Cohansey Island - at anchor

Hoolie's beach - for some reason he was very interested in that patch of seaweed

This was a terrible day of travel. We started in good season but then ran into rain and then more rain and then more rain, etc. We do have an enclosed cockpit but the "genius" who designed the enclosure thought we needed to have a window over the helm station so we could see the sails. Such a design feature was not appreciated today when the window leaked. It's hard to get a good seal between canvass and a vinyl window when both are horizontal. The rain water would collect and then give the helmsperson a "surprise" when the boat rolled, a splash of water down the neck!

On top of that it was hard to see forward in the downpour and sure enough, we snagged a crab pot buoy that was attached to a toggle (a two piece affair with a rope between the buoys, great for trapping a propeller). Most of it came off but I'm sure there's some left attached so I called for a diver at our next stop at Utsch's Marina. We were referred to a diver that thought it was a real imposition to actually have to dive. He wanted $350 to get his toe wet and then he was on an hourly rate with the minimum charge being one hour! We about choked on that and said, "No thanks". We're used to the southerly rate of $40 to dive to fix a fouled prop or replace a zinc.

The boat behind us search around for awhile but finally decided to anchor near us as is often the case

Well, where to find a diver? I tried the local marine parts store that services the fishermen and he recommended a local guy that was currently in New York (what's he doing there?). He does live in the area and he'll meet us at the marina on Wednesday to remove whatever, if anything, is left on the prop for $100. Boats are expensive but not $350 expensive!

Coming into the anchorage is where I picked up the buoy. It was raining hard and I was having a hard time seeing anything. Ann and I heard the unwelcomed clunk of a buoy hit and feared the worse (go set the anchor before we drift into shallows). However, most of the buoy and line came off and we found we still had forward motion. So we anchored and placed calls. I very much doubt that everything came off, it's not been our experience in the past with encounters with lobster or crab buoys. With a long trip ahead of us to PYC still, we need maximum speed.

Tuesday is also not such a wonderful day so we'll leave at 7:00 am and try to get into Cape May by noon so we can get under the 55 ft bridges in the canal. There appears to be a very narrow window to reach Atlantic City on Wednesday afternoon before the weather closes in again with high winds and waves. If the window stays open, we'll depart for Atlantic City Wednesday around noon and wait for a window for New York.