Day two begins at 0500 again, it was supposed to start at 0400 but the Admiral declined to give her permission. Nobodies happy if the Admirals not happy so 0500 it is. This morning it was 37 degrees so we decided to leave the doors to the enclosure open to let the temperatures equalize to avoid the windscreen fogging up. This technique worked like a charm and the morning darkness didn’t feel too bad. As so as you enter the Cape May canal theres a bridge that has a clearance of 55 feet above the water. We are 52 feet above the water but the 3 foot difference looked like about an inch.
The canal was dark as a witches heart but the trip was uneventful and over quickly. The reason for leaving so early was that we have a 75 mile day planned so we have to catch the flood tide piling into Delaware Bay. We ended up getting a full knot assist all the way through the canal and up the bay it was good for 2 knots. When we turned into the C&D canal the flood was still with us and we ran the entire length at over 10 knots while only turning 2000 RPM’s. Whoever planned this trip really had his shit together.
For the first 8 miles we didn’t see another boat so just as we were renaming it to the C&B (Christy & Bill) canal a car carrier the size of Montana showed up on our 6. It took him quite a while to overtake us and went a lot smoother than I imagined it would.
We turned into the Sassafrass River and tucked into the entrance of Turner Creek. We dropped anchor in 10 feet of water and went about the rituals of pooping the dogs, feeding ourselves and finally getting the chance to relax a bit.