Day Five of our Crossing!! If this is the first day you are reading… you might want to start at the beginning… Day One, Day Two, Day Three, and Day Four are all ready for you! Feel free to start there and come back!
Day Five (Wednesday): Let’s Sail!
Michelle: As the sun came up, we were giddy that in 24 hours we would be in Florida. The seas were calm, and we had about 5 – 8 kts of downwind. And clouds – yes! Between the breeze and the cloud-cover, it was definitely the nicest day on the boat thus far. Matt trouble-shooted our port shroud issue and determined it just needed some tightening, so for the first time in five days, we finally hoisted a sail for more than 10 minutes.
Matt: We sailed today! We had enough wind to rig Big Red the gennaker. Red is just a little bit larger than our Genoa but far better suited to light air.
Michelle: It was so nice to have a sail up! Not only for the way it catches the wind… but also the nice shade it provides the deck. Sitting out on deck was the best!
Since the winds were inconsistent (sometimes dipping to nothing, and then gusting back up again), we motor-sailed. We already had it in our heads that we would be in Florida by morning, so we were pretty eager to see land and make it safely to shore.
Matt: While the sail didn’t provide much of a difference in speed, maybe an extra half knot to knot, it was nice to have my favorite sail hoisted most of the day.
Since we caught a tuna the night before, we had sashimi for both lunch and dinner. We had so much tuna, I also threw one filet on the grill. Yum!
Michelle: When Matt caught the first tuna on Day Two, I was still recovering from sea sickness, so I missed out… but I made up for it this time… Man, it was sooooo goooood!!!!
Austin gobbled it up… that kid cracks me up. He won’t eat a hamburger, or hot dog, or mac & cheese, or any other “normal” kid food, but raw fish? No problem. He loves it!! Zach likes almost anything, so they both devoured the tuna. I had to fight my way in to make sure I got some.
Matt: The ability to have fresh fish this often will definitely spoil us.
Matt: We emptied the last of the diesel jerry cans into the belly tanks today. I hoped we would have enough fuel to make it to St. Petersburg by early morning. Calculations said we would, but it would be tight.
Michelle: Towards the end of the day, the wind just died completely. So, we pulled in the sail and kept motoring. There were some scattered storms on radar, but we managed to skirt around all of them.
Matt: We were expecting to see land around 7 am local time. Then we probably had another hour or two to the marina.
Night Watch #5: FLORIDA!!
Michelle: Well… we could already see Florida when it turned dark. Not actual land, of course… but the light pollution that filled the eastern sky. It was exciting to know that we were so close.
Night watch went by super fast. The cat and I played a fun game, where he would chill in the salon until I went up to the helm, and then he would escape to the deck. The breeze was so nice, I didn’t want to shut the front hatches, so I would lure him back with food. Then he’d act like he was content hanging out, and I would head back to the helm, and he would get up and wander off again.
I was antsy through my shift which started at 12:30 am. How many more miles? OMG, we are almost there!
Around 5:30 am, we approached an area on the chart called “Anchor Zone” about 13 nm from the channel entrance. Plus there were two things on the chart called “Obstructions” that I couldn’t see at all, and they were within 1 nm. I woke Matt up because I wanted another set of eyes to look for those obstructions and any ships that might be anchored that I couldn’t see. There weren’t any. (Matt told me the obstructions listed on the chart are underwater… so ships don’t anchor on top of them.)
About this time, Matt’s phone started dinging. HOLY COW!!! We were in cell phone range!!! For Matt’s phone. Not mine. (Same phone, purchased on the same day, with the same exact coverage, through the same company, but Matt had service. I had none. Seriously??)
As we got closer to the channel, the sun came up and we could see land! We did some math and it looked like we were going to be motoring in on fumes if we motored in. In fact, we might not make it to the marina with the fuel we had left. The wind was 10 kts, so Matt and I decided to throw up Big Red again, but this time we cut off the engines so we could sail our way into Tampa Bay.
Our last day of our trip turns out the be our best day of sailing… stay tuned for DAY SIX to see how we did, and how we spent our first night in St. Petersburg!