Dawn Watch on America's Great Loop Adventure

 Long time posting. We went back to Texas for a week to see family and our attend the wedding of my best and oldest friend's daughter. It was great to be home.  From Pleasure Cove to Georgetown SC we stopped in some cool places: Annapolis was a treat. We toured the Naval Academy. And even went to church in their amazing Chapel, which is quite large and beautiful. The highlight was attending a crazy event called Slaughter on the Water, a tug of war between the towns of Eastport and Annapolis across 1300 feet of creek. Hilarious fun! We did two long but smooth trips south through the Chesapeake Bay stopping halfway in the east side town of Crisfield MD.  The marina manager, a state employee, gave us a tour of the town with some history stories for over an hour. Terrific service. We were there at the very end of their season and the only transient boat at the marina. Love to come back again. Next back to Portsmouth VA where we again stayed at the free boat basin.  We th...

  The Relive videos seem to be most popular. They are a quick way to see a few of the pictures and a beginning to end of a days journey. This blog tool has a cumbersome way to share each individual video. It will be quicker for all of us to add the Relive ap and join us Join me on Relive! https://www.relive.cc/invite?u=xdozvwx78r65yn&s=invite-tab Jim Brace

 Way behind on blogging our trip. This section had some epically bad situations, and memory making stops. We travelled from and to: Highlights: Martha's Vineyard is a really quaint place. We spent two nights on a mooring ball. As a huge fan of the movie Jaws it was great to see some of the spots where it was filmed. And, we took a bus up to Oak Bluff. The town has dozens of weirdly cute cottages as part of the Martha's Vineyard Camp Meeting Association. Next highlight was staying one night at the Mystic Seaport Museum Marina. With the transient dockage fee you get free access to the Seaport. We had been their earlier in the summer. Love this place. It is a great museum and working restoration boatyard. I used the drone to get a pretty cool view of the entire property that evening. Mystic Seaport We spent one night anchored right next to Ellis Island with an amazing view of Manhattan. Plus we got our picture taken in front of the Statue of Liberty. Final highlight is that we arr...

Stayed nearly a week in Boston. Main reason for the long stay was several rough days offshore. What an enjoyable city to visit. The history is amazing. Constitution Marina is within a short walk to the USS Constitution, Old Ironsides. It is a marvelous free visit. Then a walk up to the Bunker Hill Monument. A Park Ranger gives a history talk every hour that is worth listening to. Went to the oldest tavern in Mass. The Warren Tavern started in 1780. A short walk and subway ride got us to Fenway Park for a Sox game. On the train we met an Aggie couple, class of 77. Boston won that night but had a bad season. And yes, it was cold! Net we visited the Old North Church where the One if by Land Two if By Sea signal was sent to warn of the Red Coats assault. Another highlight was meeting my cousin Billy Brace's oldest son Bolden for dinner. Terrific young man, hope to see him again when we go up the Hudson next year. We had to wait around in Boston for the weather to calm down. Even then i...

  Being late September we decided to halt our northbound run. The furthest north we achieved was Boothbay Harbor. To get up to the highly recommended Bar Harbor would involve many days up, and back putting us at risk of northeasters. Well we are stuck in Boston due to that, but I digress. Our journey from Portland took us back down the coast stopping in different places than the way up. First Stop was Portsmouth. We stayed in the nearby Maine town of Kittery on a mooring ball. The first day was rain, all day so stuck on the boat. The second day was wind, 30+, all day so stuck on the boat. Finally Saturday it was decent enough to launch the dinghy and run over to Portsmouth NH. It's a nice historical town, very walkable. The town docks normally charge $4/hr, even for dinghy's but the dockmaster let us off the hook--off season travel has its benefits. The town was having a maritime folk festival so we heard some cool sea chanty singing at a couple spots.  On Sunday we toured the...

 Second time with visitors. Tim and Lisa Allen came up, meeting us in Portland Maine. They wanted some nature, not necessarily city tours. So, the day after they arrived we shoved off to explore some of Maine's Casco Bay between Portland and Boothbay Harbor. The run to Boothbay was about six hours and pretty lumpy with swells still from Hurricane Earl. The new crew did not have their sea-legs yet so they had some adjusting to do. We arrived in the beautiful Maine town of Boothbay Harbor. It is still a working fishing town. It seems that every fishing town has this slogan: "___, a drinking town with a fishing problem".  But, beyond fishing the town is all tourist. But not in a bad way. Very pretty houses, lanes, hills. The trees haven't yet started to turn color but it is coming. Tour busses and small cruise ships fill up the town during the day. very friendly people. Our original plan was only one night there but a very strong NW wind kept us tied up for two days. Her...

  We pulled into Plymouth after running the boat up on plane to miss a very ominous storm. Turns out the storm just skirted Plymouth. The next day was rainy all day so we just relaxed on the boat. Wednesday and Thursday we tourist days. We saw a few local sites including Plymouth Rock and the recreation Mayflower II. Very nicely done. Then we went to the Plymouth Patuxet living history recreation of the original Pilgrim village. The staff acting in character did a great job demonstrating life in the 1600’s. Had a couple very expensive and disappointing lobster rolls. Hope things get better on that front in Maine. We were still trying to push up to Portland ME to see Tim and Lisa. So, a one night visit to Boston. We will definitely go back to Boston, but possibly not on the boat. Next run up to Gloucester MA. Another one night stay. Went on a mooring ball right in the center of the busy harbor. Had a drink at the Crow’s Nest Bar. That was were the fishermen hung out, and still h...

  True story. If too long, glance at the Tips at least. Part One, Why do I make bad decisions when I’m tired? After a long day touring around Newport Rhode Island we were looking forward to a nice evening sundowner rest before an early departure. Since we were leaving early I did an engine room check: Oil, coolant, general overview, and check/cleaned the four strainers. All good. Fired up the gen and hoped to relax. After 15 minutes or so the generator abruptly stopped. I was pretty sure the intake clogged with something floating in the harbor, which turned out true. This is where clear thinking started to breakdown after two nice but tiring days in town. I tried to back flush the generator water intake to no success, wasting a bunch of our low water supply. With the strainer open and valve open, no water flowed. I looked around the boat for something like stiff wire to push down the pipe from strainer to seacock finding only an unused coax cable. But could not get it very far,...

  Teaching Dawn to drive the boat. We left Port Jefferson NY 8/29/22 headed on a long run up to Noank CT. Long in the boating world is 66 miles for 8 hours. The reason for Noank was to stay three nights and see: The Mystic Seaport Museum Mystic Seaport Museum   and the US Submarine Museum Submarine Museum . Both very well done. Especially the Seaport. I had been there back when I was around 16 or so. Excellent visits. We also got a really nice pizza at  Mystic Pizza . Remember  the movie ? Really good pizza, very different than NY style. Next stop the famous Newport RI. Famous for Gilded Age mansions and yachting. The place was amazing. While I don't mind wealth, the uber wealth of those bygone days, as well as today has a ring of serious problems. I agree with  Mark Twain . The Breakers Mansion made me laugh at the gaudy classless excess of Vanderbilt.  Before leaving there was an issue with the generator. See the separate blog post about that. It was writ...

 Hi family and friends. We are back on the Dawn Watch after spending three HOT weeks back in Texas. Great to see the family and play with the grandkids. While we were away I had the marina in Port Washington do some much needed maintenance.  We got back to the boat last week on 8/17. The yard still had some things to do so we just hung out relaxing. Went to the Bible Church in town with our new friends the Youngbloods. We think we gave them the Looping bug after seeing our boat. Yesterday we made the run over to the cool little tourist town of Port Jefferson. On the way in the harbor another boat, same model as ours, came in behind and shared this pic on Facebook Staying here till Monday to enjoy the Sunday Farmer's Market. Then on east. We are planning on meeting Dawn's brother Tim and wife Lisa in Portland Maine in a few weeks, but first, several stops on the way. Bought a new drone-DJI Mini 3 Pro. Really fun to fly but very scared of flying over water. Here's the first a...

  We really enjoyed a few days on a mooring ball in Port Washington. Nice little town. On demand water taxi will take you to several docks around the bay-restaurants (all closed on Mon/Tues!), a dock close to shopping, and a town dock. We even found a nice little church to attend--The Bible Church Port Washington. Met a really nice fellow-Glen, who helped us out. He is also a boater and wants to reach out and help transient boaters. I gave him a few ideas. We did a short run over to anchor in Oyster Bay and get cheapest in the area fuel. Didn't do much there but we need to come back to see Sagamore Hill, Teddy Roosevelt's home. We then popped over to the Connecticut side and anchored by Calf Island. really pretty area. The dinghy had developed a couple slow leaks that I could not track down. The next stop, back to Port Washington. I had made arrangements to have the boat hauled and worked on rather than just pay for three weeks dockage. Much needed repairs, cleaning and mainten...

  We had a terrific time in The City with Sarah and Zach. So glad everyone was able to pull it off. It is difficult to schedule a time and a place while cruising.  We walked and rode rental bikes. Did a food tour. Went to Top of the Rock. Saw The Music Man. And the 9-11 Museum, a must see. Photos link Pics See where we are two ways Marine traffic (sometimes we don't show up) on Marine Traffic Nebo location Nebo location Some new Relive vids Walking Manhattan to Manhasset Bay Latest Nebo logs here Nebo

  Our journey to NYC. From Cape May NJ to Atlantic City NJ was an offshore trip. Then we spent a couple days in Atlantic City waiting for a decent offshore weather window. We HAD to get to NYC to meet Sarah and Zach. Well, the offshore weather was dicey all week. We (I) picked a window and out we went on 7/8. Tide was going out and the sea swells were coming in to the inlet at Atlantic City. Wow! There were some huge waves. Once out of the inlet we turned north for the 90 plus mile run. The sea swells were at least 8 footers coming at us from the starboard stern thus rolling under and past us. This is far from fun but the situation was forecast to improve a little which it did. I drove the entire time with the autopilot doing the steering. The less experienced crew went back to bed. Thank goodness for my offshore supply boat experience?? Maybe a little too bold. But we had a schedule and made it to anchorage safely. They say the boat can usually take more than the crew can. We were...