Towing S/V Ruby to Admiral's Hill

My friend Bill's Catalina 30 had her engine pulled out because of some problems. So there was the daunting task on how to move the boat over from Winthrop to Admiral's Hill where she will be on the dry.

Well, good excuse for a day on the water. We grabbed TapAlong, our 13 Whaler Dountless, tied her to the aft quarter of Ruby, with many, many, many fenders, and had a nice 2+ hour trip through the harbor to Admiral's Hill. The weather was georgeous. We left around 3:30 pm and arrived there just about at sunset.

After securing the boat we jumped into the Tapalong and carefully powered back, in 20 minutes. We had to be slow because inner Boston Harbor is a no-wake zone, and there was a lot of debris in the form of railroad ties in the water.

But the deed was done, and we celebrated with sandwiches and beer at the clubhouse

Bonfire on Rainsforth Island

October 10, 2009

This is the third, and probably the last time that we sailed over to Rainsforth Island to have a bonfire. It was pretty gusty, W winds 25 kts gusting to 30. We had about 6 boats joining us.

I grabbed a mooring one of the Boston Harbor Island moorings for which I have a season pass..

I do admit that when I have a chance to grab a mooring, I do it, even though I trust my anchoring skills and Waterdancer's anchor. It is a 45 ft plow with about 200 ft of chain. We have never dragged... but then again, part of the reason is, because I grab a mooring if I can :)

It was a wet dinghy ride over to the campsite which was on the eastern cove. Every time I go through Quarantine Rocks, I slow down, even with the dinghy. They look intimidating at low tide. Worse, at high tide they are not visible, and you can go over most of them, but it is risky business.

We had a great night, boiling some lobsters, cows and fish. Danielle distributed her rum again :).

There was another group camping on the other side of the island, which is something that I always feel uneasy about, but .. nothing we can do.

The one concern I have with Rainsforth is that there is a group of people, mostly from the Quincy area, who live there pretty much through the summer. So I feel somewhat stepping on their turf when we take over the campsite. But up to now, whenever we encountered them, they have been nice and courteous, so there have been no issues.

All in all, it was a great night around the fire, many stories told, quite a few braincells killed.

We went back to Waterdancer around midnight and started up the generator.

Winter is coming. The temperatures dropped down to the low 40ies. Thank you reverse cycle !
I usually don't sleep that well with the generator running, especially if the winds die. You can smell the exhaust fumes as they sweep through the portholes and other small openings if not disbursed by the wind. I have nightmares of getting CO poisoning, even though I have 2 smoke detectors, and 2 CO detector's on the boat.

Next day, we motored back to the club. We did not sail, because we are whimps! . I did not want to deal with the sails for the half hour ride. If we had been on Harmony (26 Bristol) , ow Nomad (36 Catalina) we would have at least pulled out the jib. Oh well..

Speaking of winter ...
That day, October 11, was the annual Turkey Roast at Constitution Marina. That usually marks the beginning of the winter season. Just like last year, Paul on Venesaur opened up his boat to the entire marina. I estimate that we had close to 40 people on the his boat.

Let the winter begin....

Whalering around

We spent the Saturday Whalering around, went to the Barking Crab for lunch (Way too expensive) then had a nice walk in Downtown Boston.
We also wnt to Constitution Marina and renewed our contract for the winter.

On the way back to Winthrop, we met up with Salacia and Windtalker, who had participated in the BHIR race.
It was nice to be able to get out a few more times on the whaler.
Winter is coming soon...

Winthrop Sunsets

We are really lucky that we have the most beautiful sunsets here in Winthrop.

Here are just some pictures we took from the aft deck of our home.

Vacation, Cuttyhunk

After Hurricane Bill left we decided to bolt to Cuttyhunk. We left Glochester at 9 am in the morning to make the canal with a favorable current, and arrived in Cuttyhunk right at sunset.

In retrospect, we should have stopped at Bassets again instead of doing a 10 hour dash, but I wanted to avoid the southwesterlies that were predicted for the next day. It turns out that Waterdancer would have easily made it. You can see Danielle's annoyance slightly on the video poster. It was a beautiful trip though.

Here is a great wiew from the top of Cuttyhunk.

We spent the rest of the week there, and yet once again got chased away by a hurricane. This time, Hurricane Danny. Our luck, two week vacation, two hurricanes.

We ended up sailing back to Bassets island, and spent the first day at anchor there, afterwards moving over to a mooring.

I like anchoring, and it is a matter of calculated risk, weather we drop anchor or grab a mooring.

Waterdancer is our life, our home. We are working, full time, so we don't have the luxury of full-time cruisers to work on the boat for repairs. If we were to drag and damage her, we would be in pretty deep shit. So I only anchor when I feel confident about the situation.

Things would of course be different if we were full time cruisers, since we could not afford stating on moorings all the time.

Regardless of the hurricane, we enjoyed our stay back at Red Brook Harbor.

The dogs, especially Sailor, because he is so expressive, hates it when someone goes swimming. He is ready to jump in and get us back onto the boat.

Well, Hurricane Danny came and went, and just like Hirricane Bill, it ended up going off to the east and just dump a lot ow rain onto us

The return trip to Bsoton was both bittersweet and eerie. The hurricanes had left back a mist, and we sailed back to Scituate under a hazy sky, observing whales (well at least I did) and all kind of aquatic creatures.

Vacation, Anisquam

The second part of our vacation tooke us into Salem, Hawthorne cove for the first night, and then to another on of our favorite places, Anisquam. This is a great place to go swimming from the boat (carefull of the strong currents, or from the beach.

We spent the rest of the week in Anisquam. We took the dinghy over to the back of Crane Beach, which was actually a pretty long ride. It was fun to explore, but we prefer Anisquam. The sand on the beach is impeccable, and the waters are nice.

(On the backside of Crane Beach)

( Waterdancer and the Anisquam Yacht Club)

Unfortunately, We got news that a Hurrican was coming, so we had to take cover in Glouchester.

Sunset at the Annisquam river, our traditional sunset glass of wine

(Crossing the Blyman Bridge)

We spent the weekend of Aug 22, 23 waiting out the hurricane and left for Cuttyhunk on the following Monday.

4th Wedding Anniversary

This is our 4th wedding anniversary. I feel that I am the luckiest person in the world to have such a wonderful wife, who spends her life with me.

I don't know how many years I have left, but the life I am spending right now, today, are the best and happiest years of my life. Even if I die tomorrow, I will do so with a smile, thanking fate that it has provided me with these wonderful years. Thank you Danielle.


Yes, I don't have the money I used to have. Yes I have aces and pains from the treatments, and the years that have gone by.
But I also have Danielle, and if anybody would ask me what part of my life would I want to last for ever, they would be these last 4 years.

Vacation, Bassets, Cuttyhunk and back

We decided to break up our summer vacation into 2 legs. First one was August 1 through August 9, and the second leg is August 17 through August 30. We both had business in town in the second week of August.

We went to the beach and had a great day.

Both Sailor and Sammy enjoyed the remote beach on the hook of Ptown.

We opted to go to a remote area of the beach so that we could leave the dogs loose.

(Danielle and Sailor on the Beach in Ptown)

Last year, the dinghy was stuck in the shallows, and we had to drag it out for a quarter mile. Thanks to Bill Byford, we were able to get out then. So, now I am careful about making sure that we don't land anywhere where there are extensive flats. It is not a big deal to drag the dinghy for a few tens of feet. But after that, it gets tedious.

(A really Happy Danielle on the beach in Ptown)

Next day, on Sunday afternoon, Buzz and Marcy, our winter liveaboard friends, joined us. Next morning we decided to head for the SOuth. We left on a very foggy morning, and after crossing the Cape Cod Canal, we tucked in into Red Brook Harbor and dropped anchor in front of Basset's Island.

There, we had a lovely evening.

(Danielle and Marcy Chatting at anchor at Bassets)

Bassets Island is very shallow, and has winding sand banks. The holding is very good though, but one has to be careful not giving too much scope, because you can drift into the shallows.

The water is extremely warm, 75 degrees F or so, which makes it a delight to swim.

From there we sailed over to Cuttyhunk, our favorite location. Of course, as luck would have it

there were a few regattas scheduled, so the inside was totally booked.

We grabbed a mooring at the entrance of the channel. The nice part of being outside is that we have a great view. Although it can get a bit rocky unless there are east winds.

We spend the afternoon waling in the town and showing Buzz and Marcy the area.

We had a great sunset dinner on Emeraude.

It is always fun to have a pair of like minded people with us on vacation. We love Buzz and marcy dearly. We had a lot of fun last winter when they were living at COnstitution. This year, they decided to spend the winter at Pickering Wharf, in Salem. We will miss thenm

Next morning early we were able to secure a mooring inside.

Next day, we took the dogs, and climbed up to the top of the hill. There is a beautiful view from there, and on clear days you can see Connecticut, Nomans Land and Nantucket. Gays head on Marthas Vineyard is always a great view too. I have no idea where my pictures from the top of Cuttyhunk are.

After several days in Cuttyhunk, we sailed back to Basset's Island, dropped the anchor there for the night and then sailed back across the Canal to Winthrop. Buzz and Marcy joined us and stayed in Winthrop for a few days.

Than Monday, August 10, they took Danielle and the whaler and had a great day on the harbor, going everywhere from Worlds End to Mystic River.

Clambake at Rainsforth Island

We decided to get a group of us together and have a clambake at Rainsforth Island. Ransforth is a small island that has a few moorings and reasonable anchorage available. There are 2 beaches that allow for a fire below the high water mark.

We bought about 60 lobsters from a local lobsterman, and brought plenty of clams and beer :)

It was a great evening. Especially Danielle loved it. Many friends were there. We decided to erect the pot over the bonfire, since the propane heater was not hot enough in the winds.

Scituate Trip

We had a weekend trip to Scituate scheduled. Danielle was away at dance competition. Do Bill, Christian, Joe and I sailed down on July 11 and returned July 12.

The weather was raugh and on the nose going down, but Waterdancer punched through it easily with the Yanmar Turbo, motorsailing.

It was the first trip with WD. We did the typical O'Malley stuff, hang out at the bar.

Then we went back to the boat and had a lovely evening chatting about things.

The return trip was uneventful.

After dropping my crew off, I took the whaler and went over to Spectacle Island where some friends who were not able to punch into the wind ended up.