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You are welcome to apply any part of this article to your own personal use. Please do NOT publish any part of the article or apply any part of it to any non-personal use without the express written concent of the author.
Here we are, departure for our Eastern Seaboard cruise only a couple of hours away, and I've hardly had time to think about, much less document all that's happened since returning to Ft. Lauderdale two years ago.
Where should I start these logs? Our return from our Caribbean Loop in 1999 and almost immediately obtaining our Coast Guard licenses...? Reintegrating into "normal" society...? The very extensive repairs and upgrades to Volant...? Living ashore during those repairs and upgrades...? The two shakedown cruises to the Florida Keys...? Giving up the apartment and moving back aboard...? The intensive last-minute preparations over these last few weeks...?
Nor have I had time to even think about the format of the logs for this cruise. For our Caribbean Loop both Kit and I spent hours each week documenting in great detail every thing that occurred, practically hour by hour. I know that I want to continue posting our adventures to the web, but just don't want to post as complete a journal as I did for the Caribbean Cruise - it occupied far too much of my time.
While some appreciated the detail contained in those logs, most of the feedback we received suggested that the logs were too detailed. A significant complaint was that the two perspectives contained so much duplication that many readers, having read either Kit's or my log, didn't bother to check out the other.
On the other hand a significant number of responses indicated that posting both voices was greatly appreciated. Kit plans to keep a detailed journal. She hasn't decided yet how she will handle hers, and for now won't be posting it to our web site. But stay tuned... She may do something later in our cruise.
All of this is mulling around in my head as we make our provisioning excursion to the membership-only bulk goods store... As we make our grocery runs... As I do the last minute boat chores... As I make yet another run out to the chandlery... As I attempt to get some very busy technicians (the best are always very busy) out to the boat for those things that, for whatever reason, I can't do myself... As items get quickly checked off the "To Do" list, and others get added even faster... As we make yet another trip to the storeroom we've rented to hold those items we just can't quite fit aboard... As I fall asleep exhausted every day wondering when I am going to get some time to write... And as I get up early the next morning for yet another hectic round of preparations.
In the middle of all this we did break for a few days to take a couple of groups out for day sails, the charter income certainly welcome to offset some of the expenses that have been piling up. But even then we hardly had time to regroup when it was back to the dock and working on the "To Do" list. Will that ever get completed?
It's bittersweet for me right now. In a few hours we will be leaving our dock of the past nearly two years. I'm excited about our plans, yet sad about leaving our friends behind. I'm looking forward to the closeness Kit and I experience while cruising that seems to disappear when confronted with the hustle and bustle of "normal" day to day living, yet am nervous about the responsibilities we put on ourselves to be as self-sufficient and self-dependent as possible. But I still don't have time to dwell on any of it as I'm pressed to get everything done before we coil our shore power cord, slip our lines and head out the canal before dark.
There are still a few items on our "To Do" list, but we've decided that they can wait. Some can wait weeks, some longer and a few still need attention before we can make our first coastal passage. But none of the remaining items prevent us from casting off.
For those who insist on knowing such things, our plans are laid out thusly. We are about to take the next six months to explore the Eastern Seaboard from Florida to Maine, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Starting in Ft. Lauderdale, our northward journey is planned to be taken in a few coastal hops: Beaufort, North Carolina; Newport, Rhode Island; Mt. Desert, Maine; Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. The target date for arrival in Yarmouth is July 14, 2001.
From Yarmouth we want to go to other Nova Scotia ports. Digby and West Port are respectively the birthplace and early stomping grounds of Captain Joshua Slocum, the first to sail around the globe single-handed and one of my nautical heroes. Margaretsville, up in the Bay of Funday is where my great grandfather was a shipwright in the mid-nineteenth century and where his wife's family still lives. The notorious tides in the Bay of Funday drain all the water out of Margaretsville harbor on the ebb, and then fill it to more than thirty feet deep on the flood. While there's no more shipbuilding, it's still a very active fishing harbor in spite of the tides.
After Margaretsville we want to hop over to Saint John, New Brunswick. [Note: I'm told that this particular Saint John is never supposed to be abbreviated as "St. John." It is also singular. St. Johns is a different place altogether.] In New Brunswick we plan to negotiate the Reversing Falls just inside the entrance to the Saint John River and spend a week or so exploring this pastoral region.
Then it's harbor hopping back to Down East Maine and Mt. Desert in the August time frame, more harbor hopping down to New York in September, the Chesapeake Bay in October, the coast of the Deep South and finally back to Ft. Lauderdale by the end of November.
At least that's the plan right now. But once in the cruising mode all is up for grabs. Remember: by the time the cruiser gets his plans out of his mouth he's already changed his mind. We shall see how it all unfolds.
A few days ago we took on nearly 200 gallons of diesel to top up our fuel tanks. The water tanks have just been topped up and the holding tank has just been pumped dry. Volant is now riding deep down on her lines.
The umbilical pumpout hose, required of all boats on this island, has been disconnected and hangs on its hook ashore prepared to ensnare the next resident of the dock. The shore power cord has been coiled and stowed in the lazarette. The iron stays'l is rumbling and most of the dock lines are aboard.
Just 4 more dock lines...
Friends ashore are waving...
Just 2 more dock lines...
We return the wave...
And Volant backs out into the canal.
We're free!
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