The Big Finish
Wednesday, Sept 16, 2020
Do you remember how fireworks displays always finished with lots of bursts and noise all at once? Well today seemed like the sailing equivalent of the big finish.
Checking the forecast this morning, we noted that there was now a Small Craft Advisory in place for Narragansett Bay for this afternoon. We think of the Bay as being relatively calm and familiar. It’s not often that there is a SCA for inside the bay. Certainly, it’s not what we were expecting on our final day of the “shake-down” cruise.
Even as we ate breakfast, we could hear that the wind was picking up. Our problem was the currents through the narrows/bridges at the top of the Sakonnet River. Favorable flow would not commence until 11:40 am, meaning that our journey back to Greenwich Bay would take place in the afternoon. We decided to leave early and hope to motor through the adverse current. The winds continued to strengthen, touching 23kts at one point. Rather than try to sail, we wimped out and motor-sailed with the mainsail and the engine! We were on the mooring by about 1 pm.
The “shake-down” cruise certainly put us through our paces. We experienced no-wind, strong wind, fog, big seas and benign conditions. We did plenty of anchoring drill, picked up a few moorings, generally experienced life on the water. We have a few (or more likely many) things on our “to-do” list. Thankfully most of these are tweaks or improvements rather than repairs of broken equipment.
Tonight we are going into East Greenwich to get pizza!
Gloria
41 39.438 N, 71 26.736 W
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