The lovely Heather at the helm, Cumberland Sound, GA/FL border...
We had an interesting trip today, we made the 9.7 mile journey from St. Mary's, Georgia to Fernandina Beach, FL...the trip was great...it was the pulling the hook that threw us for a loop. Tide between St. Mary's and Fernandina is an hour apart, it's a 2 hour trip from start up to shut down and Cumberland Sound in between is the grand area where we could hit slack current. My point is that we had to leave St. Mary's while current was still in motion, 2.5 knots or so, pretty subtantial. Everything was going according to plan, the anchor was out of the mud and we were free. I put HP into forward gear and began to motor off. It's fairly tight today with several boats and several crab trabs.
Heather said, "There's a problem. There's a knot in the chain."
She's still on weight restriction (the windlass does the work hauling the anchor. With her vision, helm-work while anchoring doesn't work.)
"Do you need help?" I ask
"Yes."
"Ok. Let me get us into good position."
I tried to guess what rpm/speed will keep us making headway but very slowly and controlled so I could go forward. I guessed wrong. I got up to the anchor and Heather showed me the trouble, it was truly a knot in the chain...by this time the current had turned us broadside and we were headed towards another sailboat. Hmmm.
So I head back to the cockpit and make a slight adjustment so we slid past Dream nicely. Heather is watching vigilantly for crab trap buoys while I grab the chain and haul it up through the roller, secure it in the chain lock. By the time I have the anchor locked in, she's got the knot out, chain in the locker, chain-lock in, and buttoned up. We work so well together as a team.
The sail out was phenomenal. We had the 135% genoa out and mizzen up, jib & jigger...such great balance. It was blowing 15 or so, a few degrees forward of the beam, 30+ feet of water everywhere, and we went from 4.2 knots slightly against current to 6.7, woo-hoo! We had a good heel-on, 10 degrees or so, cutting through the water. We were both smiling from ear to ear, HP was doing her thing and loving it!
We put the sails down on the approach to Fernandina Beach as traffic was fairly heavy, welcome to Sunday. The anchorage was fairly unpopulated, the mooring field was packed. $15 a night for a mooring or free for our own hook... that's a no brainer.
The sun is shining, wind still blowing happily, we're settled in and getting ready to leave Tuesday offshore towards Beaufort, SC. Tomorrow (Monday) we'll wander town again, fill our diesel jerry jugs & top off the tank. Add a little more water to top those tanks off. We'll probably spend the $15 we saved on a mooring on Benito's bento box, the fish & chips, asian black bean cake, salad, dumplings, and drink for $6. Brian has a deadline Wednesday that's already finished, I'll just do a final review tomorrow morning or even tonight.
It looks like it will be a beautiful sunset, a few light clouds to the west and the sky is ripe for some nice colors. I'm sure we'll brew a cup of tea and sit in the cockpit. Hopefully the no-see-ums and black flies are good to us.
cheers,
Cats & Crew
Read, not proofed. We're hungry & making pizza onboard tonight. Yummy. | 