Edgartown, Martha's Vineyard 41°23.17’N, 070°29.69’W

My friend in New Zealand, Dion Nash, runs a water company called 420. He was working in New York recently, and among the general revelry, gave me a black T-shirt with the 420 logo on it. It's a great t-shirt and I have been wearing it a lot. Strangely, people keep coming up to me and somewhat furtively calling out 'yeah, 420!' It's happened enough to be of note, but I've had no idea why.

This confusion rivals a night when I went out in Los Angeles after work one Friday, and was having a few beers in a bar in Santa Monica. All night, hammered English men and women kept coming up and yelling "Gigsy!" at me in loud, wet, drunken voices, patting me on the back and the like. I just smiled politely - no idea what they were talking about. Only much, much later did one of them explain that somebody in their party thought I looked like Ryan Giggs. (who?)

But with the 420, somebody just enlightened me: 420 is the US Police Code for marijuana. As in "Roger that, Poncherello, we've got a 420" It's become sufficient a cult thing that you're supposed to spark up your Bob Hope at 420pm. Indeed April 20 (4/20) is National Pot Smoking Day, and you're supposed to smoke from 420am to 420pm.

Surely this bids pretty well for the launch of 420 in the US later this year! Nasher probably has a new 'flavour' in the works. Pass me the 420, I'm, like, sooo wasted man.

Edgartown, Martha's Vineyard 41°23.17’N, 070°29.69’W

Strangely, I woke up this morning at 5am. After 15 years of getting up early I promised myself that I would never EVER get up that early again. A beautiful day, so I single handed Bandit over to Edgartown, on the eastern side of Martha's Vineyard. Really fun sail, working to windward all day, and slowly carving higher and higher into the breeze before short tacking up the channel. Good fun, and my first proper day sailing alone on the boat.

The interesting thing about single handing is that interesting things happen that I suspect wouldn't occur if you were with others. A few miles out I spotted a huge, really fast looking racer with a massive sharply raked mast. It turned out to be Mass Transit, and I had a good chat with the owner, a New Yorker called Nick. Nick used to charter a schooner out of New York City. He moved to the Vineyard 12 years ago to work on the boat. He's still working on it, and hasn't been for a sail yet. You have to realise that I get cranky and frustrated when I have to work on something for ten minutes before going sailing, so this is a true labour of love. As my friend Tom Anglin pointed out 'Did you tell him he should just buy a big ol’ swan and he’ll be ready to go right away…?' Precisely. Although, deep down I suspect that's not the point.

In any case, a very good sailor, and a real enthusiast. I found the experience a bit troublesome, as I've been finding Bandit's 20,000 lbs and 43' a handful, and every safe trip feels like an epic adventure. She looked like a bath toy anchored next to his boat. When this ship is finally finished, it's going to go like a rocket. Nick invited me for dinner with his family, and we had a great time, talking sailing and boats, and hearing about Martha's Vineyard, and their attempts to prevent people building their 105' boats in the harbor! Here's a photo of Mass Transit. This doesn't do it justice, but the mast - which he built himself (built his own mast!) - is 150' above the water.

I just came rushing in the pitch black, zooming out of the harbor on my inflatable at full throttle, aiming for the anchor light, left burning at the top of the mast. The boat bounces and twists and splashes and flys into the night. Fun and exhilarating, with just a hint of madness!

Wind and Fish - Hyannis, MA 41°38.155’N, 070°15.794’W

There are two interesting disputes happening on the Cape.

The first is relatively new, and stems from Nantucket Sound's status as one of the most windy places in the US (which, in addition to its beauty, also explains all the sailboats). It's a proposal to build a windfarm, wind powered electric generating turbines, offshore in Nantucket Sound.

It's an interesting dilemma. Politically, the East Cost tends to be Democrat, and I think people, broadly speaking, have a tendency to support alternative energy, recognising that doing so may come at the expense of pure economics: that is, it's still not cheaper to generate electricity from a windfarm than to burn coal. On the other hand, there's some pretty fancy real-estate around here; Nantucket in particular, and people have paid a lot of loot for those ocean views. So there's some interesting tension between a desire to see alternative energy flourish, and 'not in my backyard'.

I bought some food this morning and the shopkeeper commented that 'they're the most Republican Democrats in the US round here'! I did laugh when the dockmaster was saying he was all for alternative energy, but he couldn't tolerate the noise the turbines would make (these things, if built, will be 15+ miles away).

Personally, having seen the windfarms in Spain, I think slowly turning turbines are quite beautiful.

The other dispute isn't new, it's at least 400 years old, and it relates to fishing. The New England coast is close to the Grand Banks (think 'The Perfect Storm'), historically one of the most abundant fishing grounds in the world. It was for this resource that America came up with the Exclusive Economic Zone, I believe at the time, a new concept in international law. I'm very conscious of the fishing boats here (their leaving in the morning rocks my bed from side to side). There's also many more than I would have expected - strange, I never noticed them from New York City! That's the problem: there's terrible overfishing, and the legislative response is killing an industry. I want to chat with some fisherman about it. For now, it's scallop season and the dredgers head out for 10 day voyages. Henry and I overheard a dredger on the VHF (listening Tom?) saying they had 18,000 lbs of scallop meat on board after 18 days "it's true us fishermen are well moneyed, but we're no good at doing anything good with it".

Hyannis, MA 41°38.155’N, 070°15.794’W

After four days of almost non-stop rain, suddenly today a moments respite. It hasn't lasted, but it has washed away my cabin fever. A big low pressure system is floating overhead - it's been causing this gale-like weather - but it's forecast to head NE to the Gulf of Maine, and a huge high-pressure system is coming in from the Great Lakes. It should bring a week of more of sunshine.

A few pictures here.

Hyannis, MA 41°38.155’N, 070°15.794’W

Slept in the saloon last night. I left the plotter on, and set an anchor alarm to go off should we drift more than 0.05nm. Despite the rising and falling howl of the wind through the rigging, and the rain pattering on the hatches above, I slept pretty well, and Bandit didn't move an inch. Today I recovered the two anchors I had over, and repositioned on the south-west side of Lewis Bay (Hyannis) in anticipation of a SW change. On that note, the weather forecasters around these parts are absolutely top-notch. Greg and I were able to snatch a forecast weather window to get back to the mainland from Nantucket, and did so on a ripping, fast sailing breeze, so we were nicely sheltered before the true ferocity of the storm came through. Thus far, the forecasts have been very accurate, and they certainly make life a lot easier. The forecast I am currently using (apart from that broadcast on the VHF radio) is here:

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/marine/zone/east/boxmz.htm

Select Nantucket Sound for the area that applies to us. But here it is:

OVERNIGHT
SW WINDS 10 TO 15 KT. GUSTS UP TO 20 KT AROUND
MIDNIGHT. SEAS 2 TO 4 FT. A CHANCE OF RAIN. PATCHY FOG. VSBY 1 TO 3
NM.

SUN
W WINDS 10 TO 15 KT. GUSTS UP TO 20 KT LATE. SEAS 3 TO 4 FT.
A CHANCE OF SHOWERS IN THE MORNING.

SUN NIGHT
W WINDS 10 TO 15 KT WITH GUSTS UP TO 20 KT...BECOMING
NW 5 TO 10 KT AFTER MIDNIGHT. SEAS 2 TO 4 FT. 

So pretty mellow from here on in. The only other item that may be of interest is the water temperature; the instruments suggest its 15.3C. I've had one swim of well over 0.001 of a second. This is only for contrast value later.

I also look at the synopsis, which you can find at:

http://weather.noaa.gov/pub/data/raw/fz/fznt21.kwbc.off.nt1.txt

NEW ENGLAND CONTINENTAL SHELF AND SLOPE WATERS FROM 25 NM
OFFSHORE TO THE HAGUE LINE...EXCEPT TO 1000 FM S OF NEW ENGLAND
ANZ080-200230-
400 PM EDT SAT MAY 19 2007
.SYNOPSIS FOR NEW ENGLAND WATERS...LOW PRES APPROACHING THE MAINE
COAST FROM THE E WILL DRIFT SW OVER NEW ENGLAND TONIGHT. THE LOW
AND ASSOCIATED COLD FRONT WILL THEN TRACK NE ACROSS THE WATERS
SUN INTO SUN NIGHT. HIGH PRES WILL BUILD SLOWLY SE TOWARD THE
AREA MON THROUGH THU. LOW PRES WILL DEVELOP TO THE SE OF THE AREA
BY THU.

To be honest, I don't really understand it, but I'm reading 'Weather Predicting Simplified' by Michael Carr (his idea of simplified, and mine, seem a Rossby wave apart) but I'm trying to work it out.

A Nantucket or Vineyard ferry just passed my stern. My current anchorage is about 50' from the channel, and these are big ferries! However, I'm flying and all-round white light - which signifies yacht at anchor - and rigged a radar reflector - so we should be pretty visible to them. While we're on the edge, this is also a mooring field for a number of boats, and we're not sticking out too much, so I think it's pretty safe. On that note, good night to you all. If you wake up to your bed rolling from side to side, go back to sleep: It's just the Grey Lady bound for Nantucket.

Hyannis, MA 41°38.155’N, 070°15.794’W

Greg left this morning in pouring rain and a howling breeze. I'll miss him: he's an excellent sailor, and one of the few people in the world I can enjoy being with in 43' x 12'. After he left I got a bit of a fright - Bandit is a handful in a strong breeze, consider 43' and 20'000 lbs. I re-anchored in Hyannis Harbor - sprinting from bow to stern - just north of Egg Island. After backing up on the anchor I went to work on one of the many maintenance projects. Next thing I heard a bump as we hit the bottom, and the boat had been blown down on the sand bar, dragging the anchor (which, it turned out, had a mouthful of weed). It was a rising tide, and with a kedge anchor to windward, I got it off, but it's left me unsettled all day. The weather is awful: howling wind gusting to 25 knts, cold - around 45F - and very heavy rain. I never sleep well on nights like this. Still, it's fun: I'm listening to the BBC World Service on my laptop as I bang out this note, drinking a cheeky glass of sauvignon blanc (avoiding the condensation drips from the hatch above me) and feeling much happier with life.

Nantucket

41°17.45’N, 070°05.37’W

Here are some photos of Nantucket. After Block Island, which I sailed to with Dad a few years ago, which we both thought was pretty tacky, Nantucket is great: tasteful, sophisticated and styly. This partly a function of very strict town planning (all houses must be clad in shingle, you can paint them one of only 8 colours). But it’s beautiful, and sufficiently far from the mainland to have a genuine island feel and culture (my fav bumper sticker: “welcome to Nantucket. Now go back to the Hamptons. Go, go now, really.”). I was disappointed to miss the whaling museum, it was closed the two days we were there, as Nantucket whalers accounted for, at one point, half the US whaling fleet, and they were common visitors to the South Pacific including New Zealand. The whalers captains’ houses show the wealth that was created, yet, like the internet more recently I suppose, the discovery of oil in Pennsylvania changed the dynamic completely, effectively ending the market for sperm whale oil for heat and lighting and the industry folded very quickly. Nantucket does still give you a glimpse into what it was like – even if you don’t get to the museum. BTW, I have a wonderful Nantucket navigation story to pass on when I have a moment to get it down…it will make you chuckle, and will give you a good feel for the robustness of your (historic, perhaps) Nantucker.

Very interesting place, and great to visit ahead of the tourist hordes. Later in the season it’s packed: it’s hard to get a mooring after June 21 and expensive as hell. We managed to get a slip for two days at $50/night….the usual rate when the season gets going is $214. We both had a good wander around the island as we waited for a SW blow to work its way through….and for once I brought my camera.

We’re now in Hyannis on Cape Cod, anchored not far from the Kennedy’s compound at Hyannisport, after a good romp over in a 20 knt Noreasterly, reaching with the boat surfing along at 7-8 knots. We short tacked up the harbor when the wind backed on us and left nice, even, satisfying lines on the chart plotter. It’s a beautiful spot, but we could do with an extra 30F in our back pocket; the breeze is still gusting into the 20s, now for the fourth consecutive day. We’ve been effectively alone on this trip – the only yacht out bar one this whole week – and we get VHF calls from the ferry boat captains as they fly past – but there’s something remote and stark and beautiful to it all, and very challenging sailing with strong winds and tricky currents; the summer is characterized by lighter wind and this is the most active waterway in the United States in season. Will be quite a contrast in a month or two! I guess it was winter when JFK commented “I always come back to the Cape and walk on the beach when I have a tough decision to make. I can think and be alone”.

Greg goes home tomorrow, and I’m going to hang out here. If there’s a calm, sunny day I’ll single-hand the boat to Edgartown, on Martha’s Vineyard (the only US place name I can think of with a possessive apostrophe) just for fun and a sail. It’s where Jaws was filmed, but it’s really a pretty spot where many of the Nantucket whaling captains retired. Around the corner, just 4 nm away, is Vineyard Haven, on Martha’s Vineyard, where we stopped on the way out a few days ago. We had dinner in the famous Black Dog Tavern (they sell an annual T-shirt that is very sought after among the cognoscenti – I noticed the 2006 ‘special edition’ was being disposed of for $10 so you know what’s coming your way this Christmas – but if you’re a young, East Coast groovester, and you see somebody wearing their The Black Dog T-Shirt, you can relax in the knowledge that “they’re one of us!”). I plan to get one (the 06, unless there’s a better deal on the 05). Greg, with whom I am sailing, is disgusted by the whole thing.

What’s even funnier, is that the Tavern, at Vineyard Haven, on Martha’s Vineyard doesn’t serve beer, the whole town is dry. We didn’t stay.

Here are the photos: http://picasaweb.google.com/FishesEddy/Nantucket?authkey=y00f8KCSSsA