths on the depthfinder with what I saw on the chart.  I was getting some big differences and not what I expected.  Where the water was supposed to be 9 feet deep I was getting readings of 21 feet.  That's OK but it had me wondering if I was where I thought I was.  All these calculations are running constantly through my head at 2 o'clock in the morning - a time when I'm afraid I might not be at my peak decision-making best.  The dark, the tiredness, and the repetitious bright loom of the Cape May light house in my eyes added to an air of spookiness.  Sometimes it's a little nerve wracking to be on watch at night.  You have to figure everything for yourself - and as captain you are supposed to be confident - your doubts are your own - not to be shared with the sleeping crew.  I felt pretty good about my piloting skills and no one had to know that I was checking and double checking myself - but I was relieved once we got past the shallows into Delaware Bay!

Gary took over and I was able to get a good 5 or so hours of sleep.  When I awoke John found that he was having a problem with our chartplotter and asked me to take a look at it.  It did look a little strange - and it took me a few seconds after seeing the nuclear plant on the wrong side of the chart to realize that somehow John had turned us around and was taking us back to NY!  We straightened that out and entered the C&D Canal within an hour.

After a stop at the Summit Marina on the north side of the canal to fuel up we found ourselves looking for a free berth on the public dock in Chesapeake City by 1 p.m.  We had called ahead to see if there was any room.  We were assured that there was.  Wrong!  The spot that would have been ours had a Tom Sawyer-like raft in it.  Made of logs lashed together it had a tent on top of it - and on the tent was a live chicken.  A young woman dashed off the raft every few minutes to grab a cat that seemed to need some serious shore leave.  The gentleman who shared the raft later explained that he had done this voyage before and that it was being filmed for a possible reality TV show.  Bizarre!  There was also a dog and who knows what other animals shared the raft.  After 2 days and 32 hours of motoring we anchored in Chesapeake City and went ashore for some lunch.

A couple of the cute little houses in Chesapeake City
with one of the bridges that spans the C&D Canal

Good bye NYC

Our first day provided some great views of NY

Lower Manhattan with the Freedom Tower on the left - Staten Island Ferry Terminals far right.

The Verrazano Bridge and Long Island

With strong southerlies we had to motor all but our last half hour when, finally,  we were able to sail west across the bottom of Staten Island to Great Kills Harbor.  We always manage to find space in the NE corner of the harbor.  Our original plan had been to sail non-stop 3 days and 2 nights to Norfolk but a short run to Staten Island first to familiarize the crew with the boat seemed like a better plan.  The forecast had us reconsider our plan to do 2 overnights to get to Norfolk.  We decided to head either to Cape May or the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal on days 2 and 3.

The wave off the bow in the picture below was a sign of things to come when we left Staten Island the next day.

Sailing along Staten Island's South shore under main alone