CS34 Cobourg to Whitby with stop in Port Darlington

No wind at all leaving the Cobourg harbor at around noon, and the forecast showed none for the next couple of days.

We just motored along at a comfortable RPM using autohelm. 

Working on this blog @ 6 knots
with Bogart the sailor dog at my feet

Very relaxing. FLAT water.  Don't think we have ever seen it this calm during the day.

Took an easy course past Peter Rock, and out a little further to make it past the bluffs before Newcastle.  We decided to duck into Bowmanville and anchor at the beach west of the channel.

Click for a larger version

Here is a good example of anchor scope.  We were in 10ft of water with a sand bottom.  I let out 30ft of chain for 3:1 scope, and we backed the boat up using reverse at idle until it stopped.  The anchor is laying on its side, and it is really 10-15 ft of chain along the bottom holding the boat.  It the wind was blowing, there were strong currents, or we were staying overnight,  I would have let out more scope (5:1 or 7:1) and really forced the anchor to set.  The boat didn't move at all!

We gave Rita's brother a call.  Lloyd, Nikki, and Cameron came out a little later and we picked them up with the dinghy at Bobby Cs.  Port Darlington is terribly shallow; big Still Time drafts 4.5ft and would not make it to the restaurant.  We even got stuck there with little Still Time that only drafts 3.5ft. 

Cameron got to drive the dinghy and did well:

We had to make two trips with the dinghy as we only had three life jackets, and the inflatable is only rated for 3 people or 475 lbs.  We used the handheld VHF to keep in touch.

Nikki went back and got Lloyd:

Cameron and I went for a swim; MAN it was COLD!!!  Temperature of the water was 16 degrees Celsius!  When we left it was close to 24!

I made some burgers on the propane stove with a frying pan because our rail BBQ died.
This was the last trace of frozen stuff in the freezer from our trip.

Just after sunset, we hoisted anchor and went into the channel and docked at Wiggers Custom Yachts, as they dredge the channel to 10ft to their service dock. 

Thanks guys, it was a really nice visit!

We backed out of the channel, as I didn't want to risk running aground turning around in the channel.  We stayed close to shore in 10ft of water slowly passing all the houses on West Cedar Beach Road.  Once we got past St Mary's Cement, set course outside of the Darlington GS intake area, and booked it to Whitby at close to 7 knots.  The moon was VERY bright making the trip that much better.

We got in at around 10:30pm.  John Berry and Frank Smith helped us dock.

Trip Odometer: 37.30 miles
Moving Average: 5.4 knots
Moving Time: 06:53:00

Stopped Time: 04:32:00  <--- was a nice break!!!

Google Earth Track: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/12535935/Still%20Time/2013/20130817.kmz