A Tale of Two Chemists: Reflections

Reflections … Monday 8th July 2013

We awoke to the most perfect morning in the Great Salt Pond, Block Island. The wind was blowing about 8-10 knots and the air had a level of clarity that we haven't seen in days. We spent the morning doing some cleaning on the boat whilst we waited for favorable tides and currents. At 11am we pulled up the anchor and motored out of the cut, raised our main sail and turned to the north. We kept the motor running for another 30 minutes to charge the batteries and cool the fridge, but after that it was plain sailing all the way to East Greenwich. Crossing Block Island Sound was a little more dead downwind than we would have liked, but once past Point Judith we were on more of a broad reach and we had a great sail all the way up Narragansett Bay. We fired up our engine right at the end and motored into East Greenwich Bay. Gloria's brother Paul and his wife Fran were on the dock to cheer us in and they were joined by friends Tom and Joan Ashley. Picking up our mooring "C-44" went just fine - we were pleased because it's the first mooring we've picked up since we left Fernandina Beach in Florida. We quickly put on the sail cover, switched off the instruments and headed to shore to celebrate the end of this journey.

Whilst this is by no means the end of our story it is the end of this particular adventure. We will be moving back into our house in a week or so and moving on with our lives. This has been an amazing year, living on the boat and sailing from Maine to the Bahamas. We went to so many beautiful places and watched the sun rise and fall over the ocean countless times. It felt plenty exciting and certainly there were moments that were not so much fun, but overall it was a fantastic experience. We met so many wonderful people, many of whom are living on their boats indefinitely. Whilst it is tempting to just keep going we have family commitments and other plans that we will pursue. However, we have talked about taking off again, perhaps in two years time and trying to sail further south to the Caribbean. At the outset we had a vague plan that we might set up a customized charter business on the coast of Maine and that we should get our 100 ton captains license to do so. Mike is still keen to do this, but Gloria is perhaps not so convinced that this is a good idea! We are just 10 days short of the required 365 days experience so we do plan to do the courses and take the exams for the license, and we'll continue to work through what it would take to run the charter business. One alternative would be to run a charter business down in the Bahamas over the winter, which we both think might be more feasible and is something we'll consider. There are other directions that we will also pursue. Gloria would like to get involved in providing better career advice for school children - particularly in areas where the kids may not have a wide variety of role models and she would also be happy to return to a chemistry job in the pharmaceutical / biotech area. Mike will look into consultancy opportunities and also explore whether there are photographic avenues to go down. So you can see the future is not so well defined but we remain optimistic. To quote Winston Churchill - "Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is perhaps, the end of the beginning."

We want say a huge thanks to all of our family and friends who have been so supportive during the planning and execution of this trip. Without your help and enthusiasm this trip may never have happened and certainly wouldn't have been as much fun. So again - thank you.

At this point we will conclude our blog. This seems like an appropriate place to stop. It's been fun writing and we loved reading and hearing your comments. It's great for us to have this record for the future. If and when we embark on our next adventure we will start a new blog afresh.

We wish you all "fair winds and smooth sailing"

Gloria and Mike

Distance travelled: ~ 4000 miles

Engine hours: ~ 800

Longest passages: Nassau to Fernandina Beach (450 miles / 3 days and nights), Norfolk to Atlantic Highlands (~ 270 miles / 2 days and nights)

Favorite places: Wardewick Wells (Exuma Land and Sea Park), Hope Town (Abaco), Tahiti Beach / Tiloo Cut (Abaco), Charleston (SC), St Augustine (FL)

Least Favorite places: Delaware Bay (every sailors least favorite place!), Belhaven (NC), ICW in Cape Canaveral area

Favorite guests: are you kidding!

Most valuable piece of gear: GPS/Chart-plotter/Radar … the engine!

Surprising lessons: you can do a lot more than you think you can and there's a lot of shallow water out there!

How did it match our expectations? Mike: ICW more difficult than expected, Bahamas more beautiful, overall exceeded my expectations - I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Gloria: Our friend Lynn summed up the journey well--the ICW is just hard work but the Bahamas is cocktails in the cockpit. Overall, I think the trip exceeded my expectations.