Long days and longer nights

Long days and longer nights

Taking a close look at the weather window we decided to forego anchoring inside Sandy Hook NJ and opted for an overnight run down to Cape May. The weather on Monday looked great but since Tuesday was shaping up to be questionable, a long night seemed the smartest choice. 

As we turned south around Sandy Hook we joined four sailing vessels all traveling about the same speed heading to Cape May giving us plenty of company to share the dark hours. These vessels had already started communicating as a safety precaution and we added our name to the list.  While none of these sailors were previously acquainted, after our long night it did seem like we had become friends.  Several of the boats continued on up the Delaware Bay and several, like us, decided to rest in Cape May. 

With the full anchorage, we left our dink to hold our spot while we visited the marina for fuel!  Even so, we found two more boats had arrived while we were away!

Our brief stop there included fueling our diesel tanks – something we have not done since last May.  We managed close to 2000 miles on 500 gallons and were happy to find a reasonable price in Cape May to fill up.   We even topped up the dink and made a run to the Lobster House seafood store for human provisions. As we were filling the dink in Utsch’s marina, in came our Krogen friends, Ron and Michelle, on Spirit Journey.  We last saw them at Calvert Marina in May and look forward to hearing all the details of their Down East loop at the KK Rendezvous in October.  

With full tanks we headed out for a long 10 hour run up the bay – timed to catch favorable tides/currents and thankfully daylight reaching Chesapeake City in time to find a spot on the hook in the harbor for the night. (On the free wall was one of our overnite travel companions who pulled out in the morning to make room for us.) So, after all these strenuous days, we have earned a rest and moved over to the dock to enjoy a day off. Julia plans to wander this charming town and its shops.  Steve is glad to report all systems functioned well and he even found the missing connectors for the new water pump in the ship store in Cape May – so all our pesky drips have been resolved and we even have HOT water.