TO DELAWARE BAY

We left Atlantic City on Monday Morning of August 27th with the idea of catching the outgoing tide at 9 AM. The forecast was for 5 to 10 knots of wind from the South with waves from 3 to 4 feet and a chance of rain. Our first surprise was getting out of the channel into the Atlantic. The tide was running out, but the wind was blowing in. The waves were confused and hitting 6 to 8 feet in the channel so we pounded our way out to the safety of the ocean, where the waves calmed down to a smooth swell of 4 feet or so. We set the sails and had a good close reach on course for Cape May. As we watched the weather, some pretty big rains storms began to build on shore and down towards Cape May and the Delaware Bay. The winds increased to 12 to 15 knots, which was good for sailing, but we wanted to get past the storms that appeared to be headed towards us and decided to reef the genoa and motor sail with just the main. This gave us the speed and manueverability to only get caught in one rain storm on the way. We saw some interesting activity with the coast guard and police along the way. The helicopter rescue was practicing retrieving people from the water and we got to watch the show as we sailed past.

Later on, a Pon Pon came on the radio saying that a person had been spotted in the water up ahead of us. As we came closer, the coast guard and the state police were doing a grid pattern search as we sailed past. There are a lot of shoals just before getting to Cape May, so we had to sail out a little to avoid them and then back in to the channel. As we approached the channel, it looked very smooth inside. The tide was running in and after a little confused seas at the beginning, it smoothed out with an eight knot ride in. Denise had wanted to visit the town, so the best way to do that was to get a slip. The anchorages were just right outside the channel and looked a little uncomfortable with all the boat traffic. We called Utsch's Marina and they gave us detailed instructions on how to get in and avoid all the very shallow areas just outside the channel. They gave us a welcome package with wine and snacks and maps of the area. We walked over to the Lobster House on Fisherman's Wharf and had a great lobster and seafood meal. We then took a taxi to see as much of the town as we could, with the idea that we would probably leave the next morning. One of the many Victorian houses in Cape May. We were late getting in and had to take our pictures at night, but they were spectacular houses from the 17 and 18 hundreds.

I had not studied the Delaware Bay trip that much, assuming it would be similar to the Hudson where we would need to use the tide to get as far as we could and then hop off for the night, since it appeared to be about 60 miles from the entrance to the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. First, our guide book said nothing. I mean absolutely nothing about places to stay. I checked Active Captain, and they only showed a few anchorages along the way until you got to the C & D Canal. What was worse, the tide to give us a fast ride up the bay started at 3 AM. It would take us about 2 hours to get to the entrance to the Bay, plus we had to leave Cape May at slack tide or with it running out to avoid the same hassles we had at Atlantic City. To complicate things even more, the Cape May Channel is narrow and very shallow if you get outside of it, and we would be leaving in the dark. We decided to stay another day and get some local knowledge on the best way to navigate the Delaware Bay. Nobody seemed to have an answer for the best way to traverse the Delaware Bay. We were told that, no matter what, you are going to have to fight the tide at least half the way up. The Strongest tidal currents were in the more narrow portion of the bay as it approached Philadelphia. We were going to hop into the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal about 2/3rds of the way up, so we carefully looked up the tides and currents at different times of day and studied and measured the charts to be sure we would catch the tides just right. The conclusion was, we should leave between 6 and 7 AM to get the best results. So we set our alarms for 5 AM and were up and ready to go by 6:30. We followed our neighbors out, who were going for a 36 hour sail to Block Island non-stop in the open ocean. Our trip was not quite as adventurous, but we ran into the same problem exiting from the channel into the Atlantic. Once we were out, everything smoothed out and we unfurled the genoa to help us along. We had a 61 foot mast above the water and we would not fit under the bridge that would have been a short cut for us, so we spent about three hours working to avoid the shallow shoals around Cape May and into the Bay where we would have exited if we could get under the bridges. Although we have not figured out how it happened, the tides seemed to be pushing back against us from 1/2 knot to almost 3 knots all the way up the Delaware to the C & D Canal. So much for the wasted day of planning! The Delaware Bay is pretty boring. There are no places to stop, not much to see, and there are a lot of tankers, cargo ships and tug boats running up and down. Here are some of our "cruising" partners and some sights along the way.

Almost 12 hours later, we finally reached the C & D Canal. There wasn't much there either, but twelve miles down the canal, we found our anchorage and dropped the hook for the night after a 14 long hours. Tomorrow, we sail a mile or so into the Chesapeake Bay!