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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.

Figuring we may get better weather than the previous day and that we had made extra distance day 1, we decided to shoot for our Day 3 destination, Shinnecock Bay. To have a shot at this we had to leave really early. We therefore awoke at 3am and were moving by 3:19am.My 2.25 million candle torch came in handy. Bob was at the bow illuminating buoys as we approached them. I was using my GPS to navigate the channels using the information we learned from our passage into the inlet. The challenge with these areas is that sands shift and hence so do the channels. Therefore, not all the buoys are in the same position as the charts.

We left at low tide and as a consequence there was one point where the keel dragged through the mud on the bottom. Apart from this, we managed to exit the inlet pretty easily and headed out into the ocean.

The wind was stronger than the previous day but still coming from the north east which is where we wanted to go. Nevertheless, we put up the sails and made go for it.

The Atlantic Ocean gave us a tough time. At least it did me anyway. I think Bob was in his element. At one point I had an extreme urge to use the head. My bowels emptied in a big way. With the 4 foot ways and the bouncing of the boat it made quite a mess which I had to clear up. Being down below decks on a heeling and rocking boat before you get your sea legs is bad enough. Cleaning self and the bowl does not add to the fun. By the time I got back on deck I was feeling very bad and promptly heaved what was left inside me over the side. I had a good wretch which made me feel a bit better. But too much as I was sick again a little later.

By 7:30am we had covered nearly 18nm, 14nm from the mouth of the inlet and were over 7nm from the nearest land. The waves were getting into a rhythm which was killing our boa speed. We were down to 2 knots. Our straight line distance to our goal was 44nm which now looked untenable. Given that the tail end of hurricane Cindy was going to hit within 24 hours, we had to abandon this goal. Fire Island Inlet was about 8nm away, the next inlet was Moriches, a nasty one, over 30nm away. Long Island has an navigable inland waterway for much of the South side which now appeared to be our option to be sheltered from the worst of Cindy. Moriches was not on so we turned on the motor and ducked into the waterway at Fire Island inlet.

By 10:40am we had reached a marina called Captree Island Marina. It was really a base for party fishing boats. We were able to top up with fuel and have cheeseburgers for lunch. The fuel dock was more suited for much bigger, steel sided fishing boats rather than our little yacht. With my limited docking experience, I earned a couple of gouges on the side of the boat as I bought her up against the pilings.

At 12:02 we set off, motoring, along the inland waterway reaching Brookhaven by evening. At 6:38pm we pulled into Center Yacht club where we tied up in a slip for that evening. For dinner, we walked a mile and a half and had more burgers and fries at Wendy’s.

Total distance traveled day 2 was 56nm which we accomplished in just under 14 hours of travel.

We chose to kick off at a reasonable time on the first Wednesday (the 6th). Our plan was to reach Miramar Yacht Club which would have been a sail of 4 or 5 hours. Our thinking was that we were bound to forget one or two things and Miramar is in the middle of everything so we could stock up on anything we had missed and discovered along the way.

Bob and I drove the RYC getting there just before nine. We took quite a lot of stuff with us as we had all of our own clothes and bedding as well as Helen’s. It took two barrows to take our gear to the launch. The launch guy was quite helpful getting our gear on and off the boat which made things easier for us.

We didn’t spend any time sorting our stuff out initially; we just chucked it all below knowing we had plenty of time in the day to sort things out. We therefore were under way by 9:25am.

The wind was fairly light and coming right from the direction we wanted to travel so we motored. There was a lot of fog and mist so visibility wasn’t brilliant. We therefore didn’t get to see much. This stayed fairly constant all day so we motored all day. As a result we made good time and decided to make for a further port of call for that evening. We aimed for the second inlet along on the south shore of Long Island called Jones Inlet. This was a further 18 nautical miles and involved a 5nm trip up the inlet to find somewhere to stay.

That night we picked a place called Yachtsman’s Cove to moor. It looked like it had a lot of good facilities, which it didn’t, and it looked like it was in the center of things, which it wasn’t. That meant we had to use the dinghy to motor round to somewhere we could eat – 1.6nm each way. We ate at a pleasant place on the water called Otto’s Sea Grill. I had Alaskan Crab legs. Yum.

Not including our launch or dinghy ride, distance covered day 1 was 37.3nm which took 8 hours and 3 minutes.