Woods Hole

One of the Cape Cod Canal bridges...Sagamore?

When people talk about wind against current and standing waves, what they are really talking about is rough stuff. We woke up early (again) on Friday to get through the Cape Cod Canal while the current was in our favor. Because no sailing is permitted in the Canal, we motored along in the grey fog. At the Canal sides, about every 100 feet there was a person fishing, miles of guys (didn't see any women fishing) standing on the shore casting and casting and casting. Didn't see anyone catch anything though.

As we exited the canal into Buzzards Bay, the wind was coming out of the southwest at 18 knots or so, right into our face. Because the current was still flowing through the Canal into the Bay, there was a pretty wicked chop. And standing waves.

For the uninitiated, standing waves are good-sized waves that stay pretty much in one spot as the wind pushes them forward and the current pushes back. It was pretty rough going for a while, some seas broke over the bow. A few broke over the dinghy on the bow. That's a lot of water crashing around on our girl Cupcake. (And once again, we left a hatch open. This time it was the forward hatch, under the dinghy. Collected plenty of water inside again. In our bedroom. We may have learned our lesson.)

Once we got past the big waves, we contended with a pretty bouncy ride from the Canal to Woods Hole. Fortunately our angle on the wind let us motorsail so we were able to cover some ground and get out of the mess relatively swiftly. Everyone aboard was very glad to enter the protected channel to Woods Hole where the sea settled right down.

The view from our mooring in Eel Pond, Woods Hole.

We caught the current well through the channel and made it to Woods Hole without any additional drama. Poached a mooring for an hour or so while we got ourselves organized, then went through the tiny little channel to Eel Pond where we are hanging on another obscenely expensive mooring. (Massachusetts, come on, give a sailor a break!)

Yesterday we got in touch with our Freeport friends Josh and Naomi Olins who are long-time Woods Hole summer residents. Josh gave us a quick tour of town, we went in to a Woods Hole Oceanographic lab where we saw some crazy fish in research tanks. Fish with legs, a mess of squid (technical term), urchins, dogfish, all sorts of stuff. No pictures. Why? Because we are still getting the hang of all the cruiser details.

After the lab we went to Josh & Naomi's house where we did some laundry. (Remember the wave? Salty sheets). And then spent a delightful afternoon at the beach. The water in Cape Cod Bay was 58 degrees (in Freeport it was closer to 68). But now it's in the 72 degree range. Fascinating. And we like the trend...warmer.

We were treated to a nice dinner ashore with three generations of Olins and then went to a lecture series held weekly at Woods Hole Oceanographic. This one was interesting for people holding PhDs in chemistry. For the rest of us, it was a competition to see who followed the drift of the talk longest. I fared poorly at maybe 10 minutes. But we all enjoyed hearing an enthusiastic and extremely intelligent expert speak about her research. (Don't ask me about electron transfer or ATP because beyond that, I really didn't even retain any of the terms.)

Then to bed. 

Today we will probably host Josh and Naomi aboard for lunch unless thunderstorms roll in. Then we will head to Hadley Harbor for a few days of relaxation at anchor while we figure out how to manage the next stage of the trip...long day to Montauk or break it up with a stop at Block Island.