8. Baltimore to New York, May 2025

After two years we cast off. The feeling is immense. Excited, nervous, stuff is getting real.

We have spent almost two years in White Rocks Marina (https://whiterocksmarina.com/), in the water, on the hard, back in the water again. It supports owners doing their own work and it became my home away from home for the refit of Beyond. Can't recommend it highly enough.

Like I wrote in the previous log you never feel totally ready. There are still outstanding things on the list of work. And you have to leave anyway. Or you never will.

For me, the process is the big pieces, they have to be solid. Over simplifying, but the systems could be:

Sails and rigging.

Engine.

Navigation.

Steering.

And then, a couple of questions:

Are they solid? To the best of my ability to make them so and the best intent of the sea to break them?

Do I have back up systems? If (when) they break, what is my plan B? And C?

Do I have the ability to repair them? Tools, materials, spare parts?

Don't get me wrong. I am totally not totally on top of everything - one is not an engineer in terms of basic temperament - but in the background of my brain I am constantly, pretty much, going through these questions, system by system, and adding items into the to-do and shopping lists.

And all of that is theory. It is tested when you go to sea.

It's hard to describe the satisfaction of finally sailing after the work that we put into Beyond. So much of a big project, the motivation to keep pushing forward, is held together by your projecting and visualising what it will be like on that day in the distant future. The tedious sanding, the priming, undercoating, more sanding, topcoat, and the dirt, aching muscles, and the sheer tedium of days and weeks of manual labour, it's all worth it for a few hours of glorious broad-reach!

And I can see it on Cody's face. He is part of the project.

We drop anchor in a little creek, the Sassafras River, along the way. There is a charming town in there called Georgetown. We have an early night feeling quite pleased with ourselves.

One of many delights about North America is how close and accessible the great outdoors is. I grant you that my perspective here is that of sailing, but still, when you get five minutes off the freeway or out of town, you are surrounded by God's creation.

When I told people that I had bought a boat in Baltimore they instantly went "Gun crime capital of the USA! <shudder>". Yet, twenty minutes outside the city my boat was on a creek in which I saw a White Headed Eagle, fish jumping, literally a small patch of Eden.

Wherever you go there is life and beauty and it's all good. Pay no mind to the fear mongering.

The C&D (Chesapeake and Delaware) Canal was a bit of a non-event. It's amazingly impressive that it is a man-made canal, dug-out to connect Baltimore, Maryland and Virginia with the Atlantic through the Delaware River. But it's basically a straight run for some 14 miles which we basically motored as quickly as we could. Basically we don't love motoring.

The Delaware is a bit more industrial maybe but we still had the greatest sail down it. The boat heeled over, surged forward and while I was getting a bit nervous at the rail submerging (and things breaking), Cody was typical teenager going for speed records. His face was a picture. Young people are the greatest - their internal joy just paints instantly on the face with no filter.

It was a day and half to get to New York, so we decided to push through the night in shifts, each of us taking watches. I explained the basics in excruciating detail to my 17 year old and crashed for three hours or so.

When I woke up at midnight we were quite (see terrifyingly) close to the shore but I didn't say anything. He had skippered and done well.

I took over and let him sleep through the night. The engine was doing well, the weather was calm, navigation was straight forward, with a full moon we had great visibility, so all I had to do was take pictures.

Eventually we arrived at the entrance to New York waters and pulled into Sandy Hook, a classic staging port for sailors going to or coming from the Atlantic. It's a sandy spit that shields you from Atlantic fury. Excellent holding when you anchor. And we slept.

The next morning we make the big sail into New York. It's epic on another level.

We made a straight course for the Statue of Liberty. Having visited it several times in my life, getting there by ferry, I remember making a vow that one day I would sail around her on my own boat. In fact, the first time I visited with this Masonic landmark was in 1967 with my father. It's fitting that the boat, Beyond - that came through my inheritance from him - was the vehicle for this bucket list item.

I am sure he was with us to share in this day.

All good things have to come to an end and we left the Statue and the harbour behind, and head up the East River towards Hells Gate.