A Tale of Two Chemists: What do we do?

What do we do? ... Saturday 13^th October 2012

We set out with some trepidation today as the forecast was for the winds to turn to the south (and blow quite strongly later). Our goal was to make it from Annapolis to Solomon’s Island. This trip would be something like 48 miles and should take us about 8 hours, but under adverse conditions, this could seem a very long way. We set off shortly before sunrise and put up the mainsail almost immediately. Then after about an hour, having charged the batteries and run the fridge compressor, we unfurled the genoa and sailed along quite nicely on a beam reach for a few hours. Over that time the wind just seemed to get lighter and lighter, causing the speed to drop from 7 knots to about 2 knots. We wanted to make sure we covered the distance before the southerly winds set in, so reluctantly we started to motor-sail again.

Facing something like 5 more hours of motoring, you do start to ask yourself ‘what am I going to do?’ If you are actually sailing it seems necessary to pay attention and tend to the sails—not to mention steer the boat. When motoring we often use the auto-pilot so the two of us are in the cockpit with a lot of time on our hands. Today Mike made use of some time to phone his mom in the UK. Somewhat later Mike’s brother Martin phoned, they had quite a little chat. Around the time of Martin’s call we had decided that we should work on the NY Times crossword puzzle. A few days earlier we had acquired the paper and so we were all set. This diversion kept us occupied for a couple of hours (we managed to do the whole thing). Then Mike made sandwiches for lunch, and shortly thereafter, started a casserole for dinner. Once he came back into the cockpit, I had a nap on the cockpit seat. Then we were nearing our destination and had to pay attention to boat traffic (including a humungous Navy vessel that seemed to be following us) and to finding our way into the anchorage.

Having anchored, put the sail cover on and got the casserole in the oven, Mike went off in the dinghy for a ‘voyage of exploration’. I prepared (with some difficulty) carrot soup—thereby using up an excess of carrots of a ‘certain age’. Now they boat seems cozy and toasty with the heat from the oven and the lantern burning. The wind is starting to pick up outside and we feel quite snug—as long as the anchor holds.

Gloria

38 19 43.3 N, 76 27 4.2 W