From Sublime to Ridiculous

From Sublime to Ridiculous

Saturday 5th June 2021

After a quiet night at anchor near Reedy Point we woke to find next to no wind and dead calm waters. Fortified with coffee and wheat Chex for breakfast we got going and were under way by 8.30 am. We had the mainsail up almost immediately but it wasn’t doing much to start with. Current was against us for the first couple of hours but with the aid of the ‘iron-oar’ we were making better than 5 knots. The wind settled in at 6-8 knots from the southwest and we rolled out our genoa. The tide turned to ebb and gradually our speed increased to a peak of 9.3 knots over the ground. There is not much to see in Delaware Bay, it’s actually really boring; many sailors view it as the world’s worst place to sail! We kept ourselves amused swatting flies and eating “elevenses” or what the hobbits would call second breakfast, which consisted of Gloria’s homemade banana bread and coffee. It was about 1pm that we started to think about lunch and Gloria headed below to make some sandwiches. We were still in the Bay but had already noticed the start of some ocean swells and after 10 minutes Gloria reappeared looking decidedly unwell. Over the next hour the wind increased and turned more to the south, almost directly on our nose. As you head south down Delaware Bay you only get about 4 hours of favorable current before you run in to the start of the flood tide and so it was that our speed steadily dropped until we were struggling to maintain 5 knots. If our mast were a few feet shorter we would have been able to cut through the Cape May canal from the Delaware Bay, but it isn’t and we wouldn't have cleared the fixed bridge, so we were forced to take the long way round.  The Delaware Bay estuary is a nightmare of shifting, poorly charted shoals and skirting around them via the main shipping channel until you are well out into the Atlantic adds an extra 15 miles or more. As we started this detour the wind was gusting past 20 knots and the seas were very choppy. It seemed like forever, but eventually we were able to turn off the wind and head to the ocean inlet to Cape May. We opted to keep the main sail up until we were in the harbor, but we put in a reef whilst going downwind before gybing and heading up the channel. All this went well and we arrived at our current anchorage about 5.30 pm after a 9 hour, ~ 65 mile passage. We are a bit knackered now! It’s going to be spaghetti Bolognese for dinner and maybe a glass of red wine.

Mike

38 57.034 N, 74 52.994 W

Ship John Shoal Light - a highlight of Delaware Bay!