Ivy at the Helm

A moment I want to forever remember:

Leaving Peddocks to make our way back home, late in the evening. We had the perfect weather - a bit of chill in the air, *finally*. Ivy had just curled into the Ergo for her nap. She scratched at the strap around my waist with her little hand. *scritch scratch scritch scratch* and then was fast asleep.


I clipped the GPS to the ergo to have easy access - we were leaving the anchorage and I didn't want to suddenly run aground. Justin was forward at the bow, pulling the rocna out of the thick, black mud. The dinghy trailed behind us. Willie was already hiding in the v-berth, shivering and shedding from the fright of his home moving.

Having Ivy around definitely made things harder, and an extra set of hands would have come in handy a few times while we were out, but it was good to see that we were capable of handling the boat even if I was mostly incapacitated.

The sail home was quiet and peaceful and the wind was perfect. It was nice to finally be out sailing, but we weren't sad that it hadn't happened earlier in the year and we won't be too upset if it's the only sail of the season.

Our Sail of the Summer

Well, we did it! We finally took Madrigal out for a sail.

Infants definitely make things much more challenging, but it can be done and we proved it!

We went to Peddocks and met friends. They rafted up together and we chose to anchor separately, close by. We hung out with them, grilled, etc. It was great seeing everyone again - Mark will be heading south to the Carolinas in a few weeks and we learned that Mike will be sailing with him, then going to school down in Florida. This will make for an entirely different scene at Constitution Marina this year, and our good friends will be missed.


We had planned on staying out two nights, but learned that Peddocks has changed greatly. Signs litter the shoreline - "No Trespassing: Police Take Notice". And take notice they did. Thankfully they didn't bother us and we were able to get Willie to shore without anyone noticing, but they were out and about with the boats, stopping people who were close to shore.

It's really upsetting to see our favorite gem of Boston closed off to the public. Earlier in the year, I had heard that they were destroying some of the buildings on the island in order to create a campground. The news was published in the Boston Globe just a few days before it happened, so there was no chance that any action could have been taken to stop such a thing from happening. Instead we tried to take the news as a good thing - more people would get to visit the island and see what a wonderful place it was. But instead, it has come to this. To go to Peddocks, you must (apparently) have to pay to take a ferry, then pay to stay in the campground. I'd like to hope that this is not true and that we will get to visit the island again with our boat without fear of getting ticketed, but the array of signs has me assuming the worst. And even if we can visit it again, how much of it will be left? How much has the campground changed the island? How much destruction has taken place? How many buildings were left standing, and how did they change those buildings in order to allow camping to take place? I can only guess that Peddocks is a very different place than it was just a year ago, and that's a hard change for me to accept.

The Fury of Storms

Why is it that no one is ever satisfied with a storm? Either the storm is "too small" or "too big", but rarely is it the perfect amount of fury mixed with little damage to satisfy a crowd.

Hurricane Irene turned into a tropical storm before she reached the Boston area. The night before the storm, everyone was "hoping for the best". But after many many hours of preparation, I suppose people are hoping for a little bit of weather to prove that their hard work paid off.



Our spot at Thayer's Landing seemed to be quite protected - more so than our friends in Winthrop and Boston who were battered a bit more than us (although I did find out later that Weymouth did see a fair bit of tree damage).



We stayed at Jeff's house and spent much of the day out on the porch, waiting to see the gust that would make our hearts race. Had the boats not been prepared, the amount of wind that we had seen may have done more damage. Jeff's docks may not have held up so well had the majority of the boats not hauled out. With the low profile of our sailboat, we were able to stay in the water with being less of a threat to the integrity of the docks. Our boat was one of the few to stay in the water at Thayer's Landing. Other marinas who did little preparing saw more dock damage - we saw none. But without that preparation, Madrigal may have hit the docks as she heeled with the wind. Our things on deck could have been easily picked up by the wind and thrown into the water had they not been stowed.

We heeled a bit.

Ivy entertains us all.

Both north and south of us saw far worse damage - New Hampshire and Vermont were hit very hard, as were places on the Cape.

We were lucky. So lucky in fact, that we even attempted (and failed) to fly a kite.


I'm glad we made it out of the storm safely with no boat damage. Both Madrigal and Creeky were fine. I'd be lying if I didn't say that I was hoping to see a bit more weather, but I'm thankful that we aren't dealing with a terrible aftermath. Many people are still without power and many are still dealing with downed trees and flooding. A boat sank in Winthrop and quite a few boats were ripped from their moorings and slammed against the rocks. I'll take our undamaged and "boring" view of the storm over that outcome any day.