Sailing from Chesapeake Bay 2022

After a super fun two week drive across the country, we made it to Mathews, VA where we stored While One over hurricane season. It was so great to see her well taken care of! Now the work begins. We had to get her ready for the roughly 800 nautical mile trip south to Ft Lauderdale.

✅ We cleaned her inside and out.

✅ We had to unpack and put away everything we brought from San Jose.

✅ We bought provisions.

✅ Stored our car in a storage unit until we make it back to Virginia next summer.

Then we waited for a few days. We finally had a small weather window to go down the bay to York River. We took that and now were tucked in nicely in a beautiful marina, York River Yacht Haven. We were very comfortable there, but were anxious to start sailing south. We hired a captain to help us with the first leg of the trip because we read horror stories of many ships (over 600) wreck passing Cape Hatteras. Hiring an experienced captain made sense to us since this was our very first time sailing south passed Hatteras. Every morning we would wake up and look at the weather forecasts from many sources. Big Hurricane was coming up the coast. Hurricane Nicole. So we waited. She finally passed, but Captain Joe said it still wasn’t the right winds and seas to pass Hatteras. So we waited… And waited… Seven days later, Captain Joe said we had a weather window! Yah! We were both so excited to finally set sail.

Two people from Capt. Joe’s team arrived Wednesday afternoon, Captain Scott and first mate Tom.

At 5am Thursday we left York River Yacht Haven. We had clear skies and following seas, and cold winds, brrrr! Most of the sail was smooth. We motor-sailed most of the day and took the sails down at sunset.

My shift was 8am-12pm and 8pm-midnight. That doesn’t sound hard, right? The morning shift was pretty easy. It was a smooth sail most of the day. The P.M. shift was hard for me. I couldn’t see distances well, so when I saw a light, I wasn’t sure really how far it was. I was constantly looking at the chart plotter, then up in all directions. There were lots of fishing boats that were going out at night and some weren’t on AIS. So, I vigilantly kept an eye out.

We passed Cape Hatteras at 1am! Phew! You would think from then on it was easy peasy, right? Nope! Right after Hatteras we entered the Gulf Stream on the nose. While One was flying through the Gulf Stream, but it felt like we were going through a washing machine. I was terrified! Captain Scott, looked around and basically said all is well and he’s going back to sleep. Ok, I thought, if he’s not worried, I’m not worried. Having a professional give the , ‘we’re fine’ nod, is all I needed.

We arrived in Beaufort, NC at 1pm Friday.

One of my favorite things about talking to sailors is hearing their “I almost died” stories. They all have them and it’s so fun to hear them retell their tales and hear how they heroically lived through them. Capt. Scott was no different. He had a great story delivering a sailboat through Norfolk. His story was definitely one of the best ones I’ve heard in a long time. Bridge Hits Boat. I loved it.

First overnight passage, in the books. It took us 32hours to sail from Yorkville, VA to Beaufort, NC. Easy Peasy! Thanks Capt Scott!