June 24: It’s Official!

We were greeted by the patter of light rain overhead Saturday morning. A quick look outside revealed dense fog that complemented a rather dismal dawn. In our minds, it confirmed our arrival in the northeast!

Because of the weather, we decided to forego sightseeing at the cliff walk where all of the beautiful mansions would be shrouded in haze. These places overlook the water and many are fashioned after European castles with dozens of rooms and sprawling lawns. (And we have trouble just keeping the boat clean.) So we began our departure routine during which Debbie slipped on the wet dock and damn near fell into the water!

Since we only had about 60 miles to go, we loped along at about 8 knots. There weren’t a lot of other boats out since it was kind of icky. We were going to stay overnight on the southwest end of the Cape Cod canal to wait for the right tide but we happened to arrive at precisely the right time for shooting the rapids for 7 miles. We were doing more than 11 knots basically just coasting.

The current looked like a tidal bore!

Bike paths line the sides of the canal and they were busy since it was Saturday. Our marina was at the opposite end of the canal in the town of Sandwich. Debbie adroitly maneuvered Cattitude into our slip while I handed lines to the teenagers doing the dock work for the summer. Then there was a commotion and apparently Debbie had slipped down the stairs. The dockhands were so traumatized by the 2.5” sheet of arm skin hanging off her arm that they took off so we didn’t even have to tip them! Win!!!

Debbie has decided to replace the slick flip flops for something with more traction. The good news is that she is bruised and not broken!

We had a few local brews and tomorrow we will run about 90 miles to Portsmouth NH. Then, God willing, Portland, Maine the next day. Here’s a pretty picture of Peanut outside of the litter box. Later!