Hurricane Hijiinks

Position: N39 08.735 W076 30.882
Location: Pasadena, Maryland, USA

While we are down in Virginia visiting family we are continually watching the weather. Julie's brother Tony is coming from England to visit for a week, flying into BWI (Baltimore Washington International airport) and catching the train down, as we did. As the day of his arrival approaches so does Hurricane Irene. She's scheduled to pass by the Chesapeake Bay, where Rachel is moored, the day after Tony arrives. We're in a quandary, glued to the Weather Channel, watching Irene's progress and hoping she'll turn out into the Atlantic, giving us a miss.

No such luck. On Thursday afternoon the models still show her tracking close and we make the decision to drive up and have her hauled. We need to change a through hull fitting anyway, so we'll be killing two birds with one stone. Charlotte graciously offers to loan us her car and we leave Radford at 2:30 Friday morning and make the 6 hour drive back to Oak Harbor Marina. There we strip all the sails and canvas off, stow everything that could get blown away in a hurricane and get Rachel up on land where hopefully she'll be safe and sound.

Then it's off to the airport to pick up Tony. He gets to spend his first night on Rachel on land, climbing up and down the ladder, experiencing all the “fun” that comes with living on the hard. The next morning the hurricane is supposed to hit the lower bay, working it's way north. Rachel's as safe as she's going to be, so we pile into the car and head back south to Radford. This is a tough decision for us – we really want to stay and make sure Rachel is OK, but Tony is only here for a week and we don't want to ruin his holiday!!

As it turns out Baltimore area only got winds in the 45-60 mph range and Rachel was pretty sheltered behind trees so she only saw 30-45 knots of wind and no damage was incurred. Our friends who remained at the boat yard kept a close eye on her for us. We spent four more lovely days in Radford with the family and then traveled back up to Baltimore on the train. The plan was to take Tony out on Rachel for a couple of days before he returned to England.

Mark was able to change the though hull fitting the day we arrived back on Rachel and the boat yard was able get her back in the water early the next morning. We spent the rest of the morning getting her partially back together and left the dock at noon. We had a wonderful day sail in the Bay and spent the night anchored out, giving Tony a small taste of our cruising life. The following morning we gave him a ride to the airport and he's been whisked away back to England while we slowly get Rachel back to herself. Phew what a week!!

...and guess what? Now hurricane Katia is working her way across the Atlantic and may well hit the US near us at the end of this week. Sigh.

Stay tuned,

Mark & Julie

Time passes....

Location: Check, Floyd County, Virginia, USA

WAAAAAHHHH!!!! AAHuuh AAHuh AAhuuh AAHuuh!! WAAAAahhhh---.... uurp!

Babies. They're loud and wonderful and beautiful. And they're porous - they leak from everywhere. But he's so handsome and precious.

We're up in the mountains of Southwest Virginia visiting Mark's son Jeseph and his family, Emilee and baby Baylen. Emilee has left us to watch Baylen while she goes to the library to do some work. Baylen and Oma (Julie) are out on a quilt in the yard. Baylen's belly is full and he's sound asleep and Oma is happily reading Hemingway's “The Old Man and the Sea” for the first time. B'da (Mark, pronounced “BUH-dah”) is enjoying the cool quiet, the sounds of the countryside, and the slow coming and going of sun and cloud. He is also taking various random detours down memory lane from when he used to live in this area. Remembering living here with his family – Jeseph, his older brother Zac, and their mother; revisiting old regrets, some gentle and slow, some knife-sharp; tender moments with family and friends; wild and happy times making music, working, playing softball and volleyball, and just plain general carousal. All three of us are about as content and happy as it is possible to be.

Let's rewind to a couple of weeks ago...

Our oldest grandchild Alex comes up to visit us for a week on Rachel. He's 9 ½ years old and loves being on the boat with us. He's been going out on boats with us since he was a baby and always seems to enjoy his time aboard with Oma and B'da. We sail over to the Chester River and spend several days gunkholing, swimming, and exploring in the dinghy. Then it's time to head back to the dock so we can close up Rachel and go visit our three other grandchildren for 2½ weeks.


Time passes....

We decide to take the train from Baltimore, Md to Lynchburg, Va where Charlotte will pick us up. A friend drops us off at the train station about 10 minutes ahead of schedule and we get on the train. It's so much nicer than flying! No security checks, no arriving an hour or two before your scheduled departure time – it's actually quite pleasant. The conductor helps us find four facing seats so we can sit together and we're off. After the stop in Washington, DC we find a table in the cafe car and play games for much of the rest of the trip. The cafe car is closed about an hour before our arrival in Lynchburg and we return to regular seats where we read quietly until we arrive. As always, Alex is a great traveling companion!


“Look! There's Mommy!!” he cries as we prepare to disembark. Sure enough Charlotte's standing on the platform scanning the passengers as they exit the train, her head turning left, then right, like she's watching a tennis match from center court. We step down, she spots us, and there's a flurry of hugs, kisses, and “I'm so happy you're here!”s.

After a two hour drive we arrive at Charlotte's house in Radford, Va at 9pm. Alex is too excited about going home to fall asleep during the drive, although we doubt Emma, our 3 yr old granddaughter will still be up. Boy, are we wrong! We open the door and hear gleeful cries and are nearly bowled over as she runs to greet us - especially Alex, whom she has missed terribly for the past week. Kelly ushers us inside, welcomes us in his usual generous and genial fashion, and we settle in for a week of visiting, catching up, and playing with Alex and Emma.


Time passes....

We borrow a car from friends and drive up into the beautiful mountains to Floyd County, where Mark lived for 15 years, and his son Jeseph spent his first 6 years. Last fall Jeseph decided to return to his roots and bring his daughter, Tigerlily, and lovely, pregnant lady Emilee with him. Baby Baylen was born a month ago and this is the first time we've met both him and Emilee! Unfortunately, Tigerlily is away, visiting her Mom in Hawaii. We're really going to miss seeing her this visit. We discuss getting together with her somewhere on our way south later this fall with Jeseph, who'd also like to get in a couple of days of surfing.

Back to the present...

Little Baylen's tummy and bum are making lots of funny noises. Poor thing seems to be most comfortable lying face down on an arm, walking and gently bouncing around the garden looking at things and feeling the cool breeze. He especially seems to like having a running commentary on where we're going and what we're seeing. So Oma, B'da, and Baylen are playing tag-team, taking turns walking around, bouncing, talking, singing, Khronicling, making lunch, tidying up, and generally enjoying this precious, precious time together.

Missing large portions of our grandchildren's lives as they grow up is probably the most difficult part of our cruising lifestyle. As we age and they continue to change so quickly it's getting harder and harder to leave them and head out again. Their laughter, smiles, joys, and sorrows tug at our heart strings. They are such wonderful little people.

Time passes....

Mark & Julie

s/v Rachel

Log Canoes

Position: N 29 08.735 W 076 30.882
Location: Pasadena, MD, USA

We finally got off the dock for a weekend and decided to go watch the log canoe races at St. Michaels, Maryland, about 35 miles away.

As usual, we had wind on the nose. And when we made the turn from West to Southwest, the wind followed us. We had a motor boat ride in light wind the whole way, arriving at anchor just before dark. But it was so nice to be back at anchor, we hardly minded.

The log canoe races were great! We'd never seen them before and were impressed. We understand that around the turn of the century, log canoes were the “pickup trucks” of the Chesapeake Bay. Captains would race each other back to port, purportedly because the first one in got the best price for their catch. Over time more sail was added. This required boards set to windward for the crew to counteract the heel caused by the sails. Now the boats carry more canvas than any other boat their size we've seen! Luckily for us the wind was light, allowing us to follow the boats around the course in our dinghy. We had a great time. Here's a link for more info on the log canoes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Log_canoe

Unfortunately on our way back on Sunday afternoon we had a bit of a “holy shit!!!” moment at Kent Narrows ridge. This is a narrow opening bridge which usually has quite a bit of current going through it but it saves a good 2-4 hours off the return trip. We usually try to time our passage for slack tide. We didn't want to get back too late, however, so we cut the corner on the tide by a couple of hours. At that time, we had about 3-4 knots of following current. This was exacerbated by the 15-25 knots of wind from behind us that was being kicked up by a nearby thunderstorm.

We were about 10 minutes early for the opening, so we turned into the wind and current and were able to hold our position using the throttle. The bridge finally opened and all the power boats that were in front of us went through, we got turned around and were making about 8 knots at idle speed as we approached the bridge.

For those of you who don't know, the marine “rules of the road” dictate that vessels going with the current have the right of way over those going against the current, especially at bridge openings. This being the case we we weren't too worried about oncoming traffic. All the same, Mark got on the radio and let all the opposing traffic know they should hold their positions because we and another sailboat were coming.

As we made the final turn to head through the bridge we saw a BIG fishing boat heading into the opening from the other side. And there's only room for one boat at a time! There was no way we could stop with the current behind us. The fishing boat slammed into reverse and did start to back up but he also “walked” a little to the side – our side. Julie braced herself to hit, she was sure there was no way to avoid it. Mark was at the helm and with quick thinking, full throttle, a bit of luck, and masterful maneuvering managed to squeeze between the fishing boat and the bridge with about a foot to spare on either side – and without catching the mast or rigging on the bridge before the hole closed.

Phew. It was the closest we've ever come to losing Rachel. The bridge tender was yelling at the fishing boat captain to turn on his radio and pay attention!! We were just shaking. Mark didn't even try to call the other captain to give him a piece of his mind, he was so shaken up. After the adrenaline wore off we agreed that we were just happy that neither us nor Rachel got damaged.

To get a feel for what it was like, take a look at this short video we found on the Internet. Imagine a boat nearly as wide as the bridge opening coming at you as you enter the bridge: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItE_waN121w&feature=related – yikes!

Needless to say we'll not be trying Kent Narrows at other than slack tide again.

After that, the wind lightened up a bit and we had a wonderful beam reach back to the marina. All in all, a lovely end to a lovely (albeit a bit too exciting at times) weekend.


Mark & Julie

Afloat Again

Position: N 29 08.735 W 076 30.882
Location: Pasadena, MD, USA

After 24 days of living on Rachel while she was on dry land we're finally back in the water. Wolohoo!! No more climbing down the ladder to use the head in the middle of the night! No more dust, sand, and grit everywhere!

Rachel's bottom is all clean and freshly painted with (hopefully!!) enough bottom paint to last a couple of years. We cleaned and inspected all the underwater fittings, replaced a couple of thru-hulls, raised the water line (due to all the 'stuff' we have on the boat), and waxed and polished all the topsides paint (much easier to get at with scaffolding rather than from the dinghy). She's looking all sparkly ready for the 4th of July.

Now we need to spend some time cleaning out the inside of the boat, get rid of stuff we're not using and do more boat jobs. Julie is working in the marina office and picking up some canvas sewing jobs while Mark is working on the boat. We're hoping to also get to do a little fun stuff like cruising on the Bay while we are here too. We haven't done much exploring up at this end of the Bay so now's our chance.

Happy July 4th

Mark & Julie

Back on the Bay

Position: N 29 08.735 W 076 30.882
Location: Pasadena, MD, USA

Only 46 days and 1942 miles since we left Panama and we're back in our old stomping grounds, the Chesapeake Bay. We had a great trip up the east coast stopping in Isle of Palms, SC, Beaufort, NC, Deltaville, VA, and Annapolis, MD to visit friends for a few days each. This really helped to break up the trip and gave the crew some R & R time. It is always great to catch up with old friends – it always feels like we've never been apart. Now we need to do some inland trips to visit family.

Rachel is currently hauled out and we are giving her bottom some much-needed attention. Living “on the hard” is, as always, annoying. We have to climb up and down a step ladder to get on and off the boat, deal with sand and dust constantly, and the boat just doesn't move right . We're looking forward to getting back in the water.

Our current plan is to spend the summer here working in the area to put some of the money we're spending back in the “cruising kitty”, working on the boat, and visiting family.

More as it unfolds.

Fair winds.

Florida is a REALLY long state

Location: Cumberland Island, Georgia
Position: N 30 43.009 W 081 18.184

We just spent 3 days and 3 nights traveling 483 miles along the coast of Florida. The passage was not one of our best but we got a lot of miles under our belt. The winds were fairly light and not strong enough to sail most of the time, other times they were dead on the nose and we still had to motor into them. The good thing is we are now at one of our all-time favorite spots - Cumberland Island. GA. We've spent the last couple of days walking the beaches and through the live oak forests. Great after being on the boat for so many days.

On our way into Cumberland Island a huge submarine passed us on it's way to the base upriver

Today we are leaving again for an overnight passage to Charleston, SC

Culture Shock

Position: N 24 34.175 W 081 48.206
Location: Key West, Florida, USA

After crunching some numbers here are some interesting facts about our trip north:

Total miles traveled: 1,157 nautical miles (1,331 standard miles)
Total travel time: 7 days 20 hours
Average speed: 6.1 knots (7 standard miles per hour)

We feel compelled to give a huge thank you to our wind vane 'Helga'. She's been on the boat for almost three years now and we haven't really used her that much, but this trip was so long we decided to take the time to get to know her better. On the first day we learned the wonders of wind vane sailing. Not to get too technical, it's a self-steering system which uses the wind to steer the boat. No electricity, no battery power, no fuel...only wind. You set a paddle to point into the wind, adjust the sails so they are set perfectly (this is the hard part), then engage the lock to Rachel's steering wheel. That's it! Now sit back and watch Helga do her magic - silently and using no electricity!! She steered the boat almost the entire way back - we love her.

Why is she called Helga, you might ask? Well!! Our wind generator in called Wendy (windy), our electric auto pilot is called Otto (auto). As the wind vane was a close relative of Otto she also needed a Germanic name. After a few days of discussion underway, and with not much else to do, we decided on Helga, because she's a 'hell of a gal'. Can't help it if we're not all that creative...

We are finally getting caught up on our sleep and are starting to feel like our old selves again. Except that we're in Key West. Key West is a wild and crazy place, at the best of times, but after spending months in Central America and our most recent time in remote Kuna Yala, we are having culture and sensory shock. So many shops where we can buy anything, and we mean ANYTHING in Key West. So many people. So much noise. We've probably spent as much money in a week as we spent in Panama in 3 months - Yikes!!

Since we've been here we've seen a battle for the independence of the Conch Republic that involved among others biplanes, schooners, a Coast Guard fire boat. It was quite impressive.

Then yesterday we got to see the bed races. Yep. That's right. They shut down 6 or 7 blocks of Duval St. (one of the main streets in town) for a few hours and have a "parade of beds" and "bed races". Different groups (and we mean "different"!!) dress up and push a "bed" on wheels up the street in a parade, then race back against the clock. Hilarity and mayhem were the order of the day.

We're looking for a weather window to head East to Miami, then to points further north. It looks like next Wednesday will be the earliest we can leave, given the easterly winds we're expecting to have through next Tuesday.

It feels good to be back and we're looking forward to seeing all of you soon.

Fair winds.

Land Ho!

Date: April 28, 2011
Position: N 24 34.175 W 081 48.206
Location: Key West, Florida, USA

Our last 2 days have been busy and tiring. We slogged along the north coast of Cuba for a day and 2 nights, into the wind, which is never fun. However, there were times of reprieve when the winds died down and made the ride a little more comfortable. Our plan was to head for Miami ahead of some bad weather this weekend, but after checking the weather this morning we saw the wind was expected to shift more easterly. This meant 2 more days of close hauled sailing into the wind and waves. Suddenly Key West was looking much more attractive!!

We turned Rachel toward Key West and immediately she rode the waves better, sailed faster and more easily, and we all felt much happier.

About 50 miles off Key West we got a call on the VHF radio from the Coast Guard. They asked for basic information about the boat and told us to stand by. About 5 minutes later they call back and say they'll be sending a boarding party to do a 'safety check'.

US Coast Guard cutter

A pretty good sized Coast Guard cutter suddenly comes into view, they lift a big inflatable into the water off the side deck, 4 officers get into it and they head toward Rachel. While we are still sailing 3 of them jumped aboard Rachel to do our safety check. Everything went really well, they were very professional but friendly and after about 30 minutes they were on their way. We told them it was so nice to talk to someone other than each other and they got a chuckle out of that!! Apparently the Coast Guard cutter had been 300 yards off our boat while we were sailing along the Cuban coast last night, we had never seen them (even using our radar!!), and neither did Osprey, our travel companions.

30 miles from Key West a pod of dolphins came to play with us. About 15 of them swam in front of the boat doing tricks and leaping out of the water. What a lovely welcome back!!

20 miles from Key West we started seeing a lot of port traffic and hearing LOTS of chatter on the radio. All vessels with a VHF radio are required to monitor channel 16. Unfortunately, there is so much yakking on that channel that we looked at each wondering why we came back. We couldn't even have a conversation with each other without interruption. The constant chatter really got on our "last nerve". We'll take a dolphin welcome, any day!!

Despite the constant interruptions we managed to communicate with each other and slowly work our way into Key West harbor in the dark. We anchored at 9:30 pm and are safe and well. Tomorrow we have to figure out how to check in to the US here. Until then it's a good nights sleep for Rachel's crew. And we get to sleep at the same time for the first time in 10 days!

It's good to be back. Good Night

More plan changes

Position: N 20 13.427 W 85 58.843
Location: Heading for the Yucatan Channel

Yesterday was an uneventful day except the seas were rolly and not too comfortable. In the evening Julie was sitting in the cockpit on night watch looking up at the stars when she felt a flutter near her cheek. She turned on the flashlight and there was a dove sitting on the cockpit floor. We were 120 miles from land to the west and northwest, poor thing must be tired she thought. Not too happy about it pooping all over, she shooed it to the stern of the boat and it fluttered again landing underneath our solar panel. There it sat for most of the night and when we looked this morning it was gone!!

After downloading the weather this morning and talking to our weather guy we, along with Osprey, have decided to keep on going, heading to the Dry Tortugas off the Florida Keys (or perhaps further), if the weather holds. Our other 2 friends kept on going to Isla Mujeres so now we are a fleet of two!

Stay tuned.

Cayos Cajones

Position: N 17 54.573 W 84 38.792
Location: Caribbean Sea

Well we just spent 1 1/2 lovely days at the Hobbies Cays (Cayos Cajones), tiny islands sitting behind a reef in the middle of nowhere. The small island next to which we were anchored had 2 young Honduran guys living on it. They said they were there for a month and as far as we could gather they were caretakers and guards for the hundreds of lobster pots piled all over the island. One of them, Federico, paddled out to our boat and asked if we had cigarettes and we had a nice chat in our pidgin Spanish.

The snorkeling and fishing around the reefs here is reportedly amazing, that's the main reason people stop here. We did manage a snorkel yesterday which was awesome and yesterday afternoon had a happy hour gathering on a tiny beach island by the reef, surprisingly there were 7 boats anchored here.

Baracuda caught on our way into the anchorage

Saturday, April 23, 2011

After listening to yesterday's forecast we all decided it was time to head further north before some stronger winds settle in on Tuesday, so this morning we hauled anchor at 06:15 and continued our journey to Isla Mujeres, Mexico. So far it's a bit rolly but the sun is shining and the fishing line is out. Today is our 4th anniversary living aboard Rachel, it keeps getting better. As the sun set we sat in the cockpit eating a special dinner with sparkling water!! We were rolling still pretty badly but the rolling allowed us to see 2 green flashes one after the other as Rachel rolled gunwale to gunwale. Good AND Bad
A quiet night, we saw no ship traffic.

Sunday, April 24, 2011

The four boats who set out together from the Hobbies for Isla Mujeres (Osprey, Tashmoo, Mentor, and Rachel) all seem to be fairly well matched - we're all still within about 8 miles of each other, making it possible to have nice chats on the VHF radio during night watches. It's nice to hear friend's voices during those dark hours. It's been very rolly with light winds and big waves - not one of our favorite 24 hours of passage making, that's for sure. Everyone has had trouble sleeping. We're hoping to get things a bit more stable during the day today and see if we can catch up on some sleep.
Adendum - since writing this the other 3 boats have sprinted ahead of us, we're still in VHF range with 2 of them though