MV Dirona travel digest for Palm Beach to Boston 2016
Click the travel log icon on the left to see these locations on a map,
with the complete log of our cruise. On the map page, clicking on a camera or text icon will display a picture and/or log entry for that location, and clicking on the smaller icons along the route will display latitude, longitude and other navigation data for that location. And a live map of our current route and most recent log entries always is available at //mvdirona.com/maps/LocationCurrent.html. |
6/8/2016: Leaving Palm Beach
Position: 26°46.29'N, -80°2.45'W
We left Riviera Beach Marina about 5:30 this morning, roughly one hour before low water slack at the Port of West Palm Beach. The current in the marina was negligible, but we did feel it once we got out into the main channel. Only one other boat was underway as we exited the channel, but traffic picked up once the sun rose.
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6/8/2016: Boston
Position: 27°11.39'N, -79°52.88'W
Our ultimate destination is Boston. We plan to spend 6-8 weeks in there, enjoy the 4th of July fireworks, then continue north to explore Maine in August. We would like to head directly to Boston from West Palm Beach, but this is the weather model for June 13th when we'd be nearing Massachusetts. The blue boat icon is where we'd be, with 35-knot winds and 11-ft seas on 6 seconds. No thanks. We'll instead spend a couple of nights on the hook at Cape Lookout to wait for the system to pass, and then continue north. It's been WAY too long since we enjoyed a sunset on the anchor so we're looking forward to a couple of relaxing days on the hook.
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6/8/2016: Wide Open Throttle
Position: 26°58.42'N, -79°56.43'W
Man, this one is a fun one to see. We are currently operating in 84.6F sea water and we've been running for 10 min at wide open throttle and the coolant temperature is rock stable at 196F. In the past, the temps would be escalating well above 200F and would just keep going up. In warm water, there wasn't sufficient heat rejection to run flat out. Arguably it doesn't matter in that we never run harder continuously than the maximum continuous duty rating on the engine which is 231hp @ 2300 RPM. However, even this output level would barely work with the engine running right around 210F at this output level. Deere specifies a maximum continuous permissive coolant temperature of 212F so 210 is way to close to the limit. And, if the keel cooler is not super clean, even this output level can't be run. We've been limited as low as 2150RPM in the past. With the new keel cooler, we can run at the engines max continuous rating indefinitely and the coolant temperature never exceeds 187F. The engine thermostat is not even fully open until 190F so we now have massive amounts of reserve cooling. Even a dirty keel cooler won't slow us down. Just the way we like it.
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6/8/2016: Max Continuous Output
Position: 26°59.38'N, -79°56.13'W
Here we are smoking along at 11.9 kts running steadily at the mximum continuous rating output of our Deere 6068AFM75 of 231 hp. Admittedly, some of this speed is the Gulf Steam. When testing at wide open throttle we were doing 13.1 kts in the open ocean. Seemed just crazy. We are operating at 231 hp and a steady 2,300 RPM and the thermostat isn't even fully open at only 187F. We just love having greater engineering margins.
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6/8/2016: Anti-chafe
Position: 27°2.28'N, -79°55.23'W
The anti-chafe on one of our lines was heavily worn from our stay at Barbados, so we replaced it today. We've gone through a lot of anti-chafe on this trip. Before we left, Adam Block, previous owner of Nordhavn 47 Eden recommended we bring lots of anti-chafe. We did, and ended up getting even more partway through the trip.
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6/8/2016: Hydraulic pump
Position: 27°15.69'N, -79°52.73'W
During an engine-room check, James noticed that the hydraulic raw water cooling pump had stopped flowing. Unfortunately the pump is in the starboard engine room alcove, and accessing it requires removing all our stored oil. You can just barely see the top of James's back on the other side of the generator. In order to change the impeller the hydraulic system must be depowered or the hydraulic pump hydraulic flow needs to be shut off. The latter is more hassle so we just shut down the main engine and ran on the wing. The reason the main engine has to be shutdown to depower the hydraulic system is the main engine drives a "live pump" which means that pump turns whenever the main engine is running. The reason the wing engine is able to run is the wing engine hydraulic pump has an electric clutch that can be disengaged to shut down the hydraulic system. This configuration allows us to proceed on the wing with full stabilizers, thrusters, etc. Or, as in this case, we can run on the wing but briefly shut down the hydraulic system for service and then turn the stabilizers back on.
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6/8/2016: Impeller
Position: 27°18.46'N, -79°52.32'W
Unsurprisingly the cause of the lack of hydraulic coolant flow was the hydraulic raw water pump. Most of the industry recommend that these impellers get changed every year. For years, we did this but we noticed that sometimes they last a week, sometimes, 6 months, and sometimes 3 years. Changing them annually seems to have just about exactly the same number of unexpected changes and just waiting until they fail. And the outcome of failure seems no worse when they run a long time. Old impellers don't seem to show a higher propensity to throw fins off which forces the downstream heat exchange to be opened up to get the broken impeller parts. This hydraulic impeller is a perfect example: it went 2 3/4 years and 4,350 hours. And it's still 100% intact so just needs a quick change and no need to chase down parts. Amazing.
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6/8/2016: Antifreeze
Position: 27°30.00'N, -79°51.60'W
ames changed the wing and generator antifreeze today to get all the engines on Fleetguard ES Compleat. The last change on the wing was 109 hrs/19 months ago and on the gen was 1634 hrs/34 months ago.
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6/8/2016: 7900 hours
Position: 28°7.72'N, -79°45.37'W
We just crossed 7900 hours on the main engine.
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6/8/2016: Corrision
Position: 28°18.78'N, -79°44.14'W
The black water tank sensor wasn't reading. Deeper investigation shows the optional aluminum focus tube had completely corroded away and the corrosion filled the gap where the sensor reads. I cleaned out all the aluminum corrosion and the sensor is now reading correctly again.
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6/9/2016: Funnel cloud
Position: 30°35.35'N, -79°34.77'W
A funnel cloud extending below towering cumulus clouds.
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6/9/2016: Were Dreams
Position: 31°3.53'N, -79°23.77'W
The 171ft superyacht Were Dreams heading north at speed. We haven't seen much traffic on this run so far.
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6/9/2016: Hoegh Bangkok
Position: 31°20.78'N, -79°6.23'W
The 652-ft Hoegh Bangkok heading south to Jacksonville Florida with a load of cars.
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6/9/2016: Sea Water Temp Sensor
Position: 31°30.66'N, -78°56.10'W
Our sea water temperature sensor was reading incorrectly again, so James replaced the depth sounder transducer, located underneath the steps from the master stateroom to the engine room. The 1.5″ hole in the hull 4.5″ down below the water line brings in prodigous quantities of water even when switching transducers quickly. It's a reminder of how fast a boat can go down and the importance of super high capacity bilge pumps. We do have a wooden plug ready, at left next to the old transducer, in case we have any issues re-installing the transducer.
It looks like the current temp sensor just failed. Looking at it closely there is no sign of mistreatment from the recent boat yard visit. It appears to have just stopped working. That’s the second failure in six years so arguably a bit high but not completely outside of the bounds of reasonableness. |
6/9/2016: Dry bilge
Position: 31°50.95'N, -78°35.55'W
Looking down into the bottom of the now dry engine-room bilge behind the main engine. Our current working theory on the leak is when the boat was in the yard for ten days it was stored at an angle different from the angle it floats on, and water from cleaning up the keel cooler change ended up accumulating where it wouldn't normally. We still would like to get the area to drain fast in the future but we have to find it first.
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6/9/2016: Wing fuel
Position: 31°56.25'N, -78°30.13'W
We don't like to leave fuel sitting for too long in the wing engine tank. Every 6-9 months, once we're sure we have a good load of new fuel on board, we drain the wing tank into the supply tank and refill it.
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6/9/2016: Shady Lady
Position: 32°17.47'N, -78°8.33'W
The fishing vessel Shady Lady working traps about 100nm east of Charleston.
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6/9/2016: Float
Position: 32°19.79'N, -78°5.94'W
The US east coast, especially up toward Maine, is famous for a veritable mine fields of floats from traps. So far we've only seen the one set here from Shady Lady. This float is pretty obvious during the day, but we're sure many aren't this well-marked. And even this one likely wouldn't show up on radar. We do have spurcutters behind our propeller to hopefully cut any line that might become tangled there, but avoidance is the best strategy.
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6/9/2016: Second float
Position: 32°19.91'N, -78°5.92'W
This second style of float that Shady Lady is using isn't quite as visible as the first, but still quite large and obvious during the day at least.
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6/9/2016: Sunset
Position: 32°22.00'N, -78°3.67'W
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6/10/2016: Sunrise
Position: 33°23.25'N, -77°10.88'W
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6/10/2016: Payton Grace Moran
Position: 33°45.12'N, -77°1.34'W
The nearly 100-ft Payton Grace Moran pounding into the seas. We're heading in the opposite direction, and getting a better ride.
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6/10/2016: Bobbing
Position: 33°51.38'N, -76°58.08'W
Having just seen a 100ft tug pounding through the seas, a few minutes later we saw a center-console out getting tossed around in the same seas, fishing happily, but perhaps wearing seat belts.
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6/10/2016: Traffic
Position: 34°23.85'N, -76°41.29'W
An incredible amount of vessel traffic as we approach the Beaufort Inlet entrance.
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6/10/2016: Boston-area gale
Position: 34°26.88'N, -76°39.72'W
We might have stopped at Cape Lookout anyway, but the storm in the Boston area makes delaying heading further north worth doing. The 96-hour surface analysis shows that Boston-area storm that we're avoiding is now a 989mb low with gale-force winds.
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6/10/2016: Cape Lookout
Position: 34°37.29'N, -76°34.02'W
The distinctive light at Cape Lookout is prominent in the background as we near the anchorage.
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6/10/2016: At anchor
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.79'W
It's great to be back out on the hook again. Amazingly, our anchor hasn't been down for over six months—not since Plettenberg Bay on the east coast of South Africa. We're in North Carolina now, having skipped Georgia and South Carolina—we'll visit them on our return trip south later this year. The last time we spent a night in North Carolina was way back in 1991 for "Racing at the Rock" at the now-closed Rockingham Motor Speedway, our then-favourite NASCAR track.
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6/10/2016: Cochito
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.80'W
We saw the Coast Guard patrol boat Cochito standing off Beaufort Inlet as we approached Cape Lookout. Not long after we arrived, the 87-ft Marine Protector class vessel slowly came through the channel into the bay and anchored to our south.
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6/10/2016: Sunset
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.82'W
A fabulous sunset to accompany our first night at anchor this year.
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6/11/2016: Latch
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.80'W
We opened the cockpit door this morning to a strange thumping sound. The cockpit door latch had broken off. It looks like this angled latch was fabricated by taking a straight latch and welding it an an angle, and it appears the weld has failed.
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6/11/2016: Battery
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.80'W
The tender battery was discharged and wouldn't accept a charge, so we put the spare in.
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6/11/2016: Landed
Position: 34°37.55'N, -76°31.35'W
We landed the tender off the beach using the Anchor Buddy, effectively a bungee-cord attached to an anchor, off the stern with a bow line ashore.
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6/11/2016: Light Station
Position: 34°37.44'N, -76°31.42'W
The Cape Lookout Light Station is part of the Cape Lookout National Seashore. The light house still is operational, and the tower is open to the public for tours. You can see the light turning and an incredible 365° views from 163ft in the sky.
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6/11/2016: Boardwalk
Position: 34°37.42'N, -76°31.43'W
The light station has a sturdy boardwalk leading around the site and to the ocean.
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6/11/2016: South Core Banks
Position: 34°37.28'N, -76°31.25'W
The beach along the South Core Banks was filling fast with visitors.
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6/11/2016: Light house
Position: 34°37.39'N, -76°31.47'W
The Cape Lookout Lighthouse was built in 1857 and stands 163ft high. The diamond pattern painted daymark distinguishes it visually from other lighthouses in the area, and also indicates direction—the black diamonds point north-south and the white diamonds east-west.
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6/11/2016: Steps
Position: 34°37.37'N, -76°31.47'W
Climbing the 207 steps to the top of the Cape Lookout lighthouse.
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6/11/2016: Landing
Position: 34°37.37'N, -76°31.47'W
The lighthouse walls taper from 9ft at the base to 1ft 7in at the top. The lighthouse is built with double walls that are separate at the bottom, but join higher up.
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6/11/2016: View
Position: 34°37.36'N, -76°31.47'W
Hard to beat the view from the top of the lighthouse. This is looking south to Cape Lookout on the left, our anchorage in Cape Lookout Bight is left of center, Shackleford Banks are in the center, Barden Inlet is to the right of center, and the South Core Banks extend to the right. Shackleford Banks were originally connected to the South Core Banks, but a 1933 hurricane opened up Barden Inlet to Cape Lookout Bight.
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6/11/2016: Anchorage
Position: 34°37.36'N, -76°31.47'W
Dirona visible at anchor way in the distance to the northwest of the lighthoust.
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6/11/2016: Tender
Position: 34°37.36'N, -76°31.47'W
Our tender is just visible moored outermost of most of the other boats at the top of the picture.
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6/11/2016: Beacon
Position: 34°37.36'N, -76°31.47'W
The lighthouse originally had a 6ft diameter Fresnel lens that in 1979 was replaced by two 1000-watt electrict lights.
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6/11/2016: Museum
Position: 34°37.39'N, -76°31.48'W
The old lightkeeper's house is now a compact museum with excellent displays on the history and geology of the area.
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6/11/2016: Lunch
Position: 34°38.12'N, -76°33.07'W
We moored the tender off the spit at the anchorage entrance and had lunch amongst the local boats. Dirona is a white speck in the background in the center left third of the photo.
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6/11/2016: Fishboat
Position: 34°40.14'N, -76°31.39'W
Following a fishboat through Barden Inlet. Underway, the fishboats leave the nets hanging from up high, with trawl doors extended from each side, while underway.
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6/11/2016: Harkers Island
Position: 34°41.11'N, -76°31.58'W
The main visitor center for the Cape Lookout National Seashore is on Harkers Island. The is the ferry that runs to the light station.
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6/11/2016: Marshallberg
Position: 34°43.29'N, -76°31.26'W
The fishboat we were following went into this tiny marina off Marshallberg.
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6/11/2016: Dirona
Position: 34°37.81'N, -76°32.90'W
At anchor with the lighthouse in the background. We're really enjoying the anchorage and the view to sand dunes all around. It reminds us of the area north of the Gold Coast in Australia.
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6/11/2016: Refueling
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.80'W
Refueling the tender from our deck fuel. We have two 29-gallons portable gasoline tanks that we keep stored on the boat deck, starboard of the stack.
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6/11/2016: Horses
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.80'W
Wild horses inhabit Shackleford Banks. Their origin is not known--perhaps they landed there as part of some long-ago shipwreck.
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6/11/2016: Sunset
Position: 34°37.77'N, -76°32.79'W
Another beautiful sunset. We're really enjoying the anchorage.
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6/12/2016: ARPA
Position: 34°37.76'N, -76°32.79'W
We rely heavily on ARPA (Automatic Radar Plotting Aid), particularly on the MaxSea chartplotter display. ARPA is a RADAR feature that allows us to flag multiple targets, track them and know closest point of approach (CPA). With MaxSea, we can track an ARPA target via a continuously updated always-visible sidebar that we find convenient. When we upgraded the nav computer to 64-bit and reinstalled MaxSea, we configured NavNet and NavNet Fast Heading, but neglected to setup NavNet ARPA, so ARPA targets weren't displaying on MaxSea. We figured that out today and got it working again. It's sooo nice to have it back.
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6/13/2016: Line parted
Position: 34°37.74'N, -76°32.78'W
The aft line holding our dinghy to the swimstep parted this morning, probably due to the wake of one of the big sports fishers thundering by.
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6/13/2016: Generator over-temperature
Position: 34°37.76'N, -76°32.80'W
The generater was running just barely over temperature at high loads last night (it never reached the 205F shutdown temperature). This morning James checked the impeller and found it needed replacing.
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6/13/2016: Impeller
Position: 34°37.76'N, -76°32.80'W
The failure mode we're used to with tired impellers is that they break apart and throw blades into the cooling system that must be retrieved. These Globe impellers seem to have a much nicer failure mode of just weakening without actually coming apart. This one lasted 18 months with 734 hours of use. What particularly impresses us is this impeller is actually in very rough condition, with all the blades broken and the hub turning and yet the generator still didn't overheat and there's no rubber parts to go chase in the cooling system.
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6/13/2016: Rebecca Lyn
Position: 34°36.26'N, -76°33.71'W
The fishing vessel Rebecca Lyn of Mashallberg, that small harbour we visited the other day by tender, fishing off Cape Lookout Shoals. The winds over the past couple of days were up to 30 knots and several fishboats like this had taken shelter in our anchorage. They all left today and many were out fishing in the area.
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6/13/2016: Breakers
Position: 34°29.34'N, -76°30.79'W
Cape Lookout Shoal extends several miles south of Cape Lookout, with breakers down much of its length. Finding a shortcut across. although technically feasible, did not look appealing.
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6/13/2016: Tournament
Position: 34°30.75'N, -76°18.26'W
We heard something on the radio about a fishing tournament and suddently found ourselves swimming very much upstream against a flow of at least fifty high-speed sportsfishing boats. All those little red dots on the radar are boats, some we've selected as ARPA targets.
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6/13/2016: Sportsfishers
Position: 34°30.68'N, -76°18.41'W
Several of the group of 50+ sportsfishers in the tournament group passing us heading west. The slowest boat was running at 25 knots, most were over 30 and one was running 38.
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6/14/2016: BGAN
Position: 34°36.72'N, -76°4.48'W
Our mini-VSAT satellite system failed, so we're on BGAN until we get the issue resolved. The means we'll only be updating the route periodically when we connect (usually twice a day).
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6/13/2016: Cape Hatteras
Position: 34°54.08'N, -75°24.46'W
Rounding Cape Hatteras near midnight with the cargo ship Arian heading the opposite direction. The Cape Hatteras lighthouse light was quite obvious 20 miles to our north.
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6/14/2016: 10 knots
Position: 35°14.49'N, -75°1.94'W
We're making excellent speed in the Gulf Stream and doing over 10 knots at 1700 RPM with a fuel economy of 1.81 nm/gallon. At this RPM, in flat water without current, we would normally run about 8 knots.
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6/14/2016: Pitch
Position: 36°42.84'N, -74°1.05'W
The winds have switched to 15-20 from the north-northwest. This is generating a chop that is producing steady pitching of 12 degrees and occasionally up to 15. The pitch graph near the center of the gauge display shows it increase over the past couple of hours. This shouldn't last more than a few hours until the wind switches back to the southwest. As expected, we're out of the Gulf Stream current now, and need to run at 2000RPM to make 8 knots.
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6/15/2016: Calmer
Position: 38°5.64'N, -73°8.72'W
The winds have switched around to the southwest now, so we're seeing much reduced pitching motion.
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6/15/2016: Maersk Goodwood
Position: 38°29.28'N, -72°53.62'W
Passing the 653ft cargo ship Maersk Goodwood en route to Jacksonville. Vessel traffic has been pretty light so far.
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6/15/2016: Sunrise
Position: 38°32.31'N, -72°51.66'W
Conditions have remained excellent since last night's wind switch to the southwest. Seas are calm and the winds are below ten knots. We expect this to last into Boston.
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6/15/2016: Canyons
Position: 38°38.05'N, -72°47.97'W
We're passing by a series of submarine canyons where depths plummet from 300ft to thousands in only a few miles, home to a wide diversity of underwater life.
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6/15/2016: Floats
Position: 39°25.52'N, -72°17.32'W
Other than the floats we saw nearing Cape Lookout we've not seen much of anything in the water so far. That changed today. We just passed through a large field of floats like this one, with a large buoy and a radar reflector on a stick. They're pretty easy to see during the day, and do show up on RADAR. Hopefully we won't see a lot at night though.
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6/15/2016: 8,000 hours
Position: 39°31.47'N, -72°13.44'W
We just crossed 8,000 hours on the main engine. That John Deere has never once failed to start and has run reliably for all those hours.
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6/15/2016: Floats at night
Position: 40°26.61'N, -71°37.32'W
Shortly after dark, we found ourselves in a seemingly endless field of floats like the one we'd seen earlier, spaced about a third of a mile apart. We could pick them out on RADAR, but this required constant vigilance at the helm. If the seas were choppy or we were in storm clouds, they'd be very difficult to spot though. We eventually passed through after several fairly tiring hours.
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6/16/2016: Sunrise
Position: 41°11.83'N, -71°7.36'W
After we got through the floats, we started seeing a lot of fishing vessel traffic off Rhode Island Sound. They're much easier to see and avoid at night than the floats, but we were still pretty happy to see that sun come up.
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6/16/2016: Small float
Position: 41°22.72'N, -71°0.05'W
The large floats we'd seen earlier gave way to these smaller ones. They were widely spaced and easy to avoid.
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6/16/2016: Andrew McAllister
Position: 41°32.07'N, -70°49.27'W
The beautiful tug Andrew McAllister, designed by Jensen Maritime Consultants of Seattle, Washington, is powered by two EMD 12-710-G7B diesel engines with a rated 6,000 horsepower.
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6/16/2016: Where are we?
Position: 41°40.46'N, -70°40.07'W
Spitfire getting his first smell of Massachusetts while we wait at anchor for a favourable tide to transit Cape Code Canal. The tidal range at Buzzards Bay is 4 ft and at Cape Cod Bay is 9ft, which generates 3.5knot flooding currents and 4-6-knot ebbing currents in the Cape Cod Canal that connects the two bodies of water. At the earliest we'll transit on the end of the ebb current shortly before it turns to flood.
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6/16/2016: Railroad Bridge
Position: 41°43.95'N, -70°37.79'W
The ConRail Railroad Bridge is the first of three bridges we will pass under as we transit the Cape Code Canal, and the only one that opens. It's normally in the open position, but when closed has a vertical clearance of only 7ft. So we really need it open.
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6/16/2016: USTS Kennedy
Position: 41°44.19'N, -70°37.46'W
The Massachusetts Maritime Academy is at the west entrance to the canal. Moored out front is their training ship, the 540ft USTS Kennedy. The academy was founded in 1891 and has a huge campus that encompasses all of Taylor Point.
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6/16/2016: Canal patrol
Position: 41°44.33'N, -70°37.18'W
The Cape Code Canal has a number of rules for transit, including a maximum speed limit of 10mph and also minimum and maximum transit times. Boats must be able to make it through the canal in 2.5 hours or hire a tug assist. Any boat passing through must be under power with no wake. Stopping, turning around or fishing are not permitted.
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6/16/2016: Corp of Engineers
Position: 41°44.46'N, -70°36.92'W
The Army Corps of Engineers manages the canal. This is their control center.
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6/16/2016: Bourne Bridge
Position: 41°44.77'N, -70°35.74'W
Approaching the Bourne Bridge, with a 135ft vertical clearance.
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6/16/2016: Guinness
Position: 41°45.63'N, -70°34.26'W
We saw only one other boat in the canal, the Kady Krogen 42 Guinness. But on AIS we could see a pusher tug ahead of us, with a tug assist, and another larger commercial ship behind.
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6/16/2016: Sagamore Bridge
Position: 41°46.55'N, -70°32.78'W
Approaching the third and final bridge, the Sagamore Bridge, has the same 135ft clearance as it's sibling, the Bourne Bridge.
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6/16/2016: Canal Generating Plant
Position: 41°46.39'N, -70°31.18'W
The Canal Generating Plant,a petroleum and natural gas electrical power station, at the east end of the canal. It opened in 1968 and once generated the majority of the power for Cape Code, but now only handles peak loads.
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6/16/2016: Sandwich
Position: 41°46.40'N, -70°30.24'W
Sandwich, incorporated in 1639, is the oldest town on Cape Cod. The Canal Visitor Center is here, along with a popular boardwalk along the canal.
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6/16/2016: Canal Transit
Position: 41°46.63'N, -70°29.74'W
A 1:36 video of our transit through the Cape Cod Canal.
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6/16/2016: Cape Cod Bay
Position: 41°46.79'N, -70°29.19'W
We entered Cape Cod Bay on a wonderfully sunny and calm day.
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6/16/2016: Warren Cove
Position: 41°56.80'N, -70°37.02'W
At anchor in Warren Cove off Plymouth Bay with Plymouth Beach stretching out to our west.
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6/16/2016: Duxbury Pier
Position: 41°58.91'N, -70°39.04'W
The Duxbury Pier lighthouse, built in 1871, stands 47 feet high and has three levels used as living quarters and a watchroom. One hundred tons of stone were placed around the base to protect the light. This seems to have been effective, as the light survived a battering from 30ft waves during a 1944 hurricane. The lighthouse was automated in 1964 and no longer has resident keepers.
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6/16/2016: Sand dunes
Position: 41°58.75'N, -70°39.38'W
High sand dunes as we round beach point. Sand dunes really didn't fit with our image of what to expect in Massachusetts.
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6/16/2016: Mayflower II
Position: 41°57.58'N, -70°39.71'W
The Mayflower II, a working replica of the Mayflower that carried the first group of English Separatists, now known as Pilgrims, from Plymouth, England to the New World. The Mayflower II web site indicated that the ship was in dry dock for restoration, so we were excited to see it here.
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6/16/2016: Public dock
Position: 41°57.75'N, -70°40.01'W
Our tender tied off at the public dock in Plymouth.
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6/16/2016: Mayflower II tour
Position: 41°57.60'N, -70°39.73'W
It was late in the day, so we went straight to the Mayflower II in hopes of a tour. This is an actor playing Captain Jones, one of several actors on board playing characters from the voyage. He was extremely knowledgeable about the ship and did an excellent job of explaining the workings of the ship, the voyage to the New World and its dangers.
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6/16/2016: Deck
Position: 41°57.60'N, -70°39.73'W
The Mayflower was only 80-90 feet long on deck and 90-100 feet long overall. Below this main deck the 102 Pilgrims lived in incredibly cramped conditions for ten weeks during a stormy Atlantic crossing. They first anchored in what today is Provincetown Harbor, but decided to settle in what is now Plymouth. Only two died on the voyage across the Atlantic, but nearly half didn't make it through the first winter.
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6/16/2016: Windlass
Position: 41°57.59'N, -70°39.71'W
Now that's a windlass.
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6/16/2016: Plymouth Rock
Position: 41°57.50'N, -70°39.73'W
Plymouth Rock is said to be the first landing point for the Pilgrims in Plymouth. Their actual first landing point in the New World was at Providence at the tip of Cape Cod.
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6/16/2016: Historic
Position: 41°57.38'N, -70°39.79'W
Plymouth is a stately city, full of historic buildings.
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6/16/2016: Sam Diego's
Position: 41°57.41'N, -70°39.88'W
The patio at Sam Diego's Mexican restaurant caught our attention as we passed. We had a great meal streetside on tree-lined Main St.
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6/16/2016: Snow markers
Position: 41°57.52'N, -70°40.08'W
If you've never lived anywhere where you've had to shovel snow over your head, you might wonder what these poles protruding from the fire hydrants are for. They mark a hydrant's location under several feet of snow so the snow plow drivers don't hit them and the fire department can find them.
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6/16/2016: Pilgrim Hall
Position: 41°57.52'N, -70°40.08'W
The Pilgrim Hall Museum tells the story of the Pilgrims and the founding of America. Unfortunately the museum was closed for the day.
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6/16/2016: Brewers Marina
Position: 41°57.40'N, -70°39.62'W
Plymouth has a small marina that looked like it had space for us, but we're happier at anchor.
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6/16/2016: Sunset
Position: 41°56.81'N, -70°36.99'W
A fabulous sunset for our first night in Massachusetts.
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6/17/2016: Minots Ledge Light
Position: 42°16.20'N, -70°45.40'W
Minots Ledge Light, a few miles outside Boston Harbor, was completed in 1850 following the loss of over 40 vessels on Minots Ledge in the 1830s. Barely a year later, a major storm swept the entire structure away, killing the two keepers. The current 87ft lighthouse was completed in 1860 at a cost of $300,000, the most expensive lighthouse ever constructed in the US.
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6/17/2016: Boston Light
Position: 42°19.15'N, -70°54.24'W
Boston Light on Little Brewster Island, first lit in 1716, is the oldest continually used light station in the US. There sure is a lot of history in this area. Settlement of Victoria, Canada, where we originally hail from, didn't even start until the mid-1800s with the contruction of Fort Victoria in 1843. And the first lighthouse on Canada's west coast, Fisgard Light, wasn't completed until 1860.
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6/17/2016: Fort Warren
Position: 42°19.29'N, -70°55.12'W
Fort Warren on Georges Island was completed in 1860, shortly after the start of the American Civil War. The fort was permanently decommissioned in 1947 and now is a popular tourist destination.
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6/17/2016: Fenders
Position: 42°19.35'N, -70°55.30'W
Jennifer inflating the fenders in preparation for our arrival into Charlestown Marina. We're getting them ready early so we can enjoy the trip through the inner harbor.
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6/17/2016: Lobster boat
Position: 42°20.15'N, -70°57.20'W
A lobster boat working traps in the harbour. While we did see a lot of traps both coming into and leaving Plymouth, they all were widely spaced and easy to avoid.
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6/17/2016: Deer Island
Position: 42°20.18'N, -70°57.57'W
"Egg" digesters in the Deer Island Sewage Treatment Plant. The plant is the second largest in US, with a capacity of 1.2 billion gallons per day.
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6/17/2016: Haggerty Girls
Position: 42°20.19'N, -70°58.19'W
The articulated tug barge Haggerty Girls, likely heading to the bulk petroleum storage facility along the Chelsea River.
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6/17/2016: Codzilla
Position: 42°20.22'N, -70°58.79'W
The 70ft tourist boat Codzilla has 2,800 horsepower and can easily do 40 knots.
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6/17/2016: Whale Watch
Position: 42°20.21'N, -70°59.18'W
A New England Aquarium whale-watching tour heading out.
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6/17/2016: Planes
Position: 42°20.26'N, -70°59.56'W
Traffic is heavy in Boston Harbor, and it's not all in the water. Jets are constantly flying overhead bound for Logan International Airport to our north.
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6/17/2016: Fort Independence
Position: 42°20.44'N, -71°0.32'W
Fort Independence on Castle Island was commissioned in 1851. Castle Island has had a military presence from 1634 through World War II and is the oldest continuously fortified site in British North America.
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6/17/2016: Port of Boston
Position: 42°20.60'N, -71°0.65'W
The container ship Cosco Genoa and the cruise ship Norwegian Dawn in the Port of Boston.
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6/17/2016: Boston Skyline
Position: 42°21.58'N, -71°2.39'W
We were pretty excited to see the Boston skyline stretching out before us.
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6/17/2016: Nordhavn 60
Position: 42°21.70'N, -71°2.49'W
A Nordhavn 60 moored at Boston Yacht Harbor. We couldn't quite read the name behind a radio antenna, it looks like Chapiu.
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6/17/2016: USCG
Position: 42°22.22'N, -71°2.80'W
United States Coast Guard (USCG) Base Boston just north of downtown.
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6/17/2016: Charlestown Marina
Position: 42°22.52'N, -71°2.90'W
Moored in our temporary home for the next 6-8 weeks at Charlestown Marina.
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