Day 32
Travel Time:
2 hours
NM today: 16
NM total:
708
Locks today:
0
Locks total:
70
We left Big
Sound marina just after 11:00 heading for I didn’t know where. The night before we had talked about a few
options, and even the captain had not yet decided on our final destination when
we were pulling up our lines. We are
still hunting for the type of temporary cleats that we saw in Frying Pan Bay,
but we have not been able to find a store that stocks them. We stopped into the Home Hardware store
yesterday evening and asked them. The
person behind the counter said he had his for 20 years and had no idea where he
got them from. He suggested we go to Killbear
Marine where they have a marina and a good marine store.
Killbear
Marine was on our way so we decided to stop by for a peek. We did not find the cleats, but we did find
some oatmeal raisin cookies for Clark’s snacks.
We also used their washrooms to save a flush on the boat – hey every
little bit helps! We were not there long
and headed on our way.
Boaters talk
to each other on the VHF channel 14, so Clark scans that channel for talk as
well as the standard Ch 16. Today a lot
of chatter on ch. 14 centered on good and bad anchorages, so we listened
carefully. Regatta Bay came up several
times. We decided that since we had
heard so much about Regatta Bay from AGLCA members and the Canadian boaters
alike that we should poke our heads in and take a look see. I studied the charts to look for other
suggested areas we heard about on the radio.
I could not find two that were under heavy discussion, but as I perused
the charts I found both an Evelyn Island and a Clark Island – one for each of
us and reasonably near each other. How
about that!
With all the
clamor of how wonderful an anchorage Regatta Bay is, I expected a full
complement of boats and no room for us, but we found only a few boats and lots
of space for us. While looking around
for a place to drop anchor, a fellow boater yelled over that it was deeper on
the far side from her, so we wandered over there a met a very friendly man on a
sailboat who offered to row a stern line to the land and tie us up to a
tree. We accepted his gracious offer, so
with the bow anchored and the stern secured to land, we wouldn’t be going
anywhere.
 |
| Stern anchored to shore at Regatta Bay |
The water
depth is disconcerting here. If we look
down into the water and see bottom in NJ, we are in big trouble. We look down here and see rocks and weeds
below us, but the depth sounder tells us we have six feet of water to float
around in. Seeing big, big rocks below
the boat is unnerving to say the least.
 |
| Large rocks surrounding the boat at anchor |
The water
looked inviting to jump into until Clark took a reading and found the
temperature at surface level to be 67 degrees.
Surely it is a lot colder below the surface. We never went in for a dip but many boaters
around us did decide to go for a swim even with the cold water temperature. Given the setup of some of these vessels,
with anchor lines come out from all sides looking like a spider web, they must
come with the intent of staying for quite some time.
 |
| Each of these boats had about 8 anchor lines out to secure themselves in place |
I changed
into my bathing suit because I was too hot in my t-shirt and jeans, but I had
no interest in even dipping my toes in the cold water. While I sat around at my leisure, Clark
worked on solving the mystery of the foul odor we are noticing at the foot of
the stairs into the head / state room area.
He climbed down into the bilge to sniff around and tighten some hose
clamps to see if there was any apparent source of the smell. Nothing
obvious!
He continued
to investigate and suddenly declared that he was fairly certain he had found
the root of the problem. The sump pump
to remove waste water from the sink and shower in the head had stopped working,
so the used “gray” water was not being pumped out of the boat but was sitting
in the bilge becoming stagnant.
Ewwwww! He ended up cleaning out
the stale water with a sponge then taking the pump apart to see if he can rig a
fix. I just don’t get it at all, he gags
when changing a dirty diaper, but he can stick his nose and hands in that. Give me the dirty diaper job any day!!!
Ultimately
it turned out to be a bad switch. Try as
he might, Clark was unable to fix the pump with anything he had on board. It is a purely mechanical switch that turns
on when a float says the water is high and turns off when the water level
drops, but the mechanism to turn the switch on/off had rusted through and
fallen off. As a temporary solution
Clark ran a wire from a not-in-use circuit breaker he had in his parts bin down
to the chamber with the sump pump and wired it in (with my assistance). Now if we wash our hands or brush our teeth,
we have to turn on the sump pump beforehand.
Quite clever but not very sustainable.
We called
Killbear Marine Store and they have a Rule-a-matic float switch that we believe
will fit our needs. Looks like we’ll be
making a trip backwards by about 6 miles to go pick up the replacement part. As we understand it there is no better marine
facility for many miles ahead.
After we got
all the wires, tools, meters, and etc. put away, I was finally able to start
dinner around 7:30, and we ate at 8:30.
I played a little “alphabetty” on my phone which I am sadly addicted to
now. Before I knew it, it was time for
calling it a night. Weather reports are
only for one day ahead around here and even so not very accurate, so every day
begins as a mystery as we have to play it by ear as far as deciding where we
will stay the night.
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