Louise Michel headed south

[bladedancer]

We?ll be leaving on our big adventure in a couple of weeks. Madeline is coming for a month, down the jersey coast and through the Chesapeake. Daniel will join me for the trip down the intracoastal waterway to the jumping off point [to the Bahamas].
Lists of gear to buy and things to do cover the desk. For a while I seemed to be adding items as quickly as I crossed things off, but now the lists are getting smaller. This week it?s very hot and humid again but last week was warm and dry, which doesn?t happen often here, and we were able to spruce up the paint and add some color. With the yellow canopy and bimini top we are sewing, Louise M will be not just shipshape and seaworthy but looking sharp -as befit?s a sweet, feisty old dame- when we cast off lines and head out of Jamaica Bay.

[bladedancer]

We're underway!. Left Mill Basin early saturday with the outgoing tide. Getting round Sandy Hook was a slog, wind over tide, confused seas,  but after that we made steady progress down the Jersey shore and got all the way to Manasquan Inlet under sail. I have no idea how to rate the conditions at the inlet: all I know is we were very nervous coming in having never negotiated an Atlantic coast inlet before.  We checked out the inlet to port just inside the entrance but ended up anchored between the railroad bridge and the route 35 bridge just outside the main channel. Even though it was a Friday night, and  Manasquan is a busy place, it was just fine.
Coming into Barnegat inlet was awesome as well as scary.  Not only were the swells really big but just outside the channel they were curling over just like waves in surfing movies. And even inside the breakwaters in the marked channel there were 4 ft breakers. I guess it can't have been that bad because we saw another sailboat come in through the breaking waves at the entrance under sail and powerboats playing in the breakers in the channel.
What great little boats these Ariel's are! And hooray for Tohatsu outboards. 

[Captain Smollett]

Congrats on getting underway!  Grog for ye, and Godspeed for a safe continued journey.

[Godot]

Virtual grog to you.  When you get to the Chesapeake, give a holler and I betcha I can turn that into a real grog!