Overnight Sailing up to Solomons Island

After much needed rest in Hampton, and a great favor from Kate at the city dock who allowed us to borrow her car for provisioning, we were off and running again. Lasata made great time up the bay out of Hampton with most tacks running in excess of 4.5 knots. With favorable sailing conditions like that, we were not even thinking of stopping off to anchor overnight.

When conditions did slow, the timing was absolutely perfect for a quick dinner of Portabella mushroom caps, bed up like a cheese burgers. The crew absolutely loved them and were almost ready to come to blows over the last one. No, I didn't take it for myself; I made the command decision to offer it to the MVP of the team.

Passing Wolf Trap light, we were really starting to get into the groove for the night. Just a little informaiton on Wolf Trap Light, courtesy of Wikipedia; It got its name from the 1691 grounding of HMS Wolf, a British naval vessel engaged in enforcing the Navigation Act and in combating piracy. In 1821 a lightship was stationed at this spot, and after refurbishment in 1854, the original ship was destroyed by Confederate raiders in 1861 during the Civil War. Two years later a replacement ship was put on station.

So with dinner out of the way, John and I needed to prepare for a long night of sailing, so I put Mark on the helm for an extra day watch. Just before nodding off for a nap, I took the time to admire a sunset on the bay:

After the sunset, John and I set to the tasks of overnight sailing on the bay. There is something almost magical about being under full sail at night. The peace and magic lasted only just so long though. It was around 11PM we started hearing some frantic radio calls to a sailboat north of us who seemed to be headed directly in the path of a 1000 foot freighter. We had out suspicions who it might have been, but I decided to have a quick chat with the ship captain, to verify who he was seeing, and to let him know that we will make our course anything he requires, to keep us from being run over. We would continue the remainder of the night in nearly constant radio contact and on visual and Radar lookout watch.

So at approximately 7am, we made it to sunrise and our destination.

With that, we found the first place to anchor and dozed off to a well deserved nap before trying to dock at a strange marina.

I just realized; the sunset and sunrise look very similar, except they happened on two different sides of the boat.