Demasted!!!

We left the Solomon's Thursday the 28th of October. The night before, there was a tornado warning for the area about 20 miles south of us. We only saw a bit of lightning and a few gusts of wind. The next morning Solomon's was cleared out because everyone took this opportunity of good weather to make some southward progress. We lead the way at 7am before sunrise and probably about 20 or so boats followed us out. We had a beautiful sunny day with light winds and small waves. We made good progress and made it to the Great Wicomico River which was about 40 miles by 4:30 pm. Just before entering the anchorage we saw about four dolphins which was really exciting. We anchored and watched a beautiful sunset. The winds picked up overnight and were howling the next day, we decided to hunker down and had a cosy day of reading and we started watching The Blue Planet (absolutely excellent show).

We left the following day and had a day of light winds. The creek we went into had a very narrow entrance and my parents went aground both on entering and exiting the next day. Sunday October 31, we had another long day of sailing. Good winds and large waves. It was quite rough for about half an hour, then the winds seemed to die down so much that we needed to put the motor on if we were going to make it before nightfall. We anchored in Back Creek. Not much civilization around, just the odd power boater driving by. We did not have a very exciting Halloween. No boats were anchored there other than ourselves. We brought over some decorated napkins for dinner and mom gave us a little bit of chocolate. We talked about getting dressed up, but nothing panned out.

Monday November 1st. We had an 8am start. Motored out of Back Creek. Winds NE 10-15 knots, waves 2-3 feet. We unfurled the jib and raised the mizzen sail. Sal had just gone below to change the batteries in the GPS, when what I originally thought that the jib had ripped...but then everything was falling down. Sal says that I covered my face protectively, all I remember is saying "Oh my God!" The mast had fallen down! We turned off the motor and i went up deck to inspect what had happened. We pulled the jib up from the water and wrapped the sail up so it wouldn't get caught on anything. From what I could tell, the pin holding the furling to the bowsprit had come out. We got the lines out of the water, turned around motored back the 3 miles to Back Creek. My poor mom had a fit when she saw that our mast was no longer in it's proper position. They met us and followed us in. We rafted up together and assessed the damages. As unfortunate as we seem to be, we have also be so lucky! No major damages, just a lost pin (connects the jib to the bowsprit), broken pin (that connects the boom to the mast), a hoop that guides the furling line back to the cockpit also ripped out and a telltale came off. Luckily the mast fell to the side and no one got hurt. It took us about 20 minutes to sort everything out and get the mast back up and everything secure. We left again and had an uneventful trip to the Hampton River, which is across from Norfolk, Virginia.

Back in civilization. We are anchored beside Hampton University. We blew up the dinghy and got a few things sorted and exhaused, had an early night sleep.

Today (Nov 2nd) We went ashore to Hampton and explored a little. We visited the Hampton History Museum and had a private tour of the history of this area. We then paid 1$ each and got to have a well needed shower. There are a lot of boats here especially Canadians. Many are waiting to leave on the Caribbean 1500, a rally heading for the British Virgin Islands that was scheduled to leave a while ago but got delayed because of Hurricane Thomas. They are planning to leave on Friday. We are going to stay another day and will leave Thursday morning. We will be entering the Intercoastal Waterway.