Cape May at Utsch's Marina - waiting for weather

Cap May is a great fishing harbor, many boats are available for catching dinner

It now looks like Wednesday will be a good day to continue our journey. The wind continues to howl out of the northeast at 15 to 20 kts but at least it's not 25 to 30 although that's due Friday and Saturday. If we can get out of here on Wednesday, then we can beat the high winds due later in the week.

The northeast winds have also raised the water level in the Cape May canal. With our 55 ft mast we need a low tide to get under the bridges but with the higher than normal water depths due to the winds, it makes the vertical clearance less than advertised. There's a NOAA station at the western entrance tot he canal that charts the predicted tide height vs actual and puts the results on the web at their site.  In short, the extra water means you have less clearance between your mast and the bridge than predicted by the tide tables, this week about 1.5 feet less! When trying to squeeze under the bridges with our 55 ft mast, that's a lot! We figure we have 9 inches to space at low tide, ouch!

The bridges are never far from our throughts

We met another couple this afternoon that sold their house and just started their adventure of living on their boat and going down the ICW to Key West. So we spent the afternoon discussing the hazards ahead of them and how to avoid going aground. It was great fun to share adventures.

We should be able to get under the bridges starting at 9:00 am. If so we'll start out and head up Delaware Bay and either anchor at Cohansey or solder on to Chesapeake City where we're due to take on crew, Sarah, our grandchild. Ann will do home schooling while she's with us on the leg to Titusville, FL. Then we'll return home for the holidays before continuing our trip south in January.