LORD’S PRAYER LOG, Part 279:

Friday, July 04, 2003

Moored Dennis Point Wharf, Pubnico, NS

1100 The fog is quite thick this morning. Lord’s Prayer is underway; we will attempt to go out around Cape Sable today. Last night we considered getting underway in the wee hours of this morning to catch the tide at its optimum so that we might arrive at Shelburne in the daylight hours later today, but the wind forecast didn’t look favorable for that departure time. The distance to where we will turn to go around Cape Sable is about 25 nm (SSW of Pubnico) and the forecast last night was for strong headwinds during the night. At that time, light winds were forecast for later today, so we delayed. At 0400 this morning it was rainy and windy; and now the rain is stopped and the wind is under 5 kts so that seems to be in agreement with last night’s forecast, although the wind is now forecast to strengthen later today, so hopefully we’ve made a good decision on our departure time. We’ll see how the day develops, I guess! Anyway we decided to depart at this time, while the wind is light, rather than to wait for optimum current, which will occur about 3 hours later. As a result, we will be bucking the Fundian Current for a while – until it reverses around 1400. After we get around Cape Sable, we’ll be able to take up an ENE heading; we will decide then whether we’ll go to Shelburne or perhaps to Lockeport, which has more facilities, such as showers, laundromats and fuel (if our ETA’s are accurate, both these destinations would require us to anchor out until daylight arrives tomorrow). Or maybe we’ll sail right through the night tonight and go on to either Liverpool or Lunenburg.

1115 The fog thins a bit, allowing us to see the channel markers ahead.

1119 A lobster boat flies by our port side on a plane; it is a large boat and it’s impressive to see it moving so fast.

1142 The water surface is flat and smooth and the headwind is still less than 5 kts, which is good; the head current is also light at this location, although we expect it will get stronger as we approach the Cape; in any case we are presently moving along over the ground at 4.4 kts. The fog is very thick again; visibility is about 200’, but the fog isn’t dripping wet as it so often is in this area, which is interesting.

1231 As we pass abeam Johns Island Ledge off to port, the sea surface becomes a bit lumpier, the headwind strengthens to SW 5-8 kts, and the current is variable in swirls and eddies. We plan to pass about 3 nm off of Cape Sable today, as there are areas of rips and overfalls in the shoals off the Cape from the Fundian Current that we want to avoid.

1255 We get the mainsail up; the wind is now SW 7-8 kts and we can just keep the mainsail full on a new heading of about ESE. We continue running the engine making 5.3 kts through the water and 3.9 kts over the ground as we buck the last hour of the flood current.

1345 We transfer 12 gallons of fuel from deck jugs to the main tank, thereby bringing the internal fuel indication up to about 15/16ths, as best we can estimate from observance of the fluctuating needle; this presumably indicates that there is now about 28 gallons of fuel in the internal tank.

1434 We come to a southeasterly course and haul out the jib; the wind is on the starboard beam variable 6-10 kts.

1454 A ship, of evidently rather substantial size (judging from the radar return), passes about a quarter mile to port – unseen in the fog.

1510 We are south now of Cape Sable; we have decided to sail through the night and make for Lunenburg (a total distance of 120 nm from Pubnico); we should arrive, certainly after daybreak, and hopefully before noon tomorrow.

1530 The wind strengthens briefly to 15 kts and we shut the engine down, but it doesn’t last; soon it drops to less then 5 kts and we must get the engine going again.

1920 Another radar contact passes our port bow right-to-left at a quarter mile; the visibility is still negligible, so we are unable to identify the vessel.

2104 Sunset

2327 The wind is SW and has increased to 8-10 kts.

2359 Position: 43 36.658 N 64 46.441 W.

Saturday, July 05, 2003

Underway off the coast of Nova Scotia, bound for Lunenburg, NS

0030 We secure the engine and ease out the mainsail, which has been flattened in to damp the rolling; we’re now running before the wind at 3.5 kts. There’s a radar contact off to starboard at 0.6 nm; we can just see the loom of white lights in the fog over there, suggesting the visibility is a bit better and that perhaps the contact might be a large fishing boat.

0115 We rig the dual jib on the poles and flatten the mainsail back in to serve as a roll damper; our speed improves to 4.6 kts with the wind astern SW 10 kts.

0543 Sunrise

1125 East of Rose point we turn NNW and begin our entry to Lunenburg Harbor. As we make the turn, we douse the dual jib & poles and haul the jib out to starboard; we’re on a port beam reach. The wind is SSW 12-13 kts pushing us along at 5.4 kts.

1221 Passing Battery Point, we stow the jib, take a course up the harbor channel, and we start the engine.

1232 We turn into the wind and douse the mainsail.

1240 We pick up the pennant to Mooring #3 and secure it to our bow cleat; we are close to the Fisheries Museum of the Atlantic. Our position: 44 22.458 N 64 18.632 W, which is immediately adjacent to green channel marker E77 G2 Fl G. Water depth is 23 feet; the tide now is 6.4 ft above datum; the local rise and fall today is about 4.5 feet. We secure the engine with an accumulated time on the Hobbs meter of 140.5 hours. Our resettable log, which we reset at Sawyers Island upon arrival there (I forgot to reset it before leaving Cambridge this spring), now reads 369.1 nm; we have sailed 870 nm since leaving Cambridge, MD on 3 June.

            We have a good digital cellular signal here, which delights me; we have had a good digital signal at each place we have stopped in Nova Scotia since Yarmouth and we expect, based on our experience last summer, that we’ll have one until we pass east of Halifax; after that we expect the cellular signal to be analog, which will mean reduced email access except via the SeaWave/SSB/HF radio mode or shore based internet sites. We use the cellular when we can because it is the most economical form of email available to us.

            We plan to spend the next two nights here in Lunenburg.