Jamestown and Bristol, RI – 9/11 through 9/14

The wind forecast for Thursday promised to start out easy and then build steadily into the low 20’s through the day, with accompanying building seas, so we woke up bright and early to try to get a jump on things before it got too frisky.

We motored out of the Great Salt Pond and then kept motoring for about an hour until the wind started building enough to sail. And they certainly built! Pegu Club was flying down the waves at over 5 knots (her max hull speed is approx. 5.7). I could see the waves were increasing, and we had a few that were definitely 6 feet – our highest ever. I’ll admit it, at that point I was a bit scared. We had never been in waves like that and while they weren’t supposed to get higher, I was worried they would. There was a moment where I thought about suggesting that we turn around and high-tail it back to Block. But then Jeff noticed something off our stern – DOLPHINS!!

I was SO excited – I immediately forgot about how nervous I was – and started squealing “Dolphins!!”. There was a pod of eight or nine of them, and they were surfing along in the waves. Of course I had to get the camera, so I jumped up and handed the tiller to Jeff so I could hurry down below, Jeff hollering “Be careful!” behind me. The waves were making things just a bit rocky, but I had hand-holds so it was fine. Coming back into the cockpit though, I realized there was no way I was going to be able to simply stand there and take a few shots. We were rocking way too much for that. So I held up the camera in the approximate area of where they were, didn’t even look through the viewfinder, and took one shot. It wasn’t until later that I was able to see if I had taken a picture of anything besides the sky or water:

Dolphins! You can also see one in the water towards the bottom on the right.

Success!

The dolphins surfed with Pegu Club for a few minutes before heading off, but in the meantime I had forgotten all about how nervous I was. Jeff said later that this portion of the sail, with the waves and the wind, was his favorite part of the trip. We’ve both come a long way since last year!

After we reached Point Judith we had to turn towards Jamestown, which unfortunately put the wind right behind us. We decided to drop the main to avoid any accidental jibes, kept the jib up, and turned on the outboard so that we could get there as soon as we could in an attempt to outrun the increasingly windy conditions. It was a windy, choppy slog to Jamestown with whitecaps all around, but soon we were able to radio Dutch Harbor Boat Yard to get our mooring assignment. As we approached it was REALLY windy (turns out it was in the low 20’s) and I radioed for specific directions to our mooring ball. The nice girl on the radio said, “I can’t really hear you because of all of the wind, but I think you’re looking for directions” and proceeded to give us excellent details as to how to find the mooring. We had never tried to catch a mooring in these kinds of winds, and in a strange harbor no less, but Jeff caught it on our first try. Yes! We flung off our lifejackets, high-fived each other, and opened up a well-earned beer and cider.

Dutch Harbor Boat Yard is on the west side of Jamestown, on Conanicut Island across from Newport. Approximately 1 mile wide, Jamestown is VERY cute with many restaurants and a good grocery store where we could stock up. After recovering and eating some lunch, we walked to the other side of the island to scope things out and get a ferry schedule, for the next day we were going to take the ferry to the Newport boat show.

Sunset at Dutch Harbor Boat Yard, Jamestown, RI

Friday was yet another beautiful day, and we made the most of it at the boat show I wanted to pick up a spring/fall sailing jacket, Jeff was looking for some tech long-sleeve shirts, and we both thought it would be fun to wander onto the new, big boats that we would never have a hope in hell of owning (nor would we want to). I confirmed that I don’t like motor boats nor catamarans.

Some of the boats were mind-boggling. There was the the 60+ foot Oyster with the electrical panel that looked like it belonged on the space shuttle (I said to Jeff there was no way you could “do it yourself” for that one, and he pointed out that anyone who could afford a $3,700,000 boat wasn’t going to be the do-it-yourself type). We also saw an Island Packet that had the chart plotter positioned so that when you sat down behind the wheel, all you saw was the chart plotter screen. Why would you do that? Don’t you want to see where you’re actually going vs. staring at a screen? What was particularly surprising was that several of these six and seven figure boats had that unmistakable smell of “boat” from the head. It made me all the more convinced that our composting toilet (which is still AWESOME!) is the way to go.

When we were waiting for the ferry to return to Jamestown, I started chatting with a gentleman next to me who had also been to the boat show. He asked if we saw our next boat, and although he was initially skeptical when I said no, I went on to explain that we really prefer the older boats with their lines, layouts, etc. I must have passed the “test” because he began telling me about his boat – a 12 meter Hinckley from the 1930’s up in Maine. I can only imagine how beautiful it must be. He tried to convince me that we really should look for a 40 foot boat so that Jeff can have more headroom, pointing out that there wasn’t much difference in cost between a 35 footer and a 40 footer. Easy to say when you own a 12 meter Hinckley circa 1930! Anyway, he was very nice, and it was a a pleasant way to spend the wait.

After we returned we took advantage of the laundry facilities at the marina and also charged some electronics. While we were waiting for the clothes to get out of the dryer we tried out the tacos at “The Shack”. It’s literally a shack at the marina, and I had read that they were amazing. There is supposed to be a wonderful restaurant in Newport called Tallulah on Thames and this is an outpost of that. It has tacos and a few other things, literally in a shack. They. Were. Amazing. We were wishing we could stay another day just so we could have tacos again the next night. However, Bristol awaited and with that was going to come the opportunity to meet a few other Bristol owners.

Saturday arrived with strong winds again, right on the nose. We would have taken our time and tacked our way up the Bay, but our meet-up awaited. We crossed under the Jamestown Bridge (our first time going under a bridge) without incident, although we did keep the outboard on given the wind direction and the choppy waters.

The camera makes it look close but it was really 135′ high.

As we approached Bristol we were greeted by Eric, Jeanette, and Chris, two Bristol boat owners that we had met through the Bristol Yahoo Groups. The group is very active and has been a great resource for us. There are early plans to have a Bristol rendezvous in 2016, possibly in Bristol, which would be a lot of fun. Eric and Chris have sailed for many years, and we were in awe of their abilities – quick tacks, sliding right next to each other without colliding, etc. We’re hoping some day we’ll be that good.

Chris keeps his Bristol 26 moored at Bristol Marine which is where we would be spending two nights, and Eric and his fiancé Jeanette keep his Bristol 32 in Barrington which is pretty close. We discovered that Chris bought his Bristol through the same broker that runs Narragansett Sailing (where we took our ASA 101 course a few years ago), and Eric also knows the broker because he is at the same marina where Narragansett Sailing is located. It’s a small sailing world. Anyway, we spent part of the afternoon hanging out in Eric’s cockpit, getting to know each other and talking boats, and then Chris kindly took all of us out to dinner at a yummy Irish pub in Bristol (the 5 of us squeezed into his car was pretty entertaining). We had a great time.

Delta-T and Whitestar meeting us in Bristol

Jeannette captured Pegu Club under sail.

Jeff and I dinghying over to see Eric, Jeannette, and Chris.

That evening was the first rain we had seen on the whole trip (except for in the middle of the night in Stonington), so Jeff and I played some rousing hands of Go Fish and then hit the sack.

The next day we said our goodbyes to Eric, Jeannette, and Chris as they were going sailing and we planned to explore Bristol. We had a great breakfast at the Sunset Cafe and then spent quite a bit of time at the Herreshoff Marine Museum.

The Herreshoff Manufacturing Company was run by two brothers – John and Nathaniel. John ran the business side despite going blind when he was 14, doing cost calculations in his head. Nathaniel designed the boats and was an amazingly innovative sailboat designer, including designing eight America’s Cup defenders. The museum has over sixty of their boats along with other displays, and it was fascinating.

This America’s Cup boat was NOT designed by Hereshoff.

After getting our fill of the museum we continued to poke around Bristol and then headed back to the boat. We had yet another gorgeous sunset. I can’t believe how many we’ve had on this trip.

This is actually the same sunset as above, but facing the opposite direction,. Amazing!

Newport awaited the next day.

Block Island Part Two – 9/7 through 9/10

First things first – a few pictures from our sail to Block on 9/7.

The seas were smooth enough and the wind direction steady, so Jeff hung out on the bow for a little bit.

The ducks came over looking for a handout once we had settled in at the mooring.

We went to Block Island last year for our fall cruise and really enjoyed it. Block Island is thirteen miles off the coast of Rhode Island. At just under 10 square miles, it has been named one of the “Last Great Places” by the Nature Conservancy with forty percent of the land set aside for conservation. If you don’t visit during the summer season it’s a peaceful getaway with plenty of hikes, beaches, and shops to poke around in.

Our first morning there we were greeted with a beautiful sunrise:

The weather forecast looked great, so Jeff and I decided to rent bikes and explore around the island. Initially we were going to keep the bikes for two days and use them as our main mode of transportation, but we were ready to turn them in by the end of the day. We are both so used to our bikes that are dialed in perfectly to fit us, that even though the frame size for the rentals were fine, we were still experiencing sore knees, elbows, etc. by the end of the afternoon. Deciding to stick to walking for the rest of our trip was a no-brainer, but it was worth it for the day to easily get to views like this:

Atlantic Inn – note the Adirondack chairs for taking in the sunset with a cocktail in hand.

Mohegan Bluffs and Southeast Lighthouse in the distance. You can just see the staircase that leads down to the beach.

Residents claim that Block Island has 365 ponds – one for each day of the year. This one was particularly striking:

We also rode our bikes to Coastguard Beach which is where we took the pictures of the channel leading into the Great Salt Pond in the previous post.

Back on the boat that night we were down below making dinner when I glanced out the window in time to see what is easily one of the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever witnessed. Although we didn’t know it at the time, this trip was going to have several gorgeous sunsets, but this one in particular was amazing. The water was as red as the sky. Honestly, the pictures don’t do it justice.

We had only planned to stay until Wednesday, but late Monday afternoon the winds started howling at a steady 16+ mph with gusts in the mid-20’s, night and day, and they weren’t forecast to stop until late Wednesday afternoon. Heavy waves and a small craft warning were going to accompany the winds, so we decided to extend our visit until Thursday. We had a lovely time relaxing, going to the Farmer’s Market, browsing in the shops, charging our electronics in the library, and watching plenty of boat t.v..

This boat was our favorite, however:

Pegu Club at her mooring in the Great Salt Pond.

I have to admit that the howling wind started to get on my nerves by the second night. Fortunately our sleeping position from the mega-bed kept the rocking feeling to a minimum, but the wind was just so darn loud. It was the first time we’ve been on the boat overnight in those conditions (typically we would have just stayed home), but I reminded myself that if I want to live on a boat upon retiring then there will be plenty of nights like this, so I needed to get a bit more zen about it. Mission accomplished.

As predicted, by late Wednesday afternoon the winds started to calm down. Although they were going to pick up again Thursday afternoon, we had a small window of opportunity to head over to Narragansett Bay on Thursday morning so we decided to grab it. We spent our last evening watching “High Noon” with Gary Cooper on our “media center” (iPad and Bose portable speaker), and went to sleep excited about continuing on our journey the next day.

Look! It’s Martha’s Vineyard! Block Island Part 1 – 9/7

Looking at the forecast, Sunday was going to be our best opportunity of the next several days to get to Block Island. It looked like it was going to be high seas and high winds beginning on Monday, so we took advantage of Sunday’s reprieve and headed out bright and early.

Leaving Stonington Harbor was much easier Sunday morning than entering it the previous day. When we came in on Saturday there was a group of eight people racing their sailing dinghies back and forth across the harbor. Since they were under sail and we were motoring they had the right of way, but as I said to Jeff later, it reminded me of the old arcade game “Frogger” with the dinghies representing the logs flowing across the water. But this time instead of landing on the logs, I had to miss the dinghies.

Anyway, the wind forecast for Sunday called for light and variable early, building to approx 10 knots for a few hours, and then dying off for the day. That’s exactly what we got. We motored for a bit over an hour until the wind built up enough to sail, and then we had a nice beam reach for a few hours before it died and we fired up the engine again. With the exception of the short-lived winds, this trip was much nicer than last year’s inaugural trip to Block when we discovered what “building seas” meant and the wind was right on our stern. THAT was a white-knuckle, roly poly ride.

Now, about the title of the post. When you’re sailing to Block, from far away it looks like two separate islands. Last year we saw the “two” islands and spent some time debating what the second island could be. We decided that it must be Martha’s Vineyard, not realizing that Martha’s is a good 40+ miles away from Block. As we got closer we saw that the two islands were actually one, and when we subsequently looked at a chart we felt rather silly thinking that it could be Martha’s. So this trip, when we saw the “two” islands we had our inside joke – Look! It’s Martha’s Vineyard!

99% of the boats that go to Block end up in the Great Salt Pond which is jam packed in the summer. But after Labor Day there are plenty of moorings to choose from, so we had our pick after sweating it through the channel. Supposedly the channel is 300 feet wide, but it feels much narrower to me, particularly when you’re a stone’s throw away from fishermen on land and another large motor boat is coming in the opposite direction. I had forgotten how narrow it felt last year. Probably a good thing.

At least we weren’t sharing the channel with this guy!

After we chose our mooring ball and tucked everything away, we made some cocktails, fired up the grill for some surf and turf (tri tip and Bomster scallops), and settled in to spend a few days on Block.

And vacation begins! 9/6 – Stonington

It felt like it would never arrive, but we finally found ourselves on Friday night loading up Pegu Club to begin our two weeks of vacation. The initial itinerary was to sail to Block Island on Saturday, Jamestown, RI on Tuesday, Warwick on Thursday, Bristol on Friday, Battleship Cove on Sunday, Newport on Tuesday, Stonington on Saturday, and back to Groton on Sunday. We expected to have to make adjustments to accommodate for weather conditions, but we didn’t expect to change things up right away. Nevertheless, a look at the forecast showed 30 mph gusts and 3-4 foot seas for Block Island Sound on Saturday so we decided to make Stonington our first stop instead.

Saturday morning we made a last minute run to Target for a few items we had forgotten, loaded the dinghy motor onto the stern rail and finally headed out. Two weeks of living on a boat! Yay! We caught the current and flew towards Stonington until the wind died, leaving us to motor for the last half hour. Little did we know this would be a sign of things to come. Still, we made it to Stonington in 2 1/2 hours – Pegu Club was flying!

We’ve been to Stonington a few times this year so I did some pre-vacation research looking for a few off the beaten path things to check out. The Velvet Mill, an old factory that houses a variety of artists studios and a nanobrewery, sounded like just the ticket. It was only a mile from the marina and although it was HOT and HUMID, the walk was entertaining, capped off by sighting an old classic Jaguar.

By the time we made it to Beer’d Jeff was welcoming the free beer flight. Unfortunately there wasn’t any air conditioning in any of the studios (only fans blowing hot and humid air), and frankly after having a cool dry summer I was starting to get overheated so after browsing in some of the other studios we trekked back to the boat where it’s always quite a bit cooler. Besides, grilled chicken drumsticks, cocktails, and a pretty sunset awaited – not to mention Block Island the next day!

Labor Day Weekend Recap – a sail, preparing for vacation, and the Mega-Bed!

Although the forecast wasn’t promising for the long weekend, we headed down to the boat anyway on Saturday after Jeff got out of work. The forecast is wrong quite often, and we lucked out in that this time it was wrong again. We had great weather during the day, and on Sunday night after Cruiser’s Midnight we had some thunderstorms and hard rain which cleared out by Monday morning.

Jeff was greatly anticipating this weekend – the weekend of the mega-bed. I think his excitement matched mine for the Nature’s Head last weekend (which, by the way, is AMAZING!!!). We are members of the Bristol owners board (a Yahoo group), and a while back someone posted about how they had created a bed in the salon that they could break down each morning. Jeff studied it, modified the design for our boat, and promptly dubbed it the mega-bed.

The mega-bed involved drilling two pieces of wood along either side of the “salon” (a word I use tongue-in-cheek given the diminutive size of our boat), then resting three pieces of wood in the middle. Cushions from the boat are placed on the wood, thermarest mattresses go on the cushions, and a memory foam mattress topper is next. All of this should create a level base, and then we can sleep next to each other with our heads on the port side and our feet starboard. Most importantly, Jeff can completely stretch out.

The process went pretty smoothly, although we discovered that one piece of wood was a touch too wide. However, we then realized that our Yeti cooler was the appropriate height and we decided to use that instead. This has the added bonus of not having to move the cooler (which is really heavy) every night. We haven’t tried it out yet, but we’ll find out when we go back to the boat for vacation. Worst-case scenario we’ll just go back to the original sleeping arrangements.

In addition to making the mega-bed (which didn’t take nearly as long as installing the Nature’s Head last weekend), we took care of a few miscellaneous items to get ready for vacation. Hooks were installed in the v-berth along with anti-skid so everything won’t go flying around if we encounter rolly seas like last year, we filled up the water tank, took stock of how much booze and drinking water we needed to bring, etc.

The weekend wasn’t all about construction and preparation, however. On Sunday we went out for a fabulous sail around North Dumpling. North Dumpling is a small island off of Fishers Island that is owned by Dean Kaman, the inventor of the Segway. According to Wikipedia, after Kaman was initially denied permission to build a wind turbine on the island, he joked that he was seceding from the United States, and later signed a non-aggression pact with his friend, then-President George H. W. Bush. Kamen refers to the island as the “Kingdom of North Dumpling”, and has established a constitution, flag, currency, national anthem, and a navy consisting of a single amphibious vehicle. The people of North Dumpling are called “Dumplonians”, and Kamen is said to refer to himself as “Lord Dumpling” or “Lord Dumpling II”. This is obviously all tongue-in-cheek of course, but I think it adds to its charm. In addition to North Dumpling Lighthouse, the island features a replica of Stonehenge.

North Dumpling has become one of our favorite “quick” sails. It’s funny because last year we were hesitant about sailing around it because the passage between North and South Dumpling seemed so narrow. When we finally did it towards the end of the season, we felt like we had accomplished something. This year it’s obvious that the passage isn’t that narrow, and we’ve sailed around it at least three times, including once with friends. It’s nice to look back and see how our confidence continues to improve.

Anyway, the “around North Dumpling” sail is approximately 7 miles round trip. If the wind is from the southwest (which is the prevailing wind direction for the region) it’s an easy beam reach out and back, and I never get tired of looking at the lighthouse. On Sunday the winds were perfect – southwest at approximately 10 mph – so we had a great beam reach out, an easy jibe around the island, and an awesome beam reach back. Another special sail where it was “set it and forget it.”

We don't usually see freighters out where we are, so this was kind of cool. — We don’t usually see freighters out where we are, so this was kind of cool.

Seaflower Reef on the way to North Dumpling.

All in all it was a fabulous weekend, and a great prelude to our VACATION (yay!) which begins on Saturday the 6th.

Whoo-hoo! Our Nature’s Head composting toilet.

A boat is a series of compromises – so the saying goes. In our case, the biggest compromise for me, by far, has been the head situation. Before we bought this boat we already knew that we wanted to have a composting toilet. From all of our research, it seemed that with a traditional marine head there would inevitably be problems. Permeated hoses, overfilled holding tanks, leaks, odors – ack! There was no way we wanted to deal with any of that.

Pegu Club came with a traditional marine head and while the setup was ingenious for a 24 foot boat, it was really intended more for day sailing. It wasn’t going to work for the way we were going to use her, so it had to go. Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough room in the v-berth if we wanted to sleep in it and have a composting head, so we settled for a portapotty. The portapotty was o.k. for the first season, but during our second season I became increasingly disenchanted with it.

One Sunday morning on the boat we were sitting down below waiting out a rainstorm when we observed that we hadn’t used the v-berth for sleeping at all this season. Jeff fits better on the side berth as long as he opens up the hatch so his feet can go through, so the v-berth had become a defacto storage area. (Side note: he is working on a “megabed” design which, if it works, will be the subject of next week’s post.) Why not revisit the composting toilet idea? We called up the size specifications for the two main players in the field – Nature’s Head and Airhead – and took some measurements of the existing box where the portapotty was currently installed. It was going to be a tight fit, but it looked doable. We decided to make it an offseason project.

Last week I was thinking about our upcoming two-week trip and how I REALLY didn’t want to deal with the portapotty for that amount of time. That’s how the UPS man ended up delivering a Nature’s Head composting toilet to our door on Friday. I was as excited as a kid on Christmas morning.

The composting toilet works by having two separate bins – one for solids and one 2.2 gallon bin for liquids – with a pair of holes in the front directing liquids into the removable liquids bin and a trap door for solids. The solids bin has an agitator. Fill the bin up to the agitator with peat moss or coir and that’s it. Give the handle a few turns after you use it, and you’re done. There’s also a vent with a small computer-style fan that draws air out through a hose that is vented to the outside. Two people living aboard can use it for a month before emptying the solids bin. To do so you simply put a trash bag over the bin, empty it, and discard it. Some people will put it in a separate container to turn it into compost (hence, the composting toilet), but we definitely won’t be doing that. We’ve read literally hundreds of accounts on various websites, and with the exception of a couple of people, everyone loves it. No parts to break, no repairs, no added expense (beyond peat moss, which is nominal). There is absolutely no odor. For us it was a no-brainer.

So Saturday evening we found ourselves at the boat, ready to install our Nature’s Head on Sunday and to MacGyver whatever was necessary to make it work. After a beautiful sunset and a yummy dinner of cappellini with shrimp and olive oil, and fresh green beans, it was off to bed for a busy Sunday.

We got lucky in that Sunday was sunny with very little wind. The perfect day for a boat project. Overall the installation was very easy. We had to build a base out of 2×4’s cut to size because the latches weren’t quite clearing the box in the v-berth. We got lucky, however, because even with the added height we had just enough clearance for Jeff’s head. We didn’t have to spend any time thinking about how we would run the ventilation hose, because we simply followed the route that the prior owner had taken with the hoses for the marine head. Of course just because the installation was easy doesn’t mean that we weren’t squeezing ourselves into small spaces or lying on the floor peering underneath areas while holding flashlights in our mouths.

It's a little easier for me to squeeze in here than Jeff, although he can also do it. — It’s a little easier for me to squeeze in here than Jeff, although he can also do it.

Our only hiccup came with installing the wiring for the fan. We had already decided to remove the am/fm cassette radio and accompanying speakers, so we traced the wires and got rid of those. I’ve discovered I have a knack for tracing wires, although there was one horrifying moment where we thought we may have cut the wires for the running lights. We had planned to run the fan to the spot on the electrical panel where the radio was, but we didn’t have a long enough wire. So then we decided to wire it to the port LED light in the v-berth, but the fan wouldn’t work without the light turned on. We tried to run it above the light switch, but we still had the same problem. Ultimately we decided to remove the LED lightbulb and simply leave the fan wired in. We will likely buy longer wire and run it to the panel, but this works for now.

Voila – the Nature’s Head was installed. This picture was before we hooked up the hose. The hose is connected to the port on the left. We drilled a small hole into the panel so we could thread the hose through it and underneath the “floor” of the box that the Nature’s Head is in, down through the bilge, into the area that I was working in above, and attached to the old pump-out which now has a mushroom vent on it instead.

It was well after 7:00 p.m. by the time we were finished and it was time to pack up and head home, so although it’s prepped and ready to go we haven’t actually tried it out yet. That will be next weekend. But I have no doubt that this is going to be one of the best boat-related purchases that we’ve made so far.

As for the portapotty? It’s going to stay in the basement until we buy the big boat. Then we’ll take the Nature’s Head out, install it in the big boat, and reinstall the portapotty for when we put the Bristol 24 up for sale.

Two boats, two sails

Last weekend we departed from our usual routine of driving down to the boat on Saturday after Jeff gets out of work, and we went on Friday (after the shop closed) instead. This was because the marina was holding it’s annual “Ladies Night” with the Customer Appreciation party the following night.

Chatting at Ladies Night with our mooring neighbors, they mentioned that they were going for a sail the next day (Saturday). Since I was simply going to be hanging out on the boat all day while Jeff was at work, i brazenly invited myself along. It’s actually not as bad as it sounds. A retired couple with a 24′ O’Day, we’ve been friendly with them since the beginning of last season. They’ve previously stated that they are always happy to have extra people along on their sails, so I took them at their word for this occasion.

Saturday morning the dinghy outboard still wasn’t working so we rowed in and dropped it off with the mechanics (we learned our lesson after the big outboard debacle at the beginning of the season). After Jeff went off to work I proceeded to row back to the boat. It was a long, zig-zagging process – it was only my second time ever rowing a boat – but I told myself there was no other way to get better at it.

I headed out with our mooring neighbors around 11:30 a.m. for what they had said would be a “short sail.” Winds were at around 10 knots and it was a glorious day. More Chamber of Commerce weather. It was fun to simply be a passenger and not have to worry about rocks, depth, etc. I had never sailed so close to the New London Ledge Lighthouse before, and really wished that I had brought my camera. They had a neat tiller tamer that I was able to see in action (it’s on our must-have list now), and a handheld GPS which was convenient (we use our iPad for a chart plotter). However, while I liked their boat, it confirmed for me that I really love ours.

Their O’Day is the same size as ours but it’s about half the weight. While this means that the O’Day is faster (relatively speaking – we are talking about 5-6 knots after all), it felt a lot different when taking waves. The O’Day “hits” the waves. The Bristol coasts along on them. Like stomping your foot on a tile floor as opposed to carpet. Anyway, it helped to let me know that we are on the right track in the characteristics that we’re looking for in the “big boat” – heavy with a full keel. Slow, but forgiving.

Our planned “short sail” resulted in returning to the mooring ball six hours later! I didn’t mind in the slightest. Being on a sailboat is my favorite place to be, and it was really sweet to see how much they loved sailing around on their boat. We got back just in time for me to row back to the docks and meet Jeff for the customer appreciation party.

Saturday was glorious. Sunday was a reminder that the weather in New England is fickle, and no two days sailing on Long Island Sound are alike. It was still warm but the winds were up to about 15 knots. The chop wasn’t particularly bad in our marina, however, so Jeff and I fought off some laziness and decided to head out for a sail.

Wow! We were quickly reminded that our marina is fairly protected. Winds were at 15 knots with gusts up to 20, and there were 2-3 foot waves with whitecaps on the Sound. This was not what we were planning on (nor what our various weather and wind apps had predicted), but it was good practice for our upcoming vacation. We have had mild conditions for almost every sail this season, and it’s unlikely that will occur while we’re out cruising every day for two weeks. This was a good refresher course in how to sail in “friskier” conditions.

Jeff and I basically sailed around, tacking a few times (failed on the first one when I wasn’t aggressive enough with our turn and the waves pushed us back), and shaking off the cobwebs. The chop reminded me a bit of our trip to Block Island last September, and while I’d rather not have a repeat of those conditions, it was nice to have that experience to draw upon and boost our confidence. After about an hour it started to sprinkle and we called it a sail.

Back at the marina the weather rapidly improved (typical New England – if you don’t like the weather, wait a minute), and we enjoyed hanging out in the cockpit drinking cocktails, eating snacks, and finally firing up the grill for hotdogs for dinner. Another successful weekend on the Pegu Club.

Stonington, Part 2 – a perfect sail, but first: an adventure on the Pegu Club

Monday dawned every bit as gorgeous as the weatherman predicted. While the timing wasn’t good for a favorable current home, the forecast was for 12-13 knots of wind so we figured that would offset the current nicely.

One of the things that I particularly enjoy about Dodson’s are the Amtrak trains that regularly go by. They are far enough away to not be too loud, but close enough to watch. I have an affinity for trains, and when we’re at Dodson’s I’m a bit like Doug the dog from the movie, “Up” except that instead of “Squirrel!” it’s “Train!”.

Once I had my fill of trains we took a walk through the borough. Stonington Borough is quintessentially New England. Cute and historical houses, independent shops, a mural that cracks me up every time I see it. There’s something about the lobster in the middle, soaking in a pot with a smile on his face and drinking champagne.

But I think our favorite part of Stonington is the ability to purchase the best scallops on the planet – Bomster scallops. I didn’t particularly care for scallops until I tried these – half-dollar sized, sweet, delectable. When the Bomsters catch these deep sea scallops, they shuck them on the boat, rinse them in sea water, and then flash deep freeze them. No ice crystals, no fresh water, no chemicals. They are simply amazing. Every time we eat them I comment on how much I’ll miss them when we finally cast off the lines and sail away. My co-workers even have a standing order for whenever we’re in Stonington, having tried them when I brought some back from previous trips.

The Bomsters deliver their scallops to restaurants from New England to the mid-Atlantic region, but we are spoiled in that we can easily buy them at Stonington Seafood Harvesters whenever we’d like. Stonington Seafood Harvesters sells their scallops right from the dock using a self-serve honor system. Yes, that’s correct. It’s the honor system. The scallops and other assorted seafood are in freezer cases at the front of the building. There’s a hand-written sign with the prices, a calculator, a credit card machine, and a slot to put the credit card receipt or money in. Take want you want, add it up, swipe the card, enter the cost, sign the slip, put it in the slot. It’s a real treasure, and one that we don’t take for granted.

You can see the self-serve freezers on the left.

After we had purchased four packages (one for us and three for co-workers), we continued walking back to Dodson’s and came upon a potato-selling stand in front of someone’s house. “Just Dug” potatoes, $3, and again, a small jar for the honor system. Of course we bought some. I love Stonington!

Back on the boat at Dodson’s, we prepared to cast off the mooring line and head back to Groton. We fired up the outboard, Jeff let the line go, we started to motor away and within five seconds – dead silence. Crap. The prop was tangled in the mooring line.

This was the first time this had happened to us, and my first instinct was to try to steer towards another mooring ball so we wouldn’t bump into any of the mega-fancy boats around us. After about 5 seconds I realized that it wasn’t a concern. If we were tangled in the line, we weren’t going anywhere. Dodson’s has two pickup sticks on their moorings so we used the boat hook to catch the second one and hooked it onto the cleat just to be extra careful. Then Jeff hopped into the dink to try to untangle us.

Jeff made some progress but eventually we decided we needed to radio Dodson’s. Every staff member there is so professional and friendly, and soon one of the launch drivers came out to help. We chatted while he tried to untangle the line, discovering that he was leaving in ten days to enter Old Dominion as a freshman electrical engineering major, and he had sold his Boston Whaler to help pay for school (“It was a sad day.”) He was able to untangle most of the line, but the thinner line leading from the stick was jammed between the prop and the shaft, so he radioed his boss. As we waited he said this happened all of the time, and just two days ago somebody had sucked the line deep into an inboard engine. Ouch.

After the boss worked on the line for a while, he finally determined that the prop would need to come off. He asked if we had any tools, and fortunately we have an entire toolbag filled with them and plenty of spare cotter pins. This helped us to feel a bit less like a couple of doofuses. So with everyone pitching in (the soon-to-be ODU freshman keeping the workboat in place, Jeff handing tools to the boss, me trying to keep the outboard lifted up just a bit higher, and the boss working on the prop), we were eventually free.

The whole thing had taken over an hour and when I asked what we owed for this fine service we were told “No charge.” I’m telling you, this place is amazing. Needless to say we tipped them both VERY well!

Normally when something like this happens (and it always involves the stupid outboard), we don’t sail for the rest of the day because we’re a bit stressed out. In this case we had no choice since we needed to get back to Groton, so we took about 30 minutes to regroup and then headed out again. During the interim we did what we always do after this type of “adventure”: we talk about what happened and how we can prevent it from happening again. We decided that I need to give the outboard more throttle when Jeff unhooks us, and Jeff needs to hold onto the line for a second and then try to toss it away from the boat vs. simply dropping it.

With that new strategy in place and my heart in my throat, we dropped the line and motored away without incident. As we left the harbor we exchanged hearty waves with the the soon-to-be ODU freshman who had gone back to driving the launch boat, and we passed the breakwater feeling ready for a good sail.

And what a sail it was! The best one of the season. The winds were around 7 knots out of the SE but were forecast to pick up to 12 knots. We hung a right towards Groton and settled in on a broad reach. After about a half hour the winds picked up as promised to 12-14 knots, and even though there was a strong current against us we were still making 3 knots. Our course was going to eventually turn slightly to the NW at which point we were going to try to sail wing and wing using the preventer we had made, but as we got to that point the winds shifted to the south so we were still between a beam reach and a broad reach. Pegu Club was FLYING! She’s such a great boat – you could tell she was so happy in those winds – and so were we.

Ultimately, it was what we call a “set it and forget it” sail the whole way back. No tacking, no jibing, just a bit of trimming the sails every once in a while. It was amazing. We’ve never experienced that coming back from Stonington before because usually the prevailing winds are SW so it ends up being a tack fest. Not this time. Poseidon made it up to us after our inauspicious beginning that day.

Coming into Pine Island Marina the winds died down as if on cue, and we commented on how if we hadn’t been delayed leaving Stonington the conditions wouldn’t have been nearly as perfect for our return sail. This was one time where it really worked out for the best.

Chamber of Commerce Weather – Stonington, Part 1

Low to mid-80’s, low humidity. My dad has a name for this kind of weather – “Chamber of Commerce weather.” After a long, cold winter and a very cold (and seemingly never-ending) spring, we’ve had a summer full of Chamber of Commerce weather and this past weekend was no exception. Fortunately it was going to last through Monday, so I took yesterday off and Jeff and I decided to sail to Stonington and spend the night.

Last season Stonington was the first sail where we stayed overnight away from our marina. We enjoyed it so much (well, except for the part where the outboard started sounding like it was going to stall out just as we were entering busy Stonington harbor which is filled with super-fancy boats – i.e. really expensive), that we returned two more times before the end of the season. We wanted to go last weekend but it was cloudy, showering, and zero wind so we simply hung out on the boat and did boat chores. This weekend was looking substantially better, so we were psyched.

Departure day on Sunday was looking good, timing wise, because the ebb current was going to be kicking in around noon. During our second sail last year we found ourselves at a standstill despite the fact that it was windy and we were “sailing.” It was at that point that we learned that with a 3 1/2 foot draft on our boat, the tides weren’t as important for us as the currents, particularly in Fishers Island Sound. Since then we never go for a sail without first checking to see if the current is flooding or ebbing. The currents in Fishers Island Sound can frequently run 3-4 knots so it makes a big difference, especially in our heavy (6,000 pounds) 24′ boat.

While the day started out with very light winds (under 5 knots gets us nowhere fast), the breeze finally starting puffing enough that we decided to cast off the mooring line and head out. The perigee full moon was giving the current an extra boost, and before we knew it we were flying towards Stonington at over 5 knots, despite winds of only about 6 knots. Gotta love it when the current works with us instead of against us!

After approximately 1 1/2 hours the wind had dropped to well below 5 knots, and even though the current was still allowing us to make some headway, the sails were starting to slap around. When we hit the area that we jokingly call the “mini-Race”, the turbulent waters combined with virtually no wind pushed us around enough that we decided to call it a day, fired up the outboard and motored the rest of the way. We picked up the mooring line at Dodson’s Boatyard less than 3 hours after we had left Groton. A personal best for us, and all due to the screaming-fast current.

Note: we weren’t this close to the lighthouse – we sail very conservatively and give everything a wide berth. I used the zoom on the camera.

We got lucky in that Dodson’s had assigned us a mooring that was about as close to the dinghy dock as you could get. This was fortunate because Sunday morning the dink outboard was repeatedly stalling at low speed, so we had left it behind in the car (it’s highly likely that we simply need to clean the carb). Since Jeff would be rowing the dink, a close-in mooring assignment was fabulous. After we flaked the sail and got everything ship shape, we were sitting in the cockpit enjoying a drink when we began to hear a fife and drum corps playing at the Dog Watch Cafe (Dodson’s bar and restaurant). Unbeknownst to us it was the bicentennial of the Battle of Stonington, so we had some fun listening to a variety of songs while sitting in the boat, including a rip-roaring version of “Blow the Man Down.”

The guys in the red striped shirts are the fife and drum corps members.

After a trip to the Dog Watch for its version of Bermuda punch, a great sunset, tri tip on the grill and spanish rice on the Origo for dinner, and some general relaxing while watching the full moon rise, we were off to bed by cruiser’s midnight (9:00 p.m.) for a solid night’s sleep.

Sunset at Dodson's Boatyard, Stonington, CT — Sunset at Dodson’s Boatyard, Stonington, CT

So why “Pegu Club”?

One of the questions we get asked at the marina quite often is why we named our boat “Pegu Club.”

According to Wikipedia, the Pegu Club was a famous gentleman’s club in Rangoon that served British officers and civilian administrators after the annexation of Upper Burma in 1885. It’s also a cocktail – 1.5 oz gin, 1/2 oz Cointreau, 3/4 oz lime juice, and a dash of angostura bitters.

But we didn’t know any of this until we went into the Pegu Club on West Houston Street during one of our trips to NYC. The Pegu Club is a cocktail lounge that kicked off the New York cocktail craze when it opened in the mid-2000s. It’s a great place – good music, relaxed vibe – we’ve never been disappointed whenever we’ve gone there.

We were at the Pegu Club one fall evening after we had finished our first season of sailing – but before we had bought our boat – when Jeff said, “Some day if we ever have a boat, we should name it the “Pegu Club.” It was unique, it was a place that we liked – it was a great idea.

And so we did. After we bought her, there was never any doubt that she was “Pegu Club.” It has the added benefit of being slightly ironic, given her small size. And yes, the Pegu Club is my drink of choice when we are relaxing on the boat after a sail.