We were pretty sure that there would be no traveling today and, being as beat up as we were, we made no effort to get up and get going at first light. As I walked down the dock to the public head I got to looking at the sky. It was grey with a cloud train flowing right along the river, maybe a couple of thousand feet in the air, and in the same direction as we would be going if we left. Mmm...cloud trains usually mean some weather is inbound. But the direction of the wind wouldn't be a bad point of sail. If we didn't plan to go too far?
The dock at Little Current with a very large tow/barge going by.
When I got back to the boat, Deb was pouring over the weather forecasts including Windy, Pocket Gribs, and Weather Mate. Though they didn't align perfectly they all suggested that the rain showers wouldn't arrive for at least another four hours and any thunderstorms would be tomorrow's problem. The King's Point anchorage was 3+30 and 23.3 miles further along than where we were. It would be well protected from the incoming weather. Perhaps even better than the dock we were on. She suggested we think about going. I suggested we go. We have the departure routine down pat and First Light was pulling away from the wall a few minutes before 0800.
The ride was exactly what I expected it to be given the cloud train. Not perfect but smooth enough that the autopilot handled about half of the trip. It was cloudy with showers around. One caught up with us just as we entered the narrowest channel of the trip, which was about 0.75 NM from the anchorage. Not hard rain, just enough to be annoying. And it arrived without any wind. Out of the channel we made the 180 turn around King Point and into Cameron Bight. I slowed to a bare crawl into the Bight with Deb standing watch at the bow.
The information we had was that the sounding was questionable and there was the possibility of unmarked rocks. (Yes, she was out in the rain while I was up in the flybridge. But the canvas on our flybridge leaks like a screen. I got nearly as wet.)
We didn't see, or bump into, any unmarked rocks, though there were a couple that we avoided. We coasted about two thirds of the way in, dropped the hook, set it as hard as we could, and put out enough rode for the expected winds. It is likely we will not feel the winds much. There is only a single narrow slot of open water with nothing blocking the wind, and it lay on a heading nearly 180 degrees from where the hardest winds are forecasted to blow.
We are the only boat here. The rain is now steady and the visibility maybe a fuzzy mile or so. All indications are that we are the only boat within miles of here. Unless someone shows up in the next couple of hours, I suspect we will be the only boat here for however long it takes for the weather to pass. That looks like Monday at the earliest, more likely Tuesday. But today is now a travel day rather than a sitting day. And where we ended up sitting is both a very pretty place and isn't costing us any doubloons. Something that is hard to accomplish in today's world... unless you happen to love living on a boat.
It was just what I needed to get over the slog that was yesterday's living on a boat.
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