Sailing Buzzards Bay August 2017 - Onset to Cuttyhunk to Jamestown

Thursday.

We try to get going early so we have plenty of time to get to Cuttyhunk. Cuttyhunk is an adorable little island in Buzzards Bay but their moorings are first come first serve and there are only 46 of them in their inner harbor. And in high season (July and August) its VERY popular. We're doing pretty good at getting going until Lee can't find an expensive boat gizmo that he recently bought. It was on the nav station so he thinks he might have dropped it in the trash, which we threw out when we went in to walk the dogs. So in he goes again. Then Bob finds it, in one of the drawers in the nav station. Guess what? Lee doesn't have his phone! Bob tries whistling, which gets the attention of the dock manager, but not much else. So I hale the Marina on the radio. "Onset Marina, my husband is digging through your trash. Please tell him we found it!" I'm laughing as I say this, and before too long Lee is back on the boat.

We are making our way out of the  harbor and now I can't find my hat. I think maybe I left it in the Marina bathroom, but I'm not about to go back for it. I finally find it where my tidy husband had put it, under his ball cap on the bed. That's enough losing things for the day!

There is wind but it's died down a lot from last night, and we're sailing right into it. So we just motor, again. We promise our friends that we really may sail tomorrow when we head to Jamestown, maybe!

It's beautiful on Buzzards Bay this morning. The sky is blue blue with a few puffy clouds. Off in the distance, along the coast, there's a bank of fog. It's pretty far away but you never know what fog will decide to do. We turn the AIS on just in case. A few tendrils reach us but that's it.

Cuttyhunk lies sparkling in the sun, surrounded by sail and motorboats. There are mostly big boats in the outer harbor. We make our way through the narrow entrance to the inner harbor. It looks like the only free moorings are the private ones, but then someone helpfully points out a free town mooring, maybe the last open one.

We settle in, put up the grill, have hotdogs for lunch. Then we go in and walk around a little bit, let the dogs stretch their legs. It's such a beautiful island, but it's pretty hot so after an ice cream cone we head back to the boat to relax.

I decide to get in the water to cool off. It's chilly of course so I don't last long at all, but it's very refreshing, and once I've dried off it's great sitting under Lee's new shade contraption. It kept the rain off the boat a few days ago and now it's keeping us cool and shady.

While we are lazing around on the boat we see a really beautiful little boat, dark blue with a red interior, tooling around in the mooring field. In the boat, named Misty II, is a Westie! The boat makes no sound at all, its electric. It glides around the mooring field and then disappears from view. The Royal Westie, I whisper.

We take the dogs in for an evening walk and meet the Royal Westie and His owner. The Westie is 10 years old, very calm, polite and friendly. Like most Westies he loves seeing other dogs that look just like him. The owner is old school wealthy, friendly and reserved. We talk dogs and boats for a little while, the two great equalizers.

Friday.

In the morning we take our time since we only have to go about 24 miles to get to Jamestown. We decide to leave at the same time as at least 10 other boats, most of which are way bigger and fancier than us. And when we get out into Buzzards Bay there are a zillion boats heading the same direction, including Misty I. It's like a gd flotilla. There is still very little wind and what there is comes out of the south and so far does us no good at all.

We catch up to the flotilla once, and decide that maybe it's a regatta or maybe a race that isn't materializing. There's what looks like a committee boat so it's possible. And there's some big assed racing boats too. We pass them once, then later they pass us, as if they are looking for a better place to race. We never do figure out what's going on.

We head into Jamestown. It's nice, another typical coastal New England town. It's on an island, Connacicut, across Narragansett Bay from Newport. We couldn't get a mooring in Newport and it's just as well, they're crazy pricey.

I'm kind of tickled by the fact that we have sailed into another state, Rhode Island. All of our sailing so far has been in Massachussetts. It feels like some sort of achievement.

We eat eat dinner at Chophouse Charlie's. It's not fine dining, but our food is good. Bob and Beth get lobster rolls, a first for Beth. I get the lobster scampi and Lee got the jambalaya.