Barbara and I arrived at Ed’s condo around 10 AM as planned and after saying good bye to our respective wives Ed, Joe and I were off to the marina. We boarded Ed’s 31 foot sailboat around 11:00 AM and after removing the sail and windshield covers and unplugging from shore power we untied her from the dock and we were on our way. Ed let me steer out of the marina and out into the channel on the river, it is a section of the inter-coastal water way that runs up and down the east coast. On the map below the top pushpin is were we started and the bottom one was our goal to get out the Ponce Inlet and do some ocean sailing.
We motor sailed (that is running under power with at least one sail up) down the channel to Ponce Inlet. On the way we saw many dolphins and other wild life. When we got to the inlet the tide was going out and with the waves from the ocean coming in we were hitting some 5 to 6 foot swells, nothing that the boat could not handle. Captain Ed said that if the wind had been out of the east instead of the north we would not have even tried to get out the inlet. Once we got into the ocean we set a course of 050 degrees, set the auto pilot and enjoyed the peace and quite after we shut the engine off. We sailed along for about 40 minutes until one of the crew (me) started to turn a bit green so we turned around a bit early and headed back toward the inlet. Once we got back to the inlet and the boat stopped going up and down so much the crew member made a complete recovery (with out losing his lunch). On the way back through the inlet to the channel a coast guard boat was coming back in and slowed down so I could get a good picture. We tried to sail back up the channel but the wind was coming straight at us out of the north so it was just a boat ride all the way back. Once back at the slip we tied up the boat and then put the dingy on the foredeck. We were back at the condo around 17:30 (5:30 PM). I totally enjoyed the whole day, even with getting a bit sick, the next time I will remember to take some Dramamine before we set sail.
