Newport, Rhode Island

We stopped into the anchorage in Newport for a couple of night stay. We got to hook up with Mary, honorable number one son Derrek’s girlfriend, whose parents live near by. Mike and Pam – the parents -had us over for a very tasty fresh garden vegetables and BBQ dinner. Great hospitability! Somehow we managed to not get any pictures.


Next day was a tough sail over to Block Island. It was all close hauled in a stiff breeze – that means we are sailing as close to the wind as possible and the wind is blowing like stink. To break up the bouncing, we had a visit by about 20 dolphins who came by to play with the boat wake. We haven’t seen a dolphin pod this big since we were in the Caribbean.

Here’s Chris communing with a playful little guy who wanted to out run our dinghy.

We’re leaving from Block Island this afternoon to sail back down to the Chesapeake. Its clearly getting to be fall up here.  There is a cold front coming in tonight. This should clock the winds around to the North and blow 20-25kts. We’ll sail tonight, tomorrow and the next night – south along the outside of Long Island, past the NY harbor entrance, and along the NJ coast and around Cape May, arriving at the mouth of the Delaware Bay in the early morning. If timing works, we’ll take the flood tide up the Delaware and then anchor for the night near the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal.
Here’s the wind feathers showing the expected winds blowing from the North. The wind direction is the angle of the line with the feathers flying like they would on an arrow. The marks that make up the feathers tell you the wind strength. A long one is 10kts and a half length is 5kts. So the arrows near the boat icon are 2 long, 1 half == 25kts out of the north. Should be some fast downwind sailing – till the front peters out and we have light winds near southern NJ and the Delaware Bay.
Paul