A Stiff Breeze

A stiff breeze can change a relaxing summer cruise into a challenging dilemma. Just getting out of a slip is froth with uncertainty. We arrived back to Maryland on Wednesday with plans to go cruising for a few days. Since we arrived in another heat alert, it was decided to defer leaving until it “cooled”. That, as it turn out, meant waiting until Sunday.

The cool arrived Sunday along with a 15 to 20 knots breeze from the NW. There were small craft warning on the surrounding waters but in these protected areas off the large bay, it is not a concern. So, it was time to leave, but the wind had Carrie Rose pinned in her slip, which is pointed west and open to the NW.

I proceeded to get the boat ready to leave all the while thinking we would be lucky to get out without colliding with the boat east of us or smacking the already abused dingy into a piling, or both.

I have gained enough experience that I know I should not repress feelings of dread. With this in mind, I walked from the foredeck with the wind rustling my almost nonexistent hair, through the pilothouse door and down into the saloon where Charlotte was cleaning up.

“I don’t think we should leave,” I said in a wimpy voice. To which she replied, “Well, we are only going 10 miles . . . we can wait”, adding, “When is the wind suppose to die down”? “Four”, I said. “Oh”, she said, and so we waited most of the day.

That Sunday (9/11) was the first day we were able to relax on the boat with the windows open for almost the entire summer. The stiff breeze brought with it less humidity and a high thin layer of clouds to shade us from the open sun.

As I sat reading, two guys on a large powerboat a few slips to our north prepared to leave and then spent the afternoon puttering around on the bow of their boat. A couple that had spent the night on their sailboat loaded up what looked like most of their processions and sauntered off. Just then, another sailboat came motoring in with its headsail in tatters.

Charlotte had started to draw this year’s holiday card, which she hopes to print using a woodblock she will carve from the drawing, and I began to write this. It was a day spent on the water listening to the wind howl in the rigging and wavelets smack into the side of the boat.



The wind calmed down as the last bank of clouds passed over us. We eventually left at three in the afternoon. It was 9.5 nautical miles southeast across Eastern Bay to where we anchored in Shaw Bay (N38 51.326’, W076 11.156’). It is deeper than most anchorages around here. I let loose 65 feet of chain to get the proper anchoring 4:1 ratio in 17 feet of water. The wind picked up a bit making the boat hobbyhorse, and at 5AM, a crabber arrived with lights blazing and started to circumnavigate the bay for the next 8 hours.



There is a saying in Chado — the Way of Tea — One Meeting, One Time. It means what it says, though there are many variations on its theme. This day only happens once, best not to ignore it, even if there is a stiff breeze.