37:00.3N 76: 18.9W

Sun, Mon, Tues & Wednesday – 22^nd, 23^rd, 24^th & 25^th Sept

Ok, firstly let’s get the sad bit done. Huge commiserations to all New Zealanders and many congratulations to the USA for what became a thrilling America’s Cup series with the ‘Americans’ winning the final ‘winner takes all’ race in what was to a neutral observer, a match of two very distinct halves! OK, so the American boat was rather more international in its crew make up but let’s not dwell on such things. Poor Mark and Amanda on Balvenie were besides themselves and during the penultimate race, they had to motor round in circles outside Martha’s Vineyard listening to the commentary on the radio as they were unable to safely concentrate on entering the harbour.

Sunday was spent mostly preparing Serafina and ourselves for the passage south to Virginia. But the day was broken up very nicely when Craig & Karene drove down from Bristol and we all went out for a light lunch in Newport.

As forecast the wind picked up in the evening and overnight and so by Monday morning it was blowing a very healthy 20 – 25 knots and there was a short and very unpleasant chop making the anchorage very unpleasant. But our passage plan called for an early afternoon departure, so we sat out the worst of the blow and we very pleased when at midday the wind eased and we set off.

Well we would have set off, but lifting the anchor proved to be challenging as we had managed to snag a big power cable running across the sea bed from Newport town out to Fort Adams. The main cables are marked with buoys, but there are other ones we had been told and it is just the luck of the draw. However we ‘invested’ several years ago in a very simple and inexpensive device called an ‘Anchor Rescue’ and this little beauty saved us the considerable costs of hiring the local divers. It is incredibly easy to deploy and use, and the proof was in the ease with which we escaped from this potentially very expensive predicament.

So we sailed out of Newport heading south, passing down the eastern side of Block island before setting a course south west for the southern entrance to the Chesapeake bay and our destination of Norfolk, Virginia. We then enjoyed two full days and nights of easy sailing clocking good mileages and comfortable speeds before the wind died on us and we spent the final day motor sailing.

Unusually though we had a very uplifting few days on the wildlife spotting front and our diets improved with the early catching of a 4kg tuna. Sea life included a breaching humpback whale, a leaping Manta ray (barely yards from Serafina, pilot whales, dolphins playing on our bow wave, a massive turtle, sunfish, mackerel shoals and jellyfish. There were several unidentified but undeniable large fish that seemingly soared out of the sea at various junctures and even the odd seal. Birdlife included all the usual suspects along with ospreys and pelicans, but we also had several feathered visitors on board, one of which Sarah has decided was a Nashville Warbler another was a juvenile robin (we had one as a passenger in Maine) and the last was the most wonderfully nosey (quizzey) Winter Wren.  The wren stayed with us for the best part of an entire afternoon and it pottered around investigating every last inch of Serafina, presumably seeking out insects judging from the eagerness with which it caught and ate a moth. Nothing was excluded from its investigations and we did photograph it checking out all the nooks and crannies. We sort of got less enthusiastic when it turned its attentions to the inside of the boat and we spent quite some time persuading it to get back outside!

The downside to making such a fast passage of course was that we now arrived at the entrance to the Chesapeake far earlier than planned (this is certainly not the first time we have got this bit wrong…) and we knew that we could not hope to turn up at Gary & Greta’s slip in Norfolk at 0200 hours and be very welcome. So Sarah simply navigated us to one of her back-up options and we slipped into a small anchorage tucked in behind Fort Munroe at Hampton, VA.  But not before we had excited the nice folks at Point Henry Tower which guards the very busy shipping lanes, who were more than a little anxious it seems at spotting at 2200 hours, the AIS signal of a small yacht tracking across all the shipping lanes just as a number of huge cargo ships were converging on the same intersection. But it was all very polite and civilised and we were able to confirm that we were tracing these behemoths and had every intention of avoiding any bloodshed (ours) and eventually, once I had persuaded them to repeat the rapid fire questions, I was able to confirm our planned night time destination and they wished us a safe journey and welcomed us to Virginia.