Shuffled Off To Buffalo

And...we're off!  We left our dock just after 9:00 on Thursday, September 8. Jo-Ann and Craig And Alex and Kathy saw us off with a champagne and orange juice toast, and our dock neighbour John saw us off, too.  So nice!

We made it to Buffalo after travelling for over 280 nautical miles and 40 hours straight. To be eligible to participate in the ARC 1500 with the World Cruising Club, we needed to have done a 250 nautical mile non-stop passage on our boat with just us two. Done!

We took turns sleeping Thursday night while the other person was on watch. I didn't get much sleep so I was tired on Friday, but we kept going because we were in the middle of Lake Erie. It's a long and tedious passage to go that long without a break, but it was kind of neat travelling at night. We had a half moon and stars in the sky so we had some light that reflected on the water. We had to watch for freighters because they go the same route--right down the middle of the lake.

When we finally made it to Buffalo, at midnight, it was too late to get a dock so we tied up at the fuel dock, had a quick shower and went to bed. Finally!

Unfortunately, the next morning was a schmozzle!  I woke up with a ferocious headache that I couldn't shake and that made me nauseous. Plus, another boat had moved down to the fuel dock and wanted a fill up but they didn't open until 9:00. Then the fuel hose wouldn't reach either one of our boats, so we had to jockey the boats around, plus another boat came in to add to the mix. It was 11:30 by the time we had our slip assignment and fuel. And we hadn't had our coffee or anything to eat yet!  To top it all off, another boat was in our slip so we had to find a different one. Aaaarrrrggghhh!

Eventually, we went out for lunch and had a nap, so we're feeling better now. Tomorrow Jo and Craig are coming to help us take the sails down and we'll have the mast taken down on Monday at RCR Yachts. That's our wrap up for now.