Keeping it fresh.

One of our goals for this year’s travels is to visit places we haven’t yet seen. We had a great time last year and while we want to return to some old favorites, we thought it would keep things fresh if we made a point of stopping in new harbors and towns. Given that, we took a look at the chart and selected a few interesting spots to check out as we worked out way west along Long Island Sound.

Although we had hoped to visit Mattituck again, the weather wasn’t going to cooperate so we bypassed it and went straight to Port Jefferson for the night. From there it was a quick hop to Northport, NY which was a new destination for us. There wasn’t much wind until we turned into Huntington Bay (which is very large). At that point we went from 1 knot of wind to 18 knots and had a nice sail up to Northport.

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Gardiners Bay: it’s a love/hate thing.

We’ve tried multiple times over the years to feel the love for Gardiners Bay in Long Island. The first time we were there was to bring Pegu Club back to Groton after we bought her. She had been kept in Dering Harbor in Shelter Island and we were looking forward to sailing her back. What we ended up with was a hot, humid day with zero wind and the most obnoxious power boaters we had ever encountered. The kind who go full speed on autopilot while hanging out down below without a lookout. Those who were actually at the helm seemed to enjoy going as fast as they could while aiming right at us and then turning at the last minute to see how big a wake they could give us. Jeff vowed he would never return to Gardiners Bay.

The next season we decided to give it another shot. We had a sporty, close-hauled 40 nm sail from Block Island to Three Mile Harbor in Gardiners Bay (that was actually our longest sail until we left to go cruising). Three Mile was a lovely spot with a very large anchorage, excellent holding, and clean, warm water to swim in. We enjoyed it so much that we stayed there for several days before having to motor all of the way home on a hot, humid day with zero wind while being harassed by obnoxious power boaters. Are you starting to see a pattern?

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July by the numbers.

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We spent the first part of July on the hard before splashing Pegu Club and staying in a transient slip at Shenny while we hung around for various medical appointments. Our last appointment was on July 23rd and we wasted no time tossing the dock lines and heading out again on July 24th.

47% of this month’s spending was for medical appointments and related expenses (i.e. rental cars and fuel, hotel rooms, etc), along with haul out, storage, and annual boat maintenance costs. We put two solid coats of bottom paint on Pegu Club so we are hoping that we can avoid hauling out next year.

Based on how expensive June and July were, Jeff jokes that we aren’t coming up here any more! Honestly though, our expenses should crash for the foreseeable future – thank goodness!

Days under way since July 24th: 5

Nautical miles covered since July 24th: 26.31

Number of States: 2 (Connecticut and New York thanks to Fishers Island)

Nights at anchor: 16

Nights at a dock: 11

Nights on the hard: 4

Expenses:

Groceries/Non-food Groceries: $621.83

Diesel/Gasoline: $31.10

Medical: $842.40

Rental cars, hotel room, and related expenses for medical appointments: $603.35

Cell phone and internet (2 phones, iPad, iCloud storage, Garmin inReach subscription): $162.50

Laundry: $7.00

Amazon Prime: $12.99

Boat US Towing Membership: $131.77 (West Marine was running a sale, so now we are paid up until April, 2021).

Boat Expenses: $790.91 (haul out and four weeks storage for Pegu Club, gear oil, spark plugs, and zinc for the outboard, food hammocks, windlass parts, new flares to replace expired ones, new vent hose for Nature’s Head, extra flare gun for ditch bag, diesel additives, 2 water jerry jugs, bucket, bungee cords, gloves, paint brushes, tools)

Restaurants/Entertainment: $203.64

New York Times subscription: $20.20

Clothing: $123.32

Life Insurance Premium: $220.75

Subscriptions: $130.30

Random: $776.18 (fishing gear, galley items, Burley trailer, guidebooks, etc.)

Total: $4,678.24

2019 monthly average to date: $3,720.00

2018 monthly average (September – December): $4,465.95

Monthly average since starting to cruise: $3,991.09

Snippets of Southern New England

When I last left off we were debating whether we were going to head north for awhile or spend some time in Long Island before moving south. Ultimately we decided to take the slow route though Long Island, but Mother Nature (also known as our desire not to motor everywhere) dictated that we first spend another 12 days in Fishers Island Sound.

Criss-crossing the Sound, we spent some time in West Harbor before moving to Mystic. Mystic personifies the growth in our confidence over the past year. Before we went cruising we had talked about taking Pegu Club up the river into Mystic, but several things made us hesitate: the long motor up the river, having to time the openings for two bridges (the first of which doesn’t keep an opening schedule because it’s a busy Amtrak railroad bridge), and the fact that the charts indicated that the water above the Seaport was extremely shallow even though we had heard it had been dredged.

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On the “road” again.

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We’ve visited friends and family. We’ve taken care of some boat chores and routine maintenance. We’ve had assorted medical appointments and received the go-ahead from Jeff’s cardiologist with a one-year follow-up (vs. the six month reprieve she gave us last time). So it’s time to sail away again! It’s been great to settle in for a bit and see everyone, but we’re excited to head out and continue exploring. The “Where is Pegu Club” map has been cleared, and we’re ready to lay some fresh tracks down on it.

Where are we pointing our bow this year? As you can imagine, this has been a topic of extensive conversations on Pegu Club over the past two months. We really like the Bahamas and want to spend more time exploring the various islands, particularly those south of Georgetown. We were so close to Cuba last time that we had talked about going there on this second go-around, but the recent policy change by the current administration has quashed that idea for the time being. It’s probably better that I withhold my thoughts on that one.

What about continuing farther into the Caribbean? We’ve tossed that one around. We spoke to some former Shenny members who have sailed the route we were thinking about, and are currently on the west coast of Mexico. Island-hopping south is against the prevailing wind so we bought a copy of “The Gentleman’s Guide to Passages South” by Bruce Van Sant. He is the purported guru of minimizing your chances of getting a good ass-kicking by Mother Nature as you move south from island to island. The whole idea is really intriguing and certainly doable. But there are some drawbacks, and I would also like to spend time in Maine or Nova Scotia next summer. That’s very unlikely to happen if we sail further into the Caribbean this winter.

In the near-term we initially thought we would point the boat north to explore a few areas of New England that we haven’t yet been to, then hop offshore to Cape May, NJ. But then we talked about all of the spots on Long Island that we had to miss last season, and we really do like the trip down the East River. Honestly, having the ability to go anywhere can lead to a touch of analysis paralysis. So all we know for now is that we’re going to see where the wind blows for a bit.

We do have a few plans. We definitely want to spend September exploring the Chesapeake. We know we’d like to be in the Bahamas ideally by Christmas. Other than that, it’s all up in the air. It’s a far cry from the detailed schedule we had when we started out last September.

There’s a saying we’ve heard several times over the past year: “A cruiser’s plans are written in sand at low tide.” At first I thought the saying came about because traveling by boat is so dependent on the vagaries of Mother Nature, and that’s true.

But it’s not just the weather that changes our plans. It’s finding a great town that you just don’t want to leave. It’s the perfect anchorage with the gorgeous beach that you have all to yourself. It’s what happens when you ask, “Hey, what’s over there?” and decide to point the bow in that direction to find out. So we’re going to keep it loose with some rough parameters in place.

Let’s see what happens!