New Jersey coast, Cape May, September 29-30

Since it takes about 20 hours to get to Cape May we plan to leave around noontime so we arrive and couple hours after sunrise. After we have breakfast we head into town to go to the “Flaky Tart” and get some bake goods for the overnight trip. 

 

Two old flaky farts at the Flaky Tart

We move a little faster than I expected and we are underway by 11:00 AM. Still a little cool with the light north wind but after we round Sandy Hook it will warm up with the wind on our behind. Not enough wind to sail. Even though this was the warmest overnight passage south on the New Jersey for us, we were rather cool by sunrise. Had a number of Facebook conversations and emails with other boats we have previously met, in person and virtually while we are all heading south. Linda and I both get a couple hours sleep. Listen to a bunch of podcasts. Had a few conversations over the VHS radio. Boats nearby heading south could see our AIS position and called to verify where we were going. As usual we seemed to of spent half the night looking at the lights of Atlantic City, which are visible from 25 miles away.

As we get close to AC the wind picks up out of the West and with a fair amount of moon light we put out the head sail. Still motor-sailing I throttle back on the engine so we don’t get to Cape May too early. We arrive about ½ hour before sunrise. A couple other boats coming south converge on the Cape May entrance about the same time. Later we find out one of the boats is “Gypsy Spirit” our Catalina 36 sister ship we met at Hop-o-Nose, Dave and Leslie Holck. They had waited for good weather in Sheepshead Bay, Long Island, at Sheephead Bay Marina. As we enter the entrance there is a parade of sailboats coming out because their masts are too tall to go under the Cape May Canal bridges. This leaves a lot more space to anchor.

We drop the anchor, have breakfast and go to bed for a couple hours. Later in the afternoon we head in to the Lobster House for a late lunch/early dinner. First we stop by “Encore” , Chris & Mary, who we also met at Hop-o-Nose to chat. We have been emailing back and forth the previous night. They sailed more than we did and did not arrive until early afternoon. They have four people on their boat so no one is too sleep deprived.

Head back to our boat and get it ready for an early departure the next morning.