One of the greatest challenges of cruising so far, has been making and keeping a schedule.  As I reread our previous entry, I have to confess that we never made it to Tarpaulin Cove.  Instead, we wound up in Lake Tashmoo, on Martha's Vinyard.  Once Jean arrived, we set out for our day sail.  The weather was cloudy and a bit foggy in Woods Hole and, naturally, the fog only got worse once we were out in the more open waters of Vineyard Sound.  Our destination was about 10 miles to the Southwest.  Turns out we were sailing dead upwind and also directly into the current.  As we tacked back and forth a few times, it quickly became apparent that we would have a riot on our hands if we insisted on sticking to our original plan.  Jean, in a moment of brilliance, noticed that we were sailing straight for Lake Tashmoo on the Vineyard.  Our friends Chris and Jane from the charter boat "Liberte" had mentioned this as a good destination for a day sail.  It was blowing 25 knots and the current was wicked, so it was a bit of a challenge negotiating the narrow channel, but it proved to be well worth it. 

Francois quickly deployed his windsurfer and Jean broke out a fabulous lunch that he had brought with him.  Kids and adults alike jumped overboard to enjoy the slightly warmer waters of this protected harbor.  We even got some sunshine to accompany the day's activities.  Needless to say, it was the perfect ending to the Dunoyer's vacation with us.  The kids all had a great time swimming, the adults windsurfing (some better than others!), and there weren't even any complaints on the sail back home.  This time we were heading in the right direction vis-à-vis the wind and the current so it was going to be a quick trip.  We unrolled the headsail and saved ourselves the effort of raising and lowering the main for the 20 minute ride.  We sailed all the way back to the mooring without firing up the engines.  Unfortunately, the current messed up our landing and we had to start the engines to secure ourselves on the mooring line.  Still, it was quite exciting.  The ferries going in and out of Woods Hole complicate things for us little sailboats.  In fact, as we were making our final approach to the mooring field, a ferry came up behind us.  Joe called him on the radio to make sure we weren't in his way.  Commercial vehicles always have rights over other boats.  He came back quickly and told us to continue on our course, he was making a sharp turn to the right and we would be well out of his way.

The next morning was spent cleaning the boat and planning our next passage.  We wanted to make it to Boston by Monday night so we would have a day to get laundry done and the kids packed up for their big trip to Seattle to see Gran and Gramps.  We discussed it with our friends on Cenou, and set out to meet them in Pocasset Harbor, just south of the entrance to the Cape Cod Canal.  This entailed going through the dreaded Woods Hole pass (see the warnings from the 080505 entry).  We looked at the tides and determined that a noon or a 6pm passage would be best.  Although we had to change some plans we had made to meet up with the Delaneys in Woods Hole, we decided it would be safer to hit the noon tide and give ourselves plenty of daylight to make it to Pocasset Harbor.  It was a speedy trip with good breeze on our beam.

The girls wasted no time getting together with Celine and Anouk, and Joe and Claude caught up on each other's adventures while I took a nap.  We all needed some rest after our week with guests onboard.  We decided to have a cocktail hour with Claude, Rike and the girls, but have dinner alone and call it an early night.  Cassie actually fell asleep while the girls were over playing which is totally unheard of, so we read the signs and stuck to THAT plan!  We spent most of our time with Claude and Rike planning our passage to Boston the next day, agreeing to set alarms for 4:45am.  The hope was that it would be light enough to negotiate the passage out of our anchorage and make it to Cape Cod Canal by 6am to catch a favorable tide.  Alas, despite Reed's Almanac claiming a 4:49 sunrise, it was pitch black and a little foggy.  We didn't even bother calling each other, but went right back to sleep.

The next tide was at 11:45am.  The forecast was for north winds and 2 to 4 ft. seas.  The trip to Boston is 64 miles.  So, it would likely be a motor and a bash into the waves for 9 hours.  Fun!  Joe and I decided that we didn't want to leave the whole trip for Tuesday, since we had a hard deadline to put the girls on a plane early Wednesday morning.  So, we left Cenou behind and took off, not sure if we would make it to Boston in one shot or have to find a spot to overnight along the way.  Choices are very limited along the Cape Cod Bay coastline but we called around and figured we could hit Scituate if we had to.  Adjusting to this mindset has been a challenge to say the least.  Even for those who aren't control freaks :) , it is hard to live with this kind of uncertainty in your immediate future. 

I am happy to report, at 6pm, the Boston skyline is on the horizon.  Our ETA into Constitution Marina is 8pm.  We called ahead to make sure there would be someone there to meet us and show us our spot for the evening.  The trip up was about half motoring and half sailing.  A few face fulls of seawater and a few upset tummies later, we will be safely tied up to a pier in time for a late dinner.

Christy, Joe, Cassie, and Juliana

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