Artic Nova Scotia to Tropical Rhode Island

You know you are in Canada when you’ve found the town curling club.

After a rainy and cold day in Halifax, we continued the passage down the Nova Scotian coast. Next stop was Lunenberg. A couple of hundred year old fishing and boat building town. Probably most famous for building the Canadian fishing and racing schooner, the Bluenose, in 1921. Probably most infamous for contributing to the total collapse of the cod fisheries on the Grand Banks. It’s a pretty cool working/tourist town now. Lots of Victorian buildings.

(Steve C, here’s another one for you to fix up)
Mostly well cared for as private homes, B&Bs or businesses. The people are, how would you say it, talkative. Once you’ve opened up to them by saying something revealing like ‘Hi. Sure is wet today’. After that you are likely to get the town’s latest gossip, the fishing report, what boats are in bankruptcy and your new best friend’s life history. Great people!
We stayed 2 days in Lunenberg because of the winds, cold and dumping rain. We don’t have a lot of cloths with us we could only carry what fit in our airline bags. Getting all the warm stuff soaking wet in the dinghy rides isn’t helping in keeping the core body temperatures where they should be. We left Lunenberg for a slog to windward to Lockeport. The cruising guide describes it as a typical, down on its luck, Nova Scotian fishing town. Friendly enough place, with less to gossip about.
The next passage was a two and half day crossing from the bottom of Nova Scotia to inside of Cape Code, MA. We sailed it all to windward, blowing mostly about 15-25kts. We would sail a long starboard tack. Then when the wind got light or the tide turned against us, we’d do a diesel assisted tack due south. Cold on the night watches. Lots of good, hot soups out of the new galley. We ended up sailing back and forth in 25kts of wind for 3 hours in front of the Cape Cod canal, while waiting for the tide to change so we could enter the canal without bucking a big current.
All and all its been good trip down so far. The boat is pleasure to sail. Much easier on the crew than the J. We’ve had a few exciting docking moments, but that will get better. We broke the typical amount of things on a passage:

• Broke the toilet seat cover
• Wind instruments quit working
• The engine water-in-fuel alarm goes of intermittently
• Lost an anchor snubber overboard
• Skyed a jib halyard
• The pressure water is a bit flaky
• Got my foul weather jacket caught in the power winch (which Chris was too tired to even laugh at when I called her up to release me)

We stopped in Portsmouth, RI, (next to Newport) and cleared into customs. Very low key check in. We got to meet up with Bill and Lori on their Outbound 44 Toodle-oo who I’d been talking to on email as we considered our purchase (the only one on the market). Good to meet up with them in person and to check out what they have done on their OB. They plan to cut the ties and take off next summer!
We also stopped for the night in Block Island, RI, and had dinner on our boat with Tom and Cary off Dragon’s Toy, our friends from El Salvador. Huge beautiful anchorage with hundreds of boats and even more people who have come over to celebrate the 4th. It’s a beautiful place, we enjoyed our walk into town along the shore and old homes.
Tonight it is New Haven, CT, and more fireworks. Tomorrow it is NEW YORK CITY!
Paul