We had been anchored in the Cape May basin awaiting good weather to sail up Delaware Bay to the C&D Canal for two days. The optimal time to transit the Bay due to favorable currents was on Tuesday, September 4th. The current would be a northerly current running with us for the entire day of the 56 mile sail. Wind was forecast to be from the southwest which would be a beam reach on one tack until our arrival at the the Canal where the sails would be dropped. Joe had been closely monitoring several weather apps on the iPad. It appeared that even though the remnants of hurricane Isaac were bringing thunderstorms to the area there would be a possible break in the weather on Tuesday. At dawn on Tuesday we decided to leave via the Cape May Canal and make our move toward Chesapeake City, Maryland.
Simple Life has a cutter rig which consists of a large mainsail, a 130% jib and a staysail. She was built to reach and that is where she can occasionally reach unbelievable speeds when combining wind speed and favorable currents. Tuesday had all the right ingredients. At times we were reaching at consistent speeds of 8.6 knots! We sailed up Delaware Bay on one tack, took sails down and turned into the C&D canal by 2:00 PM. We motored through the canal which also had favorable current and were anchored in Chesapeake City by 3:30. Finally a perfect day! Wind, great current running with us rather than against us, no thunderstorms and most importantly...no flies!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Maryland
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