69 ! ...................... from P

I woke at 5:30 to get an early start. While K was still snoozing I threw the mooring ball line off the bow and started motoring away from the charming town of Essex and down the Connecticut River to get back into the Long Island Sound. No more than 15 minutes later Senara's bow disappeared from view. All I could see was a white veil of fog that had quickly rolled in from the north. My only choice was to fix my eyes on the GPS and follow my "bread crumb" trail back to the mooring ball. I was thankful the mooring ball suddenly appeared, right where my GPS said it was going to be. How on earth did they do this in 1607? You never read about the Godspeed running aground! Awakened by my clattering around, K popped her head out of the hatch and again repeated our time-honored mantra.... "What are we doin' ?!" Always a good question.

As quickly as the fog rolled in, it snuck out again on "cat's feet" as Robert Frost once wrote. So after getting started again, and waiting for the bridge to lift, we were away and sailing by 7:30. The wind built from the south south-west and by mid day we were close reaching at 6 knots or so. Just about when I was thinking how life was perfect, K ascended the companionway with a distressed demeanor accompanied by really bad news - the potty just broke! What do you mean? ... you can't flush it? No - it shattered. There are pieces on the floor. Sure enough, the base of the unit (made of plastic of course) had apparently developed fractures and finally just cracked up. Immediate change of plans. No potty, no anchoring or mooring balls. That's a new rule I quickly developed. Yes, the captain has to think fast in emergencies. We needed a marina for the night, for the morning, and for repairs. After a few phone calls I had arranged to have the needed parts overnighted to Brewer's marina in Stamford, CT so we fell off the wind a little and headed for Stamford. We now had motivation for a destination. The next day UPS finally came through and I got started on the nasty little job of replacing boat potty parts. After several attempts the job was eventually successful but we had to stay a second night. The dockmaster must have felt sorry for me because he did not charge us for the second night, and he gave me a piece of hose I needed. Who says yankees can't be nice!?

Part of our departure routine is to always check the nautical miles traveled. This morning I checked our distance and compared it to the distance shown at Essex. We had made 69 miles! I had to double check and then think about the foggy morning departure, the favorable wind, the afternoon current that carried us, and some motivated motoring to finish up. Sure enough - even amid our little distraction we traveled 69 miles in one day! Turns out we shattered all previous one-day records - along with the potty.

This afternoon K was at the helm reeling in a J-30 sailing up ahead when I asked her how much water we had under us. 69 Feet! Must be our lucky number. I think I like it!