Captain's Choice blog: Delaware City to Cape May

Delaware City is usually used as a staging stop to get down Delaware Bay. It is located just off the C&D Canal that takes you from Chesapeake Bay to the Delaware River. It's a small town with a few restaurants, bike path and a park nearby. Depending on weather, you can be here 1 night to several nights. Our plan included a 4 night stop so that we could rent a car on Friday and drive to Mark's sisters house just outside of Philadelphia. We had a wonderful visit with his sister Marge, Bob, our niece Amy and great nephew Vinny. Being that Friday the 16th was our 39th wedding anniversary we stopped in at Kathy's Crab House for crab cakes...so good!

The Delaware City marina owner Tim gives a talk every night at 5 p.m. to go over the winds, currents, tides on Delaware Bay for the next day along with his local knowledge. Together with whichever boaters are leaving in the morning they come up with the best time to leave and optimal weather strategies. There are several different weather patterns that you go through and the bay opens to the Atlantic Ocean, so having a "predicted" weather update is essential. Depending on the winds and the crews "comfort level" you can be stuck for a few days in the marina waiting for so called perfect weather window. Although we weren't leaving Thursday morning we went to the meeting Wednesday night to observe. Nine sailboats were going to head out and after they heard all the weather reports they opted for a 5 a.m. departure. Due to us being a power boat and not a sail boat, Tim told us he would go over different strategies the night before we planned to leave. After we attended the meeting we headed over to Crabby Dick's for dinner with fellow loopers In Deep Ship.

Thursday was a relaxing day, I finished a book and Mark puttered around. We really don't get many days like that. Usually we are catching up on maintenance, cleaning, exploring...it was nice to not have any plans or "must do" items. Of course there were plenty of "should do" items and I decided I "should do" nothing.

I returned the rental car Friday after our trip to PA and Mark attended the 5 p.m. meeting along with 2 other boats (1 sail and 1 power). The wind forecast looked good, problem was t-storms were expected to develop overnight and possibly early morning. It was decided we would all leave at 6:45 as long as there wasn't a storm. We were up early, the thunderstorms did not materialize, but the skies opened up at 6:15 and it was a downpour. We weren't happy because we knew if we didn't leave Saturday we would be stuck there until Tuesday. Mark checked all the weather reports, winds were still suppose to remain around 7 knots and it looked like the rain was going to head north giving us a decent weather window to get "out of dodge." Sure enough the rain stopped around 6:45, the intended departure time, the sailboat behind said the new departure time was 7:10. We were ready, the rain stopped, we undid our lines and casted off by 7.
One of the things Tim told us was take advantage of good seas and fast boats should go fast, minimize your time on the bay. We were able to run 25 mph for the first 75 minutes and then the 7 knot winds that were predicted were actually 15 knots at Ship John Shoal. Thank goodness they weren't beam seas, as we were taking the waves on the bow. The problem was we had hurried and ended up getting caught in the tide going one direction and the winds increasing in the opposite direction which creates increased waves. We were getting pounded with 4-5 footers, occasional 6 footers...we slowed it right down and with the distance between the waves the ride was much better. Then we hit a fog bank...we decided at one point the visibility was maybe 120'...time to definitely trust your instrumentation and follow the USCG rules and sound your horn every 2 minutes to alert anyone in the area that we were there.
The total trip was 61 miles and with about 8 miles left the fog cleared, the winds died down and we could see land! We tied up at Utsch's Marina in Cape May at noon and got busy washing the salt off Captain's Choice. It was certainly a very interesting ride down the bay. We have also now gone from one of the sailing capitals, with sailboats everywhere to a fishing port with tons of fishing boats. The tuna are running right now and wow did we see them bring in some big ones!

Once we were settled in we contacted In Deep Ship, The Journey and Time Out who were staying at another marina about a mile away. They had planned a pot luck dinner and invited us to join them, which was delicious. We hadn't seen Time Out or The Journey in quite some time... I would see them behind us on the app and then suddenly they were ahead of us and then we were ahead of them. It was great to reconnect and celebrate the fact that The Journey crossed their wake and are now flying the gold looper flag! The Journey are fellow Lake Erie boaters from Ohio and we hope to see them on the lake once we have completed the loop.

The timing could not be more perfect for us to be in Cape May because one of Mark's friends, since they were 5 years old is on vacation just a few towns away from us. John and Alayne came to get us Sunday afternoon and take us back to the house they rented in Stone Harbor. This is a vacation destination for Alayne's family and about 40 cousins gather in different houses close by. We met her brother and family and several cousins and we are now known as "the boat people".
We tried to walk on the beach but the wind was just blasting us, we no longer need to go to a spa as our skin is totally exfoliated. We went back and sat on the upstairs deck enjoying the view and the company and a delicious father's day dinner. Thank you John and Alayne!

We got the bikes off the boat and set out to explore Cape May on Monday with the winds just as fierce as yesterday. We stopped by the beach, but it was useless to walk on it in the wind and looking at the waves we wonder just how long we will be here. We biked around the side streets to see some of the beautiful Victorian homes and then over to the main downtown area before heading back to the boat.

From here in Cape May we will be traveling in the Atlantic Ocean as the ICW is not recommended due to shoaling and shallow water. This calls for a big change in the current weather, we need the winds to die down so the ocean can flatten to something manageable. Right now we are looking at possibly Wednesday and maybe Thursday before we can leave. We will be watching the weather for the next window to head north towards NYC.