This was our first day with Helen aboard. Our goal was Essex on the Connecticut River. We started by having breakfast in a local diner. I had the best ever omelet.
Leaving the seaport we had to wait at both bridges so our journey was initially quite slow. Heading out of the Mystic River Helen got to see the sights Bob and I saw the previous day. The whole area is very scenic and full of boats.
The current was behind us, winds were ahead of us. In this case, this made for an exciting day as the current gave us a good boost making our tacks into wind quite effective. We had an enjoyable sail. We included heading through “The Race” which is a notorious area where currents merge / diverge and depths change dramatically giving rise to very interesting surface conditions. This was a good first day for Helen – I don’t think she would have enjoyed our first few days.
Essex was a really quaint little town. We only had enough time to walk down the high street and eat. This was the first time we were on a mooring ball rather than a slip. Rather than use our own dinghy, we used the provided launch to get to shore and back to the boat. Helen had decided she wanted to stop somewhere for a full day. Quaint in Connecticut also means exclusive and expensive. It was nice to take a look around, the setting was very pretty but we decided not to stay in Essex.
Upon arriving back at the boat after our meal, I tried to start the outboard on the dinghy. I couldn’t. All I managed to do was to work up a sweat which I had to wash off using the shower on the boat.
Distance traveled day 6 was 34.3nm which took us 7 hours and 50 minutes.
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