June 9, 2009.

The days really are longer at this time of year. What a huge difference that can make if you were trying to cover a lot of distance during a single day.

I woke at 0530 and it was actually daylight out. We only had a fifty mile day on tap so I didn’t want Christy to think I’d gone insane so I didn’t wake her until 0630. We raised the hook followed by both sails and we were underway before 0700.

The wind was either light or non existent. We did have a few hours of sailing but some of it was at 3 knots. The day was sprinkled with storm cells passing through. Fortunately the tide was with us for the majority of the day.

We decided to stop for the night in Indian Creek, Va. As we made our approach we found a huge storm cell blocking our path. At the same time the Coast Guard is on the radio warning boaters to take shelter as there are several vicious storms in the area. Yeah, no kidding. Fortunately the cell was moving to the southeast as we made our approach from the east. We got to watch a pretty good display of lightning without having the danger of actually being under it.

There is no wind in the forecast for the evening. However there are small craft warnings about storm cells moving through the area this evening. So instead of our usual 2 mile trip up Indian Creek we opted to stop at the first part of the river wide enough to accommodate us without leaving us encroaching on the channel.

This choice left us fairly exposed but allowed us to put out more scope than the narrow confines would have if we ventured further up the creek. So of course an hour before nightfall things went to hell in a hand basket.

We had finished dinner and were sitting in the cockpit reading when I looked up and remarked “looks like we’ve got weather coming”. Christy looked up and nodded in agreement. Not 2 minutes later I glanced up and couldn’t believe how ominous the sky had become, especially so quickly. The difference was amazing. I walked to the bow and dropped another 20 feet of chain into the water and lengthened the snubber by another 10 feet. I was sure we would be fine but better safe than sorry, besides, what’s the use of carrying all that chain around if you’re not going to get it wet every now and again.



By the time I walked back to the cockpit the wind was gusting to 45 knots. The wind was between 20 and 30 knots for about 20 minutes. We did have several gusts into the 40’s followed shortly by voluminous rains.

Tomorrow we can leave a little later and hopefully ride the tide right to Solomon’s island, Md. Where we’ll probably stay for a while.