Thursday, March 16, 2017

Surprise!

The wind kicked up again last night, which was fine as long as it was with the current. Once the current was against the wind, Hold Fast danced around her anchor, sometimes at 1.2 knots. She would reach the end of her leash, then turn around and race to the other extreme. The holding is so good, it did not bother us at all. We slept well under all the blankets.

We woke up to temperatures in the 30's F with a wind chill to 26F. Slightly painful on the hands washing down anchor chain. I am glad we were able to delay our departure until after 9 am in order to make a noon opening of the Main Street Bridge. As we moved around to pull up anchor this morning, a security boat cruised by, protecting the security zone around the naval fuel depot island. They soon dismissed us, recognizing that we were just a harmless sailboat chasing our anchor chain in the current.

Myron checked in with the Main Street Bridge and put us on the list for the 12 noon opening. As we were leisurely riding the current toward the bridge, they called us and asked us if we could hurry and they would open early for us. Really? All we could figure was that commercial traffic was coming as well and the bridge did not want to open twice. We stepped on it and called the bridge when we had it in sight, checking in again when adjacent to Metro. As we approached, the bridge opened well before our arrival. That has NEVER happened. There was no commercial traffic in sight. Auto Paul was on Gretel and met up with us before the Main Street Bridge. We were going to have him board between Main Street and FEC RR since FEC RR was down, but as we cleared Main Street Bridge, the FEC RR Bridge opened. Bizarre. To what did we owe this VIP treatment? We shall never know.

Paul boarded and we towed Gretel and visited. Then we came up with a scheme to surprise Shari. We anchored Hold Fast here in Plummer's Cove, then all got aboard Gretel, went in for a late lunch. After lunch we paid a surprise visit to Shari and her mom. Mission accomplished!

The boat yard has scheduled us to haul out tomorrow. Is it too much to ask for VIP treatment two days in a row? One can only hope.

Love to all,
Dena

{GMST}30°11.61'N|081°38.49'W|5:34 PM|{GEND}

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