Help

No, we're not sending out an SOS. But we can all use some help from time to time.

We had planned on leaving Solomons today but Jeff felt a bit under the weather yesterday so we fell behind. Today we are getting out an ActiveCaptain newsletter which will mean lots of emails, updates, and comments, so we decided to stay put one more day.

We had lots of folks asking for beginner's help using the ActiveCaptain site, so we've put up a Getting Started tutorial. Look for the big help button under the articles section.

We're also announcing some big discounts at two of our Co-Op marinas here on the Chesapeake, Bay Creek Marina and Severn River Marina.

It'll be a busy day with lots of time behind the computer. However, that doesn't mean we can't find some time for a dinghy ride with Dyna and Dylan to the swimming beach around the corner. Gotta keep the crew happy!

Speaking...

October 10th - the day we all turn back into pumpkins. For the last 6 weeks we've been speaking at various rendezvous or preparing to speak at them. Yesterday's double session with the Krogen Cruisers annual rendezvous was our last for a while. This morning we awoke at anchor to see the 40 Krogens preparing to all take off from Solomons, MD enroute throughout the waterways. One thing about these Krogen owners - they know how to throw a party! We were dancing to live music until late last night...

We met many hundreds of people and made lots of new friends for life. We provided two types of talks at these get-togethers - the combination of our EMS/emergency medicine experience applied to cruising, and Q&A's about ActiveCaptain. It was all a wonderful experience and incredibly fun for us.

Now that all the speaking is over, finding a good swimming hole for Dyna & Dylan has become a priority. We'll stay in Solomons for a few days - we have some local knowledge about a beach good for swimming around the island. Then we're thinking of heading to St. Marys, the Piankatank River, or wherever the seas carry us. Having no plan is sometimes the best plan - for both pumpkins and puppies.

Hat's entertainment...

One of our most favorite things with ActiveCaptain is awarding hats for user-contributions. After a captain has earned 250 points for adding updates and writing reviews, they receive a highly-desired ActiveCaptain hat. We've mailed out hundreds of them.

Occasionally someone goes over the 250 point limit when we're in proximity. This calls for an official award ceremony. Truth be told, we're really just trying to save on mailing costs!

Over the weekend, captain PJ (Paul & Jo-Anne) worked hard to cross their 250 point level. This called for the ceremony with previous hat recipients Bob & Lynn and the consumption of Dark & Stormies onboard aCappella. Dyna & Dylan officiated but mainly slept.

Satisfaction

I grew up in Rockville, Maryland just outside Washington, DC, one of five children. My parents just sold our old house earlier this year. It was in a nice suburban neighborhood. We moved in when the house was new. One of the things my parents liked about the neighborhood was that when it was built, rather than leveling everything in site, they carved out lots and roads leaving most of the wooden area it was built on.

Of course, that meant that every fall there were tons of leaves; I mean an endless, mountainous supply. And, as it should be, it fell to the children to rake them up. In response to our complaints my mom would say, "Just think of the satisfaction you'll feel when it's done." I guess some lessons take time.

Many years later, I have grown to love the feeling of completing tasks, looking at something that was a mess and is now, due to my labor, beautiful.

Much of the past two days have been spent cleaning the dinghy. When you live on a boat your dinghy becomes your car. It takes you from the anchorage or mooring field into shore. It takes you from your rented slip up the river to a restaurant or grocery store. Sometimes it takes you on the cruising equivalent of a Sunday drive. Over the past 9 months, our dinghy has delivered groceries, taken us to dinner dates, and, the best outings, brought the kids to their swimming spots. But all these activities had taken their toll and she was in need of a thorough cleaning.

After rinsing her off I got out one of my favorite products, GoJo Orange, which we list in our Products and Tips We Love section of our website. It's not just that it does a fantastic job of getting off the dirt and scum, it's also not a "boating product" so it's reasonably priced. I'm convinced that somewhere there's a Federal statute levying any product with "marine" or "boat" in its name with a 200% tax.

So I started in and as I finished the starboard side and moved to the port I had to step back and admire the difference between the two. And, yes, I felt a great sense of satisfaction. Mom, you were right.

Love,
Karen

Swamped (digitally)...

No, we're not sinking - in the water at least. We've sure been swamped with aftermath from the Miami Boat Show. OceanLines ran a nice story about our new MaxSea/Furuno integration. That's two of the 12 writers on BoaterMouth who have blogged about us. For those of you who aren't aware, BoaterMouth is a nice aggregate place to get the latest boating news from 12 accomplished bloggers. If you want one place to watch manually or through RSS for the latest in boating news and info, that would be the one to choose.

Karen and I have been going through the hundreds of emails we received. We saw more people join ActiveCaptain in the last 2 days than in the last 2 months. Marinas have started updating their own information in bulk. We've prepared 3+ years for this. Bring it on!

As marinas have started looking critically at their own reviews, one interesting thing stood out. The state of North Carolina wrote to me because someone put in a review that there was a rattlesnake on their dock. It's important to note that this facility has a 5-star rating with an exceptional following. They admitted that they do have rattlesnakes but would prefer if I'd change the word "rattlesnake" to just "snake" in the review. Well, we've never changed a single word in any review ever. But I wrote to the captain and asked if he really meant, "rattlesnake". Turns out, he's an expert with snakes - it was a rattler.

So here's the thing. The facility is still excellent. And the review will stand as is. Now cruisers like us with dogs will still go there, but we'll be warned and be a little more careful. To their credit, the state responded back accepting this and will work to warn people better too so they're not surprised.

To me, that is the true benefit of ActiveCaptain. There is just no other place where you can get this type of real, user-written information, critically important to having adventures of the non-emergency type.

Miami Beach - just another dog park...

With our antenna woes behind us and the antenna all fixed and looking great, we took off early en route to Miami Beach along the ICW. This route would take us along another ActiveCaptain hazard - an area of severe shoaling off Bakers Haulover inlet. I have to admit that I'm loving these hazards.  Not that I want them in my way.  But I love being able to find the few that are in my travel and prepare for them.  I knew about this low water area a few days ago.  Having some time to prepare allowed me to plan our arrival to the area near high tide.  The extra 2 feet of water we had were plenty to get through.  There would have been another "blog entry of woe" otherwise.

But instead, today was a wonderful day.  We arrived behind Belle Isle right off Miami Beach around noon.  It's a nice anchorage with about 20 other boats (mostly sailboats).  Right next to us is Compass Rose, a boat with a dog we met at Vero Beach.  We lowered the dinghy to explore and learn about the area.  Our team of dogs was very excited to be going for a dinghy ride.

We tied up the dinghy at the Miami Beach police station - kind of makes you feel good about leaving the dinghy!  We visited the park next door and found out that 5:00 pm is the time when everyone brings their dogs.  After walking around a little, we got back in the dinghy and explored Collins Canal to the Publix grocery store.  This is Miami Beach and the place is teaming with stores, shops, restaurants, and things to do.

At 5:00 pm we were all back at the park where we met a variety of dogs.  Dylan's new friend Dewie is a good match for our high-spirited pup.  Dyna spent the entire hour looking for a place to jump into Biscayne Bay to go swimming.  The 4 foot drop off the sea wall was enough to stop her, at least for today.

Among the other dogs was Victor.  The unique thing about Victor is that when he's thirsty, he stands against the water fountain and waits for his mom to press the faucet.  Dewie has enough experience here to know that he can get a drink too from Victor's droppings.

Needless to say, all dogs are fast asleep.  At least until tomorrow at 5:00 pm.

Wayne's Hat

Although we're in Stuart, FL right now, there are some blog entries that we need to catch up with.

As captains use ActiveCaptain and contribute to it, they gain points. As they accumulate points, they win awards sent by different manufacturers. When they reach 250 points, we send them an ActiveCaptain hat.

Wayne, Carol, and Eddie are the crew and captains aboard Fluke, a beautiful Krogen Whaleback.  We've seen them before in Vero Beach and they've been up to Castine on one of our moorings.  We've kept in touch over the years. But this year, Wayne qualified for a hat. Since we were both cruising on the Chesapeake last October, we decided that we'd hand deliver the hat. But when we finally got together on the Wicomico River, it was freezing cold and neither of us were interested in taking our dinghies down. We vowed to meet them in Vero Beach to deliver the hat soon.

Months later, we were finally in Vero Beach. They invited us over to their boat for an excellent dinner. Needless to say, we finally delivered the well-deserved hat.

The Crossroads

We left Vero Beach on Tuesday, a nice, bright, sunny day. Our objective was to get to Stuart. We've never been to Stuart and there seems to be a lot of cruising activity there.

Part of the planning process for any leg of our travel involves, surprisingly enough, checking ActiveCaptain. We just implemented a new "Hazard" marker that details problem spots that develop in an area. Sure enough, our path would take us across a hazard called "The Crossroads" - the marker in yellow/orange above. This is the place where the ICW crosses the St. Lucie River and the St. Lucie ocean inlet. It's a very busy place that has been shoaling with sand over the last few months.

While approaching The Crossroads, we heard multiple boats calling for towing companies because they had grounded right at this spot (why aren't they reading ActiveCaptain!). We decided that we would arrive just after low tide and it wouldn't be a good idea to risk going through the area. Instead we anchored at Jensen Beach (another ActiveCaptain anchorage - we didn't know about it otherwise). Since we had the whole afternoon, I bothered Karen to the point of surrender in taking down the dinghy and traveling the 6 miles to see the The Crossroads first-hand before our appointment at high tide the next morning.

The kids loved the idea of getting in the dinghy as we zoomed off down the ICW at 25 knots. The 6 miles flew by and we were at The Crossroads. Lot's of boats everywhere and me with my leadline to measure the actual depths.

So it turns out there is only 4.5' of water in the channel at low tide. We would have gotten there a little after low tide and the depth would have been 5'. aCappella draws 6' and we would most certainly have gotten stuck. Chalk up another one for ActiveCaptain.

While messing around the area, the sheriff came by in his patrol boat. We had a nice conversation about the channel and all of the boats that ground there. A few boats a week bend props and break shafts by hitting the bottom there and a good five boats every day end up grounded.

This morning we got underway before sunrise to be right at The Crossroads at high tide. We never saw less than 7' although I have to admit we were all holding our breaths. Then up the river to Sunset Bay Marina where we got pumped out, filled our water tanks, and filled our gas tanks for the dinghy. We're now on mooring #51 ready for the next adventure...or hazard.

At Sea Again

We pulled out of the Charleston Maritime Center right on time. ActiveCaptain user Jim on Arrivederci helped us with our lines. The sea predictions for the next couple of days were unlike any we'd seen – "2 feet and less," all on our starboard beam so the stabilizers should smooth things out to flat calm. We'd decided to take advantage and do a double overnight. I hate them; Jeff finds them challenging. But it did make sense to make use of the conditions. So off we went with two overnight meals prepared and layers of clothing to stay warm.

We experienced perfect conditions coming through the Charleston Harbor and out the inlet. I decided to go ahead and prepare our lunch - chicken burritos. I hadn't found the large wraps I usually used, so I made us each two smaller ones. As I carried lunch onto the pilothouse the boat gave a lurch. Jeff had just come out of the inlet and turned south. We had 2-4 foot seas right on our nose with short periods. My ultimate nemesis.

Experience told us to wait on lunch. Jeff thought maybe it was some effect from the inlet – they hadn't predicted this. Soon my stomach gave that familiar flip. Jeff was also a bit off, partly due to some expected off-gassing from our new exhaust lagging blankets which he got a whiff of with each engine room check.

We decided to try Queasy Drops. Jim McGee from Queasy Drops contacted us several weeks ago interested in supplying a sample for our Captains through our points program. Queasy Drops are sucking candies that use all natural ingredients to calm a queasy stomach. They were developed for kids on chemo and for morning sickness. Now they wanted to promote them for seasickness. I told him they sounded too good to be true but would be willing to try them. He sent samples.

To our delight, they worked. Our stomachs settled almost as soon as we began sucking them. I found it lasted about 30 minutes after the candies were gone. The seas persisted, so we spent the afternoon trying the various flavors. Not wishing to tempt fate, however, we wrapped up lunch waiting for the predictions to prove true. By late afternoon the seas had flattened. We ate one burrito, waited an hour and finally finished lunch.

Over our years of cruising and after many overnights we have developed a routine that works well for us. During the day we switch watch when we feel like it. Jeff takes somewhat more time at the helm as he likes being in control. Around 7 pm we eat half of our prepared dinner – tonight it was chicken fried rice. Then at 8 pm I go below to sleep and Jeff takes watch from 8-10. I take watch from 10-midnight while Jeff sleeps prior to his midnight to 3 am watch. I finish the night with a 3-6 watch because I find it easier to stay awake waiting for the sun to rise. We each finish our dinner at the start of our longer watch. The calories help us stay awake and eating gives us something to do to help the monotony.

The boat runs on autopilot so we mainly watch for other boats. We have MARPA (Mini Automatic Radar Plotting Aid) on our radar which lets us select targets and track their distances from us, the direction they're moving, and how long before we reach our closest distance and what that distance will be. It's mostly entertainment but occasionally there is a “dangerous target” we must hand steer around. On my earlier watch I encountered two shrimp boats, a common site off the coast of South Carolina. One was on a collision course with us. I find these boats particularly creepy. They're large boats with big arms out to the sides that have huge nets hanging from them. At night they display bright deck lights, lighting up the decks like daylight, which send out this eery glow on the water around them. They look like a vampire sent from Neptune. I veered slightly and we passed about a 1/4 mile apart. The lights lit up the pilothouse for a few minutes as we passed.

Daytime temps were fine with the solar heat through the pilothouse windows warming her to the 70's. As night fell it started to get cold. The layers we had shed during the day came back on. The kids complained that it was a three dog night and they were only two dogs. When I awoke for my 3 am watch the boat had a different bounce. The seas had finally turned to our starboard beam as predicted.

As I climbed out of the warm berth I felt the cold – 50 degrees in the pilothouse. The kids were huddled together for warmth. Jeff decided to start the generator so I could have heat during my watch. I love my man. He then informed me that the drip he had noticed on an earlier engine room check had turned into a spray. We were going to have to swap water pumps again.

On our way to Charleston last November, we developed a slow drip on our starboard side raw water pump. Jeff had swapped that with a spare and rebuilt the old one for a new spare. We now needed to use this spare on the port side. No big deal - simple swap - but the port engine runs the stabilizers so shutting down this engine would turn off the stabilizers. And we were in beam-to seas. We decided to see how calm things were at daybreak. Calm seas and we could do the repair while underway, otherwise, we'll head into Fernandina Beach and do the repairs there.

It's 5:22, the end of my watch is in sight. The pilothouse is warm and for now life is good.

Engine Room Checks

My husband is what polite company would call meticulous.  I sometimes have another word for it.  Something he has always insisted on is an hourly engine room check when we are underway.  We do this whether we're out for a day cruise on the Penobscot Bay or heading offshore overnight.  In the beginning I thought he was just "being Jeff" but after discovering some potentially serious issues before they became big problems I realized how important this routine is to our safety.

A week or so ago Jeff did a video about the broken hose clamps he found during our overnight trip to Charleston.  Losing a hose to a water intake could sink the boat.  The engine room checks discovered it when it was just a drip and not a gusher.  He thought the video was a good illustration of the importance of simple safety precautions such as engine room checks.  Apparently others agreed.

OceanLines, the online passagemaking magazine, ran his video this week to emphasize this point.  See what they said at The Underway Engine Room Check: Why You Need It.

Here Comes the Sun

It has been raining for days. First it was just rain, then pouring rain, then rain and wind, then rain, wind and, cold – so cold it was breaking records in Richmond, VA.

Dyna and Dylan were little troopers – no swimming, no running in the fields, not even a walk. They ran to the bow several times a day as we tried to hurry their business along so we could get back in out of the wet and cold. Dyna took it in her stride using the time to catch up on her beauty sleep. It was harder for Dylan. He grew restless. Jeff took him below to “open a can of whoop-ass” on him. I think they both needed the rough housing. I pulled out some of the reserve toys I'd brought, something I learned from traveling with young nieces and nephews.

We made hot drinks, kept the dogs close, and wished for the sun. This morning our wish came true. We woke to glorious sun! We're on our way to an anchorage on the Piankatank River. According to ActiveCaptain it's a great place for dogs. The kids will let you know. But I think we'd go there regardless just because it's fun to say the name. Go ahead, try it, it's pretty much like it's spelled – Pee-yank-a-tank.

Three Dog Night

We left Olverson's to continue working our way south. Friends of ours from Vero Beach onboard a Krogen trawler named Fluke were anchored on the Great Wicomico River at Rogue Pt and we thought it would be nice to share the anchorage with them. We didn't know how cold it was going to be. Wicked cold. Richmond, Virginia broke their all-time record for cold last night.

For me, checking email on the settee was pretty nice with two dogs tired after moving just 30 miles down the bay. Karen, on the other hand, was complaining of being cold.

It's hard to believe that just this Tuesday we washed the whole boat wearing T-shirts and shorts. By Wednesday we wore long pants for the first time during the day. By Thursday we were wearing socks. Socks! That's not supposed to happen when cruising south. It's cold and rainy and windy and just miserable.

So we fired up the boat's heating system and got everything warm over a couple of hours. Karen turned happy. The comforter came out on the bed and we rushed down to get under the covers earlier than usual. The only problem for us was that it was a three dog night and we only had two dogs.

Dylan and his studies...

Dylan is a thoughtful dog. At home, he'll watch birds and squirrels for hours. He studies their movements and occasionally gets to chase one. But here there are no windows. For Dylan, he gets to experience nature up close and personal.

While we've been busy in Solomons meeting people, having dinner out on other boats, having people over to our boat, and enjoying a variety of other social events, Dylan has been watching ducks. Here at the "Solomons - 2" anchorage they cover the water. They swim all around the boat and can't understand why we're not throwing food to them. Dylan studies their every move, quietly standing watch and hoping they'll move closer. If degrees were ever given out to dogs, Dylan would be due a PhD in ducks.

The people onboard aCappella have been very busy too. With the end of TrawlerFest yesterday, we were finally able to do some normal errands and household tasks. This included laundry, walking to the large grocery store that is further away, walking to the closer grocery store (for ice cream reserves), walking to the fish market, and walking to the pet supply store who carries our special dog food in 30 pound bags saving us shipping costs later. It was a lot of walking but it was a beautiful day with crisp, cool 70 degree sunshine.

It's funny how little walking is done any longer. While cruising, we're forced to walk often. I have to admit that we were offered cars by 5 different people here in Solomons over the week - the cruising community is small and friendly and we know a lot of people here. We appreciate the offers and would make use of them in a heartbeat in an emergency. For normal needs though, walking is OK with us.

We have these two wonderful Rolling Carts that carry groceries and fit well in the dinghy. We bought a fair amount of food today, filling the carts. Arriving back at the boat we were greeted by two wagging tails. Given the choice between fresh food and ducks, even Dylan goes for the food.

Why the Wye?

I've been told that when God takes a vacation, he goes to the Wye River. I can fully appreciate this now.

It was a long day from Crisfield to the Drum Point anchorage on the Wye River. We've never been on the Wye or in Eastern Bay. We have a few days before SSCA to try it out. It is quite pretty and an excellent anchorage.

The dogs have been sick over the last couple of days. Gastrointestinal sick. It hasn't been fun. They are both on a diet of rice and are starting to look better. They either caught something from one of the many dogs they played with in Crisfield or they ate something on the dock.

So we'll explore the area by dinghy tomorrow if possible. It might just end up being a chicken soup kind of rainy day though.

Pictures from our presentation...

Thanks to Celeste Yost (again!) for providing pictures from our MTOA presentation about ActiveCaptain.

A copy of the slides used during the presentation can be seen here.

Where Did Everyone Go?

The Marine Trawler Owner Association (MTOA) northern rendezvous ended last night with an awards ceremony and party. Karen and I each received a highly coveted ruby pin. By this morning, most of the boats had disappeared.

Our presentation on ActiveCaptain went really well yesterday afternoon. There were some excellent questions and the response was wonderful. It's times like this when we realize that we're onto something important and believe even more strongly that we're headed in the right direction.

Going even further in the "we believe" direction, OceanLinez.biz released a feature article about ActiveCaptain on Wednesday called, "ActiveCaptain Could be the Wave of the Future." Quoting their first paragraph:

Telling you that ActiveCaptain “could” be the wave of the future is probably a little bit like saying the Internet will “probably be a big thing.”  The truth is, ActiveCaptain already is a fantastic resource for cruisers and passagemakers, but it might actually become something huge — a source of real-time, up-to-the-minute information that your navigation system can access while underway.  That’s saying something and the more ActiveCaptain develops, the less far-fetched it sounds.  But more on that later; let’s see why it’s already worth your time to “become” an ActiveCaptain.

The MTOA seminars that we attended were great. We met hundreds of people, ate exceptional food, exchanged sea stories, and made plans for future get togethers with new friends. All of this was exhausting! Today we lounged around, went grocery shopping, caught up on computer work, and arranged play times for Dyna and Dylan with other dogs.

The grocery store in Crisfied is pretty small with few selections. I was, however, able to prevail in getting Breyers ice cream. Karen was seriously considering a type called Turkey Hill and another called PET. I now have veto power over ice cream selection and I draw the line far before ever purchasing something with an animal name or any play-on-words cute names. PET ice cream? That's just asking for trouble!

There are a bunch of DeFever trawlers still here so we're all getting together for a group dinner tonight. It'll be a group of a dozen or so people. Dyna and Dylan were specifically invited and will tag along for the fun. You know, our song was right - it isn't about the boat, the places, or the sunsets. Cruising is about the people you meet.

One Emergency Solved, A Second One Looms

Provisioning on a boat is tricky business. One is always making tradeoffs - how much space to allow for the staples vs how much for the "good stuff." Well, about five days ago we ran out of ice cream. Now if that is not an emergency at sea, then I don't know what one is. This is not only a catastrophe for Jeff and I, but also for Dyna and Dylan as they get to lick out the top and bottom of the ice cream container when it is finished.

After several days we considered calling the Coast Guard but then saw in ActiveCaptain that there is a small grocery store about a half mile from our spot here on the Rock Hall Town Dock. So off we went this morning with our insulated bag in hand. Jeff wanted to buy 3 cartons but fortunately I prevailed as we only have room in the freezers for two. Jeff suggested throwing some of the frozen vegetables overboard but I pointed out that we could go back just before we leave on Thursday or Friday. Being a single mom is sometimes difficult.

No sooner had we solved that impending disaster when the next one loomed. A couple of summers ago our friend Pat looked at us one beautiful day on the Castine Town Dock and said, "You've never heard of Damages?" She then loaned us her DVD's for season one of the show Damages with Glenn Close and we were hooked.

Several weeks ago we were on the town dock again with Pat and she said, "You've never seen Mad Men?" A couple days later she shows up with DVD's for season one of Mad Men. We started watching an episode each evening while we were in Northport. Well, last night we watched the last episode! Now we have to find season two. I'm not sure what sort of sick pusher our friend Pat is but next time I see her coming, I'm heading in the other direction.

The reason we're at the beach...

Today was a good day. As we figured, the forecast was too rough for us to transit down the New Jersey coast. It's looking pretty good for tomorrow so we're planning to pull up the anchor at 6:00 am and start heading toward Atlantic City. Taking some advice from people who grew up along the NJ coast, we'll stay a little closer to the shoreline than usual. The new NW winds developing today will keep the seas down there and it should be a pleasant 80 mile ride.

We have exceptional internet and phone connectivity here at Sandy Hook. Karen and I are using a Verizon MiFi which is giving us high speed access to both laptops at the same time. It's just like we're connected to a real DSL line.  Absolutely incredible.

So the weather is wonderful. It's 80 degrees and the sea temperature is in the low 70's. I was interviewed by phone for an upcoming article in PassageMaker magazine about mobile phones on boats, internet connectivity, and ActiveCaptain. All I did was talk about the things that we're actually using on our own boat. It was a fun interview.

Karen was just asked by Nor'easter Magazine to write a monthly column about coastal cruising from a woman's perspective. She wrote most of the first article - an introduction to our boat, crew, and about being lucky...

Sandy Hook is a 7 mile stretch of beach coming off the ocean side of New Jersey. It is kept pretty wild on the Atlantic side and is dominated by a Coast Guard station on the protected, western side. Tomorrow we hope to get to Atlantic City. Sunday looks possible to go through the Cape May canal and continue up the Delaware Bay to anchor behind Reedy Island. That would put us one short hop across the C&D Canal before entering the Chesapeake Bay.

By the afternoon, the beach was calling to us. Well, more the dogs than us but it was calling. As soon as we finished lunch, both dogs looked like they expected to play. Who were we to deny this? Down came the dinghy to a couple of fiercely wagging tails.



There are a bunch of other boats anchoring in the immediate area tonight. As the sun is getting lower, more and more boats are here for the night. Everyone who's been waiting to head south along New Jersey knows that tomorrow is the day we've been waiting for.

I think Karen is right.  We are pretty lucky.

AroundMe

First, a word about our Live Tracking. Thank you to those who have written to us asking why we haven't moved from our initial anchorage in Northport last Friday. We are OK. We've gotten a good 25 emails asking about our condition. Everything is fine - it's just that the weather off the New Jersey coast has been terrible and we didn't see the need to move away from a nice harbor with many services and a great dog swimming beach. I now issue an "OK" message on the tracking device every afternoon that we don't move to show that we're fine. If we needed something, you can bet that we'd be making a blog entry about it. It's nice to know that there are so many people watching our movements. Really though, it's been very, very nice here.

That brings me to our need for fruits and vegetables. Fresh fruits and vegetables don't last longer than a week. Sure, we've got some frozen and canned items, but those are last resort types of things. We've been on the boat longer than a week already so needless to say, our fresh supplies are running quite low.

Finding a real grocery store within walking distance from a harbor is rare. As you can imagine, property close to the waterfront is expensive - usually not the place where a large store would be built. We asked some locals and everyone told us that a grocery store was miles away from the harbor. But then I checked AroundMe...

AroundMe is a free iPhone app. It looks at your current location (from the built-in GPS) and gives you a list of items to select from like Hospitals, Hotels, Movie Theaters, Restaurants, and, you guessed it, Supermarkets. Here's what it looks like when you start it:

It thinks I'm in Asharoken which is the closest beach to where we're anchored. Touching the Supermarkets item displays the following:

That's a list of supermarkets in order of approximate distance from where I am (I'm not sure why Thebarn is in the middle). We looked at this list and decided that 2 miles was too far to walk so it looked like nothing fresh was in our immediate future.

But wait a minute. That's 2 miles from our current location - out on the boat in the anchorage. It's a 1.5 mile dinghy ride to get into town. So here's the cool thing - touch on a supermarket in the list and it'll show you where it is on a map. It turns out that King Kullen is only a half mile away. The blue dot is our boat. The town landing and dinghy dock is all the way in the inner harbor on the east (right) side. The red pin is King Kullen:

So off to town we went. We had some ActiveCaptain hats to mail at the Post Office and some items to buy at the hardware store. A few side streets and some traffic lights to cross and voila, a huge King Kullen grocery store:

AroundMe hit a home run on aCappella today. I'm thinking of it as technology you can taste!

We're all ready...

The boat is ready. The house is ready. We've gotten everything we're going to get for departing. We just have to do a final loading of perishable foods this afternoon, top off our water tank, and disconnect the mooring pennant. The dogs know that something is up.

We plan to leave tomorrow at 8:30 am headed for Rockland, Maine to quickly top off our fuel tanks. By loading up with fuel now, we won't need fuel again until we're on the Chesapeake unless we come across a good price somewhere. We need to leave Rockland by 1:00 pm to get long past Mongehan Island by sunset. Then we'll be making a straight line from Monhegan to the Cape Cod Canal approaching Cape Cod at sunrise and entering the canal around 9:30 am. Our departure delay of a couple of days will cause us to now be against the current on the canal slowing us down significantly for those 10 miles. Once in Buzzards Bay we plan on heading to Third Beach (ActiveCaptain reference here) off the Sakonnet River to anchor for the night. We've never been on the Sakonnet River or near that anchorage before. But is has a 4 star rating by 3 captains. We especially like the comment someone made about there being a "pet friendly beach".

It's both sad and exciting to leave. We'll miss our friends, Castine, our house, long hot showers, high-speed internet, DVR, and our general routine. The dogs have a huge surprise coming when they take that dinghy ride to the boat expecting a fun day trip only to find that they're not getting off - and not even stopping for the night. It'll certainly be a change. But we'll all be together. We'll face the challenges and share the joys of whatever comes our way.

Fair winds and following seas for all...