Aboard Dignity (Lagoon 420) Blog

Looking at our itinerary, we opted to skip Clinton and head straight for Milford where we planned to stop 2 nights. The wind wasn’t strong enough to sail so we made a beeline for Milford on the engine leaving at 5:20am and arriving at 1:35pm.

We chose a slip at a marina closest to town. We had a walk around town in the afternoon. It was hot, humid and windless. We found a supermarket where we picked up more provisions. In the evening we ate at a Mexican restaurant close to the slip and had three margaritas each which went to our heads.

Distance traveled was 40.4nm in 8 hours 14 mins.

Our goal for today was to reach Mystic Seaport to meet up with Helen. This was a straight hop across the sound with a turn around Fisher Island to Mystic River. Not forgetting my errors with the currents of the previous day I double checked the plan for today. In the end we had terrific wind conditions which meant the current across our path of travel mattered little. We left our slip at 6:05am. On leaving the harbor we raised the sails and shot over the sound. We rounded Fisher Island nearly 2 hours before prediction which meant we could sail around the body of water between Connecticut and Fisher Island for a bit.

We eventually pulled down the sails and motored up the Mystic River. A week earlier, we had managed to arrange a slip in the Mystic Seaport itself, the old waterfront museum. This meant we had to get past a couple of draw bridges. The railway bridge was kept normally open which was passed pretty easily. The road bridge only opened at 40 minute past each hour. We had arrived over half an hour early so we took a temporary slip just in front of the bridge and stretched our legs.

When the bridge opened it was just a short trip to the seaport where we docked with the help of shore side staff. Bob and I had 30 minutes to clean up before Helen arrived where we did the best we could. Earlier I had showered down the toilet and had already given Bob instructions that if he used the head he had to clean it all again.

Neither Bob or I had shaved until this point. I told Bob that Helen would make me shave as almost the first thing she said.

I was quite pleased to see Helen. She remarked on my tan and then told me to shave.

That afternoon we explored the museum. I was fascinated by the old wooden ships. The museum itself tells the story of the Mystic of old which was a major center for shipbuilding and commerce. This has all gone now. The museum is a collection of old ships and buildings which have been moved to the one location.

The benefits of berthing in the museum is that you get automatic tickets to the museum both for when it is open and at night. It’s quite cool to have the old seaport to yourself in the evening.

Our goal for this day was to reach Shinnecock Bay, a distance of just under 18nm. We figured it wouldn’t take too long to cover this distance so we did not rush off in the morning.

I used this time in the morning to figure out how to use the alcohol stove. I poured in the fuel into the top, opened up the burner and put a light to it. I now had an inferno. What I should have done was to open the burner first so that the fuel would soak into the receptacle below. As a result of my actions, fuel had made it’s way all around the inside of the top of the stove and it was all now aflame. I felt quite glad at this point that I had bought a fire blanket. I got this out and chucked it over the stove. It reduced the flames but did not put them out. The stove got hotter and the blanket began to smolder. When I took it off, the flames whooshed up. I decided I had no choice but to use the fire extinguisher. Being a halon extinguisher, it worked very well. The fire was out. So was a lot of the oxygen on the boat so we had to open all windows and get on deck to breath.

Given that we bought Timeless to learn about living on boats, I learned some important lessons this morning. I’m now a big fan of halon and absolutely know how not to fuel an alcohol stove. I made a mental note to share this knowledge with Helen when she joined us.

In fact, both Bob and I were keeping in touch with our respective homes letting our wives know where we were, where we were heading and basically that we were safe. I reported my experience with the stove to Helen that day. I wonder what she thought.

Just after 11am we set off. Again motoring as the wind was still coming in from the north east and our movement was constrained by the channels we had to navigate.

We soon learned that we had to battle increasing headwinds and an ever present current pushing us the wrong way all the time. Our average speed would be little over 2.5 knots. We also had to deal with poor visibility, blinding and often painful rain and shallow depths. On two occasions we managed to hit bottom. In these cases, the fact that we were now experiencing the tail end of Cindy was a good thing as we had 2-3 foot waves in the waterway. These bobbed us off the sandbars we struck.

Our destination became quite a trial. Our marina was right inside the inlet from the ocean. We had 20 knot winds and over a 2 knot current. All of which conspired to make entering the marina, turning the boat into our slip and tying up a very difficult experience. Seeing all the million dollar plus sports fishing boat backed into their slips, I believed this is what we should do too. Turns out this is not easy at the best of times which is exactly what this wasn’t. We had a hell of a time trying to keep Timeless from tangling herself in the anchors hanging off the bows of the various expensive vessels there. In the end I had to fling a line round a pillar and use it as a pivot to reverse Timeless around through 90 degrees into her slip.

That night we had a very nice meal at the one and only restaurant by the marina. It would be nice because we were effectively in the Hamptons. We both had very nice steaks.

Distance covered day 3 was under 18 nm taking us 6 hours 40 minutes.