(note: due to the storm, preparing for our passage, the 8 day passage, and sparse internet in the Caribbean, we are WAYYY behind.  Please stay tuned as we catch up on the exciting adventures of the past few weeks! Thanks for reading! -Erica, from the Bitter End Yacht Club, Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands)

 

Aurora, North Carolina, October 22-30

It was supposed to be a week of projects, getting everything done for our trip to the British Virgin Islands.  Instead, we spent the bulk of the week getting ready for Hurricane Sandy.  To make matters worse, we have no cell service here and no internet service.  Chris’ phone can make a call if he is on the porch.  My phone will pick up some sort of signal every once in awhile, if it is in the center of our bed and the wind dies down, and I don’t breathe while hitting the “send” button.  This made it difficult to track the weather with the absorption and intensity to which we are accustomed.  We relied on our every other day trips to “town” to download email and send messages (town is 45 miles away).

Thank you to all those who follow us on our Facebook fanpage and sent concerned messages.  It was so nice to know that so many of our friends, family, and even our new “never met in person” friends and readers are thinking about us.  I could not get enough of a connection to post to our website or return many of the emails that were sent.  It was so frustrating, but again, all of your thoughts and concerns were very much appreciated.

I tried to get the message out that we were, indeed, safe.  We were in a hurricane hole, on Campbell Creek, in Aurora, North Carolina.  We were docked at my mom and stepfather Sal’s neighbors’ dock and moved to anchor on Saturday afternoon (there was not sufficient room at the dock for both boats to be safe).  We set two anchors and checked and rechecked them.  We removed the bimini, dodger, kayak, paddleboard, cushions, winch handles, lines, fenders, and anything else that could catch the wind and be damaged or cause damage.  Chris fixed the leaky seal in the forward hatch and looked for other minor leaks that could be shored up.  Finally, we were ready for Sandy.

The rains started, the winds picked up, and we moved to the house to ride out the storm.  We had to trudge out in the dark and the rain and the quickly rising tide to bail out the dinghy every couple of hours.  By the 11pm trip, it was getting a little creepy.  I was alone, the water was half way up my new seaboots, and the wind was threatening to blow me off the dock.  Standing in the dinghy, flashlight between my knees, pumping out the water, I made sure to keep my head down and ignored the scary howling of the wind in the swamp weeds.  Getting out of the dinghy, I momentarily thought about what would happen if I fell in.  Almost everyone was asleep back in the house.  It would be hard to get out of the water on my own with my full foul weather gear on.  I was very, very careful climbing back out onto the dock…  On the way back, I was convinced that I was going to be attacked by an alligator or a snake.  I had a flashlight in one hand and my open knife in my other hand as I ran/hyperventilated my way back to the house.

Meanwhile, in between all the hurricane preparations, we have a long and crazy list of things to do for our trip!  As a reminder, we will leave the U.S. on or about November 4^th, with the Salty Dawg Rally.  My dad will join us for the trip so that we have a third adult on board.  We will travel approximately 1,200 miles from Beaufort, NC to Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands.  The trip will take approximately ten days, if all goes well.

We will stay in the BVI’s through New Year’s and will then travel directly to Grenada, which is the last island in the eastern Caribbean chain.  We opted not to visit Venezuela or Trinidad and Tobago, due to security reasons.  We will then travel north through the Windward and Leeward Islands, back the to BVI’s in April.  In May, we will visit Turks and Caicos and the Bahamas.  We will return to the states by June 1 and will travel north from Florida back to New Jersey.  Our complete Floatplan (itinerary) is located on its own page on our website.

On one of our trips to the town of New Bern, we started provisioning for this next, biggest leg of our journey.  We set out for West Marine, and spent a bundle on supplies to finish our projects.  We went to Staples for school supplies and printer ink and Big Lots for watertight containers and little “gifts” for the kids to open each day of our passage.  Then we hit up Lowes for more project supplies.  By the time we got to Harris Teeter (supermarket), American Express had put the kibosh on our card.  Two carts and $680 later, the cashier told us, “I’ve never seen anyone spend so much on groceries.”  Apparently, American Express thought we were the New Bern Nabbers, buying up all the marine supplies in town on a mad spree with a stolen card.  We paid for the groceries with our Visa card instead and had to rearrange the car in the dark to fit all of our purchases in.  On the long car ride home, I tried to avoid thinking about how I was going to fit all this stuff on our already stuffed-to-the-gills Patronus.

If you are at all interested in how we are provisioning our boat for this voyage, check out the Provisioning page.  I’m not sure why I thought anyone would want to read our shopping list, but I know at least Lisa will check it out.  (Hi, Lisa!!!)  In addition to stocking up on our favorite “American” foods, which will be expensive or non-existent in the Caribbean, we bought 7 pounds of chopped meat for meatballs and 9 pounds of chicken to make breaded chicken cutlets.  We will freeze and vacuum seal them so that we have meals ready to go for our voyage.  I also made three lasagnas.  Kathy just sent me a message that she is also making macaroni and cheese and another chicken dish to send up with my dad!

Of course, a 10 day passage is no time for gourmet cooking.  If the weather or seas are bad, it can be uncomfortable moving about the boat.  If the boat is heeled (tipped over) a lot, you have to brace yourself against the wall in the galley in order to cook.  The range gimbals (tilts to stay with the pull of gravity, instead of the boat) but the fridge and cabinets don’t, so food might fly out of them when you open the doors.  Staying down below and trying to concentrate on cooking is much like reading in a moving car.  Not a great combo.  During those times, we will hunker down and do only what is absolutely necessary: drive the boat, sleep, take care of the kids, and eat.

We will have lots of nutritious snacks available that are “grab and go”.  We will also have lots of foods that the kids can make and eat on their own as they get hungry.  But the night watches require a little old school energy.  Think about those college all-nighters, fueled by a pot of coffee, or in my case, a quart of Wegman’s sweetened iced tea.  Chris is planning on subsisting on Triscuits, Gatorade, Tea, and Circus Peanuts for 10 days.  He will probably also get about 10 hours of sleep the whole time.  My secret stash for night watches is two bags of Swedish Fish and two pounds of Twizzlers.  If I am feeling particularly healthy, I will try starting out with my Chinese herbs, made up as tea.  I am also stocked up on Hammer products, which is the nutrition-packed fuel that endurance athletes use.  (Little did we know that Mema had more food surprises for us, including her famous peanut butter balls!)

After all our Hurricane Sandy preparations and all our projects and provisioning, we somehow managed to enjoy a Thanksgiving dinner.  This is my mostest favoritist holiday, because it’s all about focusing on Gratitude.  This year, as always,  I am grateful for family, friends, my personal growth as a Bodhisattva-in-training, and the possibility that all beings, everywhere, may be peaceful, happy, and free.  I am also thankful for stuffing and sweet potato pie.  Chris even got to watch the Cowboys on our pre-Thanksgiving Day.

Following is a partial list of jobs we had to complete before our departure (minus one: today my mom helped me dye my hair).

Chris:

Aft head

Change engine oil

Change outboard oil

Fix leak in forward cabin

Install watermaker

Make bookshelf

Satellite phone data

Anchor locker

Install WiFi

Set up flags

Generator: move fresh water bottle higher

Generator:  secure exhaust to make level with downhill run, add clamp

Set up fishing gear

Install zincs

Fix macerator

Install Float Switch in bilge

Install U-Bolts and store delta anchor

Move anchor rode to bilge

Attach new snubber

Fix wetlocker

Splice new anchor rode

 

Sieze shackles to anchor

Set up storm anchor with shackle

Install Serpentine pulleys

Fix leaks in rail

Compass lights

Outboard gear oil

Water leak from after shower

Reroute 2 head siphons

Reroute  a/c siphon

gel coat port side

coolant leak

liferaft

floor board

oven gimbal

check for leaks, fix

mast leak

fridge fan

courtesy lights

check Ventilation – power ventilation operable (blower) and natural ventilations cowls open and clear

check Gauges – functional and reading properly

 

Erica:

Call Atlass Insurance to add Caribbean rider

Measure welcome mat area

Put pictures on flashdrives

Brendan/Rosemary: get stuff from home

Clean boat

Provision: food

Provision: HABA

Provision: school supplies

Measure companionway

Check for mildew in game cabinet/forward cabin

Clean railings (started)

Tape railings

Buff hull

Fill propane tanks

Fill SCUBA tanks

Check NOAA database for our EPIRB

Clean/treat/seal/tape forward hatches

Make cabin wall bags

Measure for aft starboard locker shelving

Install magazine racks

 

Clean/Buff companionway covers

Clean/buff all hatches/portholes

Post emergency information/label MOB and ER buttons

Phone meeting to review Floatplan with Tom, Rosemary, Kathy

reTraining: EPIRB

reTraining: Engine start/shut down

reTraining: SOS call

reTraining: Satellite phones

Dye Hair

Clean Vents

 

To order/buy:

Replacement PFD cartridges

Fridge fans

Railing drink holders

Freezer shelf

Bilge bins

Bin for forward dresser top

Book shelf supplies

Temperature sensors for fridge/freezer

McMastercar.com for electric motor mount for watermaker

French flag, Antigua flag

Tiger Cub Handbook, Misty of Chincoteague, Heal Your Body A-Z, Mitching/Beautiful swimmers

Camera Lens

Batteries AAA, C, D

Pelican hook for stern lifeline

2 brass flag clips

Bigger flag halyard

Potholders

Coffee Pot

Heel-Tastic

Seasick patches

Plastic page protectors

Bonine for kids

Ginger gum

Red/Black Scrubbies

 

And yes, we are supposedly leaving in 1 week…

Dear Friends,

We have been very busy preparing Patronus for her first long voyage and have not had a chance to completely catch you all up on our progress.  We left Aurora, NC on 10/31/12 and arrived safely in Morehead City, NC, where we have spent the last few days completing our provisioning and projects.

Due to changes in the weather forecast, our departure date has suddenly changed from this Thursday to TOMORROW.  We apologize for not giving our close friends and family a personal phone call, but it is too late and we have had to prioritize our time by completing all safety procedures.  We are sure you understand.

My dad is with us as a third adult crew member.  We leave at 0730 tomorrow and will be heading to St. Thomas (another unexpected change in plans).  Please follow our progress on SPOT.  The link is on the left margin under “Our Links”.  This will be the only communication you will likely get from us for 8-14 days.  Once we are settled and find internet service, we will send a message via Facebook and our website.

We hope you are all well.  Leaving the US is a big step for us and we are excited, anxious, and full of the knowledge that we will continue to miss you all very much.  Be safe and happy until our return, especially all of you so terribly affected by the storm.

Love, Chris, Erica, Bryson, Riesling, and Porter

s/v patronus

Morehead City, North Carolina

• Tangier Island, VA to Great Bridge, VA
• Great Bridge, VA to Columbia, NC
• Columbia, NC to Aurora, NC

October 19-21

First of all, I’ll just get my complaining out of the way right now.  No, I’m not going to complain about the brown water, or waiting for draw bridges to open, or the monotonous yet stressful navigation of this LOOOOOOONG stretch of water.  I am, of course, going to make a grammatical complaint.  This 1,658 mile stretch of connected canals, bays, and rivers runs from New York to the west coast of Florida.  It is called the Intracoastal Waterway, which should be abbreviated to the IW, not the ICW.  Ok, I’m done.  No more complaining, though most laypeople will wonder why I’m NOT complaining by the time I’m done describing the last three days.

We left Tangier Island like we were on fire.  We are getting pretty antsy about getting to North Carolina so that we can start in on our long and growing list of boat projects before we leave for the Caribbean on or about November 4^th.  The wind was 15 knots and pushing us onto the dock, but Chris laid on the starboard bow thruster until we managed to push off, gunning it so that we wouldn’t crash into the pilings.

We headed into the CPB (I’m going to start calling the ChesaPeake Bay this just to drive home my point.  Ridiculous, right?) and set a rhumb line for Hampton Roads, Virginia, the bay that encompasses Norfolk and Hampton.  We planned on staying in Hampton for the night and starting the ICW the following day.   We managed great time and hit Hampton Roads by 1500.  We were tired from three days straight on the move, but we decided to push on and get some of the ICW under our belts.  After all, we had to traverse 150 miles of it to get to Aurora, where my mom and Sal live.  As soon as we made that decision, Chris went down below for something and we hit two pieces of wood with huge nails coming up out of them.  There was a thunk-thunk-thunk and then they spit out the back of the boat.  I spent the next hour waiting for the boat to just start sinking.  Chris was more practical and pulled our bed apart to look at the hull to see if any water was coming in.  We don’t see any damage, but I’m sure the bottom of the boat didn’t get away unscathed.  We won’t know until we dive under the boat when we get to the Caribbean.

We motored past Norfolk after waiting 15 minutes for a cruiseship to leave the dock.  It needed the full width of the channel to maneuver.  We took a picture at mile marker “0” and we were on our way.  The ICW is known for its shallow depth, bridges, and locks.  It is quite narrow at times and contains bodies of water such as the Albermarle Sound, which is large and shallow, creating choppy and confused seas that can stop boats in their tracks for days.  You might be wondering why we have chosen this route, with names like Alligator River and The Dismal Swamp?  Apparently, as awful as this route is, it is way less daunting than going “outside”, in the Atlantic Ocean.  I’m still not sure why, since we sailed 270 miles through the ocean to get to the Delaware Bay and we are about to sail TWELVE HUNDRED miles through aforementioned ocean to get to the BVI’s.  But the ICW it is.

 

Before docking for the night, we went under 8 bridges and through one lock.  Some of the bridges are fixed and have a vertical clearance of 65 feet.  Our boat needs 62 feet of vertical clearance, so we basically held our breath going under those ones.  The other bridges are closed and you have to hail the bridge operator on the VHF to request an opening.  One bridge only opens on the half hour, so we had to wait around in neutral for about 20 minutes for that one.  While we were waiting, Chris whipped up some lemon chicken with rice and peas.  I ate standing up at the helm, trying to keep a 47 foot sailboat from moving around.  We wound our way down the ICW, under the bridges, past all the buoys, and constantly checking our paper charts, our iPhone charts, our laptop charts, and our chartplotter, which is built into the boat.  The dredged channel in some areas was extremely narrow and we had very little margin for error.  If we veered off course for even a few feet, we could find ourselves grounded in four feet of water (we need 5’ 7” of depth).

By the way, this youtube video is crazy.  A boat with an 85 foot mast had to get under the 65 foot fixed bridge.  See how he did it.  Tell me you don’t watch it and think, “This guy has b—s.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiv0fxFcV3I

 

Due to the delays from the cruiseship and the one bridge, we didn’t get to the locks until it was dark.  If you aren’t familiar with locks, they are a system where one body of water is dammed into two parts so that one side can have a higher level of water than the other.  In order for boats to get from one side to the other, a middle “room” is made, with swinging doors on each side.  One set of doors is opened and the boat enters and ties up to the side.  The doors are closed and water is pumped into the “room” to bring the water level up to that of the other side.  Then the opposite doors are opened and the boat can leave.  Boats coming the other direction do the same thing except that the water is drained from the “room”.  Don’t ask me why they have to have the water at two different levels.  I have no idea.

Well, we have never gone through locks in our boat, so we were pretty nervous.   I have been through locks many times.  I lived on a boat on the Shinnecock Canal in Hampton Bays (Long Island, NY).  There is a lock system on that canal as well.  The only trouble is I was about 16 years old the last time I went through.  Not exactly fresh in my mind.  The fact that it was pitch dark out didn’t help.  I guess that was poor planning.

We approached the 4 red lights ahead, which was all we could see, and had no idea what to do next.  So we hailed the lock operator on the VHF and I just admitted that we didn’t know what we were doing and we needed help.  Please.  Thanks.  The operator was very friendly and came down to help us tie up alongside.  The whole place was lit up with lots of floodlights, so it ended up being easy, fun and exciting.  The lock operator even called ahead to the next bridge to let that operator know we were coming and needed the bridge to be lifted.  He also told us that we could tie up on the pier just past the bridge and stay for the night for no charge.  Yay!

We went under the bridge, stopping up Saturday night traffic on the highway for about a mile, and pulled up to the pier.  We tied her up, went inside, and I couldn’t believe how tired I was.  I had to lay down for ten minutes before I could even think about what else we needed to do.  We got the kids to bed, Chris started working on the head, I did the dinner dishes, and then I decided that I had hit a wall.  Tangier Island to the Great Bridge Bascule Bridge in one day.  Holy Smokes.

The next morning, Chris and Bryson started up the engines early and we were on our way before the rest of us woke up.  We had a full day ahead on the ICW, including many more bridges and the dreaded Albermarle Sound.  The wind was looking after us and we were running with the current all day.  With the current and the wind behind us in the Albermarle, the waves didn’t act up and we sat back and enjoyed the sunshine, being careful not to look down, else we be reminded of the mud brown water below us.

By evening, we had made it to the Alligator River Bridge.  We decided to stay at the Alligator River Marina, due to the glowing reviews they gave themselves in the cruising guide.  Oh, and the fact that this was the only place to get fuel before we hit my mom’s house.  We got diesel, tied up the boat, took showers, and headed to the Restaurant, which just so happens to be attached to the Gas Station and the Convenience Store.  We all chose to have the “Country Fried Chicken”, which the menu claimed was “worth the extra wait”.  I’m not sure what possessed us to do this since it had taken 15 minutes just to get our menus.  I think the waitress was also the chef and the checkout person at the convenience store.  I would not be surprised if she was also outside pumping gas in between customers.  The kids and I amused ourselves by going “shopping” at the convenience store while we waited for our food, assuming that we would be waiting awhile.  Chris wanted circus peanuts, but we couldn’t find any.  Here’s what we did find:

• T-Shirts featuring the Guist Brothers from Swamp People
• Box wine on the same shelf as the motor oil and cleaning supplies
• All the beef jerky you could imagine
• “Souveniers” from the Alligator River (such as baby sharks preserved in formaldehyde, “displayed” in glass containers)
• Pork Rinds, Little Debbie Cakes, devil dogs, Sno Balls, etc, etc.  But no circus peanuts.

We finished our dinners and went right to bed, tired as the dickens.  At midnight, the security alarms started blaring from the Restaurant/Gas Station/Convenience Store.  Being as we were 7 miles from “town”, it was awhile before we had quiet again.  We decided to lock the door.

Up again early, and we were the first ones out of the marina, followed closely by two decrepit sailboats that looked like they had been around the world six times.  We called to have the bridge opened for us as we motored towards the sunrise.  Another long day lay ahead.  We had to go 70 miles to get to Mile Marker 155, which is where Campbell Creek veers off of the ICW towards their house.  The day went on and on, but we got lots of schoolwork done and I spent every minute on watch scrubbing our fenders.  I have tried every vinyl cleaner and fender cleaner out there, but it turns out that Black Streak Remover is the magic potion.  You know.  In case you are having similar fender issues.

In two spots, the dredged channel was so narrow that our depth sounder made our hearts pound as we watched it plummet, not realizing we had veered out of it.  It was strange to be in a river that was ½ a mile wide and only be able to stay in the middle, with about 10 feet of error on each side of the boat.  We learned not to hug the marks, but to stay directly in the center of the channels at all times.  At one point, the sounder said “6.2”.  Not possible since we draw 6’ 7” empty.  But we didn’t run aground.  Knock on wood.

As we approached Campbell Creek, we radioed ahead to Mike and Kathy Orr (my mom and Sal’s neighbors, whose names are so similar to our Ho-Ho-Kus friends, Mike and Kathy Orbe).  Mike and Bill Garrison came out on Bill’s fishing boat to guide us into the canal, which is off our chart and very shallow in places.  We felt like superstars, getting our own private escort up the creek.  We would have enjoyed it more if Chris and I weren’t holding our breath, waiting any moment to run aground.  But we didn’t.  Knock on wood.

We tied up easily at the Orr’s dock, right next to their sailboat, s/v Braveheart.  We welcomed them aboard and shared sailing stories for awhile before we had to finish cleaning up and packing up some clothes for the kids, who would be sleeping at Gma and Gpa’s house.  We made it, but we were too pooped to celebrate.  I refuse to acknowledge that we will eventually have to leave here and continue on in the ICW.  Welcome to the Hotel California…