…And what a doozy it was! Objectively this was the worst passage we’ve had to date. I enjoyed it, but the weather definitely decided to test us.
We got an early start on Friday, stopping for fuel in the C&D Canal. We were overtaken by a giant ship but otherwise had an easy transit but were wishing for a breeze to help ease the heat. Be careful what you wish for.
As soon as we entered the Delaware River, the wind piped right up… directly on the nose and directly against the current. That meant we had a slow, slammy motor slog the entire way through the river and bay. It was legitimately miserable – four foot waves on a less than four second period. Poor Jack was miserable, and I wasn’t exactly seasick, but a little queasy for sure. I normally take a less-drowsy Dramamine before heading offshore (better safe than sorry), but the forecast was so mild that I didn’t feel like I needed to bother.
A couple hours before sunset, it finally started to calm down a bit and I took over at the helm. Of course, in my watch I had close passes in narrow bits of the bay with six big commercial vessels, but I kept just outside the channel and it was fine. We raised sail just past Fourteen Foot Shoal Light and motorsailed, finally seeing speeds over 6kts again.
Overnight was beautiful and we had calm, peaceful sailing. It was a full moon, and I really enjoyed my final overnight of our trip home. I needed to gybe just after sunrise, and I’d planned to try doing it by myself but just as I got everything prepared, the breeze piped up and we were surfing waves at 9+kts at times. I hated waking Chris up, but it was the smart call. After we were settled in on the new course, I let him get some more rest. By 7am though, I was wiped out and woke him to take the watch.
No sooner had I drifted off than I was awoken by “Concerto for Kazoo in Quack Minor,” as I’ve dubbed the sound of our fog horn. One long, two short blasts no less than every two minutes (the signal used for a vessel under sail in the fog). It took me a couple cycles to put two and two together and realize I needed to be up on deck. Basically as soon as I laid down, a heavy fog rolled in. Our radar was back to not working (of course!), so I settled in to stand fog watch.
We had an intense fog bow, definitely the most intense one I’ve ever seen, and it stuck around for a couple hours as the sun was still low in the sky. We kept hoping the fog would dissipate, and it did… six hours later. Occasionally we’d hear a power boat up on plane at full speed, but fortunately the engines never sounded particularly close and we never saw another boat the entire time. But maintaining that level of concentration for that long was exhausting.
The sailing, however, remained just lovely and once the fog cleared, we enjoyed a couple hours of a wonderful passage. That, however, came to an abrupt end as we saw thunderheads forming in the distance. We were close enough to shore to pull up weather radar, and there was a bright red nasty blob heading our way. We rolled up the jib, and shortly after decided to tuck in a second reef (we’d kept a reef in all day to keep us somewhat slow in the fog) – our timing couldn’t have been better.
Seemingly out of nowhere, this nasty looking cloud came towards us absolutely churning, and as soon as it was overhead, we were hit by a 55kt gust. Windara handled it beautifully – she never felt out of control. I was more worried that this monstrosity was going to start producing lightning, but thankfully it was past us quickly, leaving us with about a half hour of 30kt winds, driving rain and building seas. We later learned it was a roll cloud:
A low, horizontal tube-shaped arcus cloud associated with a thunderstorm gust front (or sometimes with a cold front). Roll clouds are relatively rare; they are completely detached from the thunderstorm base or other cloud features, thus differentiating them from the more familiar shelf clouds. Roll clouds usually appear to be “rolling” about a horizontal axis, but should not be confused with funnel clouds.
source: NOAA’s National Weather Service Glossary
I learned a new term – yay?
Eventually things calmed back down and we decided we’d had enough – time to get the sails down and just get in for the night. The one good thing was that we were rewarded with some whale watching just off Sandy Hook, and I even saw one breech. Although we’d originally hoped to run the East River and head to Manhasset Bay, the storm threw off our timing – besides, there were more storms in the forecast. So we went back to an earlier version of the plan and spent the night at Atlantic Highlands. It looks like a nice area, and I’d actually love to go back and check it out sometime. But for this trip, we were just glad to have the anchor down somewhere protected and call it a night. Of course, as we were anchoring, the next storm approached so it meant Chris stood watch while I made dinner. Fortunately it passed north of us and we just got rain. After a late dinner, we both knocked out and slept like the dead.
We were up at the crack of dawn this morning to make the tide at the East River and were treated to a beautiful sunrise. Even though this was our third time coming through the Verrazano Narrows Bridge into New York Harbor, it was no less incredible. The flood was already running when we hit the East River, and we rocketed through, seeing a max speed over ground of 13.2kts at Hell Gate. Other than all the ferries, it was one of the easier trips we’ve had through the East River.
Passing under the Throgs Neck is such a relief – back in familiar waters, so many of the stresses of constant passage making fade away. We picked up a mooring in Manhasset Bay for the next few days and cracked open the two Kalik mango radlers I’d brought back from The Bahamas to celebrate.
This passage was a testament to my growth as a cruiser. There were lots of challenges and typically these conditions would have had me stressed/complaining. Maybe it was because I knew it was our final passage, or maybe I’m just getting more comfortable with being uncomfortable, but it somehow all seemed more manageable, and I knew that even the worst parts would eventually dissipate. It’s always emotional coming full circle again, and there’s a lot to process and reflect on. For now, I’m just happy to be back in home waters.
