Arriving in Tangier Island by Sail

After waiting for the two hurricanes (Hurricane Jose and Hurricane Maria) to pass by while anchored out in Reedville, VA, the time had finally come to sail to Tangier Island! Our planned route was only 16 miles long, but the weather was still of a concern to us. Hurricane Maria was still in relative proximity to us on this early morning, and we would be swept along with powerful winds from the North, followed by a wind shift with winds coming from the West. This wind shift was to occur as the hurricane moved further North of us, and the circulating winds would change direction from our perspective.

As the hurricane is East of us, we would feel winds from the North. As she moved more North of us, the winds we would feel would come from the West.

This wind pattern would be perfect for us, as we first needed to travel South to exit Reedville, and then East to get to Tangier Island.

As we left, the winds were rather powerful and we were glad to have reefed sails set. According to the forecast, the winds were going to shift and also get lighter as the day progressed, owing to the fact that the hurricane would be farther away from us as the day moved on.

Knowing this, I was less reefed than I would have liked to have been, granting me more speed (but a less comfortable ride) as we went along. I knew that the winds would get lighter and lighter as the day moved on, and the afternoon would be becalmed. Worse yet, early the next morning a powerful cold front was to move in, making it very uncomfortable to anchor midway if we did not make it in one day.

It is rather ridiculous to think that we would fear not making it to our anchorage that is only 16 miles away, especially when we are starting off with 20 knot winds in the right direction! Our speed at the beginning of the journey ranged between 5 and 6 knots, and we were slated to arrive in under 3 hours. The problem was that the winds were to be getting lighter each hour as the day moved on, and that would make our travel speed slower, and our elapsed time longer. When you depend on the wind, it is always a vicious cycle!

While swooshing along through heavy seas and leftover chop from the passed hurricane, the winds did begin to lessen. Instead of waiting forever like I usually do to let out the reef, I promptly let it out early to maximize our speed in the powerful, but diminishing winds.

We raised anchor at 7am in Reedville, and yet dropped anchor at 5pm in Tangier Island. A 16 mile trip took us a full 10 hours to make, owing to the constantly lessening winds. The worst part of the arrival was the tide. As we rounded the southern tip of Tangier to enter the Tangier Sound, we were confronted by a tidal current of nearly 1kn! We had light winds and were now giving up a knot of speed to the tide.

This led Maddie to ask "are we even moving? It feels like we have been looking at the town of Tangier for hours!" We were moving, but our speed over ground was pitiful! We practically held our position in the Sound until the tide went slack around 4pm and finally made our way in.

Entering the harbor was fun! I sailed farther to windward than where we needed to be so that we could come in on a run. At this point, Maddie had fallen asleep from boredom, so I knew I was sailing solo. I lowered the mainsail and sailed in under only the staysail. As we neared the anchorage, I went forward on the deck, dropped the staysail and then released the anchor with 100 feet of chain (in 8 feet of water).

The momentum of the boat kept us moving along at around 2 knots even though we had no sail up at this point until the anchor dug in! The bow stopped and the stern swung around quickly as we came to lay to the anchor.

I chose to anchor in this fashion because of the approaching cold front. I anchored in the direction that I anticipated we would be pointing tomorrow and wanted to be certain that the anchor would be well set. Once the anchor had been buried into the bottom, I then let out even more chain (totaling 180 feet of chain in 8 feet of water) that way we would have no risk of dragging as the cold front moved in over night.

With the anchor set, Maddie, Morty, and I, went to shore in our rowboat Tooth to check out the locals and the town.

Crew Opportunity

A few months back, we posted an opportunity for someone to come along on our voyages across the Atlantic Ocean. This position was temporarily filled, but due to health issues, that person was not physically able to make the journey. This means that there is an opening for someone who wants to come along on the adventure!

We will be leaving from Virginia in about a week or so (weather permitting) towards Bermuda!

To get a feel of what sailing with us is like, check out our YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/riggingdoctor

If you are interested, please email your sailing resume to RiggingDr@gmail.com.

Watching a Monster

Maddie and I are currently anchored in a tiny creek, next to a tiny town. There is deep enough water for our keel and enough room for us to swing, but that is about all there is to appreciate in this small town. 

Reedville has a few restaurants, a museum, and an ice cream shop. These locales are only open a few days a week, and are all closed by 9pm. When we asked what the locals do for entertainment, the answer is unanimous: get in their car and drive to the next town over which has everything! 

Being how we do not posses this luxury, we instead opted to stay on the boat and pass the time with projects that needed to get done. 

You might be wondering why we are anchored in such a random place, and why we don't just sail to a different town that has more activities and amenities? The answer is simple, Hurricane Jose has passed by and Hurricane Maria is close on his heels. We were in a completely protected anchorage for Hurricane Jose, but had no town to visit and explore.

Instead of heading out into the bay and risking getting caught with no wind to return to a safe anchorage, we chose to sail to Reedville and wait out the time. It was a full week between the storms. The winds were all in upheaval as the hurricanes disrupted their normal patterns, and we just waited at anchor. 

In a few days, we had explored the entire town, made a few friends, and had friends come visit us, but the reason we were staying here seemed to slip past our minds. We often wondered why we were anchored on such gorgeous days! The winds were steady and pleasant, on sunny yet cool cloudless days! We often completely forgot why we were here and almost raised the anchor when once again, we remembered that we were hiding from Hurricane Maria. 

After being here for over a week, we were both on the deck. Maddie was reading a book in the hammock while I was dissasembling our windlass to re-grease it. The winds had been building steadily as the storm was approaching. The day before, sky became completely covered by altostratus clouds, letting us know that severe weather was nearby. Today, the sky was completely clear, as the hurricane had drawn all the clouds back into it. Off in the distance, a giant mound of clouds sit. 

That mound of clouds was Hurricane Maria! It was passing a few hundred miles away but the towering storm reached up into the sky and we could see it from our protected anchorage. 

That giant monster of a storm had destroyed the homes of millions as it tore through the Caribbean, smashing islands that had just been devastated by a Hurricane Irma! This moment felt like in an action movie, when the superhero would leap out from the shadows and command the attention of the monster villain. Then they would duel and justice would prevail. 

Unlike in a movie, we simply sat quietly as the monster slowly lumbered on by. We sit quietly in our protected refuge hoping that it doesn't notice us, and instead passes on by.  

We are not superheroes, nay, we are merely extraordinary chickens. 

The Kindness of People

Living nine years in a large city has sort of put a hamper on my outlook towards the general population. I used to hear people plotting how they were going to hold up a store while walking down the sidewalk in broad daylight! I have been held up by people in the city as well. All of these years in a city put a very sour taste in my mouth. 

Even though other people in the city would not help in a time of distress, I always treated others as I would like to be treated. I would give rides to cruisers that were passing by, as I had a car and they needed transportation. I would also invite them over for meals and show them around the local areas.  

When we set off cruising, I kept that bad taste in my mouth from living in a city. I seem to expect the worse at first, as that is what I have been conditioned to expect. Then I get to meet the people in these small towns and I get a fresh blast of refreshing hope for humanity! 

While here in Reedville, VA, a small fishing village on the Great Wicomico River, we have been aided by a few locals. We were in a local restaurant and were asking for directions to the nearest grocery store. It turns out that there is no such store in this town, and the nearest market is 15 miles away. I was ready to travel the distance on my bicycle with a backpack when a waitress there offered to drive us to the store! She picked us up, took us to the store, and drove us back to the boat. 

On another occasion, we were sitting in the cockpit as a storm was approaching. We were keeping an eye on shoreside landmarks to make sure that the anchor was holding well and that we weren't dragging. An older gentleman came over in his motorboat and offered that we tie up to his pier to ride out the storm. The offer was very tempting, but the water at his pier was a bit shallow for our keel to make it, so we had to decline. 

People really are helpful and caring for other people. They will go out of their way to make sure that everyone is able to meet their basic needs. Be it food, or the security of a pier in a storm. They will help give you directions, or even take you the distance, because they care! 

Flies!

I typically think of flies as an insect found at outside gatherings or around garbage cans, but not out at sea! Flies can transform a normal day into a fight against insanity. 

These little buzzing nuisances seem to come out of nowhere and for no reason. We will be sailing along, fly free, miles from any shoreline and then all of a sudden, the flies will appear! Almost out of thin air, flies will begin coming out of every part of the boat! We always first notice them in the cockpit, since that is where we are sitting while we cruise. We may find a few flies buzzing around us in the cockpit and think that the flies are really bad. Then when we anchor and go below deck, the number of flies is mind boggling! 

Having a parrot onboard denies us the ability to use all those wonderful chemicals that instantly handle the fly problem, and leaves us with only more passive methods of fly control: Fly paper. 

We currently have 3 of these ribbons hanging in various parts of the boat where the fly population seems most dense. While the paper becomes riddled with flies in a short matter of time, it doesn't seem to put a dent in the number of flies we have onboard. 

Naturally, our first thought in these situations is that they are coming from something we are carrying. This means that we will instantly do all the dishes, in hopes of removing a possible food source for the flies, and I check the composting toilet to make sure it is not a fly factory. After that, we begin searching through our provisions for any foods that may be spoiled and a spawning ground for flies. 

As always, none of these places turn up to be a source, and the flies seem to linger for a while. Talking with other cruisers, the going theory is that a mass of flies will get blown off the land and out to sea. When the flies hit the sails, they quickly dive down into the boat to hide from the wind and set up shop in the cabin where the wind is never as fierce as it is outside. This is why we only see a few flies in the cockpit, because they would easily get blow away. In the protection of the cabin however, the flies can live for a long time! 

Parrots have very sensitive respiratory systems, meaning that we can't use anything like spray bug killer or citronella candles. Instead, we have to set up fly tape and wait for them to get attached to the trap!  

Flies can really drive you crazy though, always buzzing around, and making you feel like you live in an actual trash can! While most of the flies we seem to house don't bite us, they do annoy the heck out of us! 

When we leave the pets with our parents as we head offshore towards Bermuda, we will certainly take full advantage of all the toxic fly killers we can find. Until then, the closest thing we have to sanity is a full fly ribbon!