Catching Up from the Sassafras

We left Nikita in Stamford, previously a home for us for about 3 years, while we traveled back to Washington State to visit family. It was enjoyable to be around our families again, especially watching the kids interact with their cousins. We experienced quite a bit of luck, missing Hannah which blew through while we were gone, seemingly doing very little damage but I am sure would have created much anxiety had we been on the boat.

On our return to Stamford we were greeted by Nikita still on the hard without all of the commissioned work done yet. So we had one night sleeping on the boat on the hard and spent the following day hustling the yard staff to complete the work. We then had a nice weather window for Wednesday that would close Thursday for a few days. So we headed out and sailed 215 km (29 hour trip) to the mid point on the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. The trip was a mixed bag; the trip down through NY was fun, seeing all the sights from the water, we got smacked with some steep waves leaving the harbor and had about 5 gallons of water pour in through open hatches (lessons.....lessons), were under motor most of the night down the NJ coast, a bit tedious, caught some nice winds early in the morning, and then got a royal pounding going up the Delaware bay with 3-5 foot seas, direct into the wind and current pushing us. We did get the currents right at each juncture which was a big benefit. After a quick respite at the Summit North Marina in the C&D canal we headed down the Chesapeake and are currently anchored in the Sassafras river. We will spend most of the next month poking around the Chesapeake before heading down the Inter Coastal Water Way (ICW).

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