Getting rid of boat smells with a solar fan

I had diesel leak a few months back and even though I had it fixed, the boat smelt like diesel. West marine were having a sale on their nicro vents, down $85 from $185 so I bought a couple of them to replace the ones I bought through amazon and which lasted only a couple of months.

I installed the new ones and the smell dissapeared overnight. Here is a new one installed.

I am hoping that these new ones are a bit more robust than the last ones I bought and they ae supposed to have a 2 year warranty.

Replacing an old mainsail

On my way up north to New England back in July, I tore my mainsail. Now I had ripped it last year at this time in the Chesapeake and the loft told me then that I needed a new one. When I took my newly torn mainsail to a loft in Newport, RI, they told me it was not worth repairing. So I did a a search for a used one and found a pretty good match at Bacons Sails in Annapolis for $800. The trouble was, it was a light air one with just a 5 oz Dacron with no reef points. It did well on my sail down from up north but now it is being relegated to the "spare" category. I went ahead and ordered a new mainsail from Kerns in California for $2,700 and yesterday, I hoisted it for the first time.

It is a really good one but being new and stiff, my sail cover no longer covers it. I still have to organize some reefing lines for it and select some battens but other than that it is ready to go.

New York City to North Carolina

Before I set sail, I produced a float plan from Predict Wind and it ended up being a quite good description of my journey.

I more or less stuck as close to the coast as I could because I wanted to stay out of the gulf stream but also I wanted access to the internet to download the latest forcast to keep up with progress of tropical storm Erica. Here as an example is my first day run down the New Jersey coast in yellow.

I clocked roughly 110 miles each of the 4 days on my trip and you can see a short video of my journey here.

Manhasset Bay to the Statue of Liberty

I motored through NYC on the East River with the current, reaching 9 knots at times. Here is my track with the green line.

It was exciting being so close to downtown Manhattan. 

Right now I am anchored behind the Statue of Liberty and am looking forward to seeing the nighttime view of Manhattan especially the new Freedom Tower. Tomorrow I am headed down to North Carolina, and depending on the track of the storm Erika, will either go around Cape Hatteras or into the Chesapeake and down the ditch. I am hoping that this storm will dissappear over the next few days.

East Hampton to New York

I did another 24 hour sail this time to Port Washington in Manhasset Bay on the outskirts of NYC. My track is the yellow line.

I wanted a place to provision and stage my next hop to the Statue of Liberty through Hell's Gate on the East River where the tidal current is very strong.
I had a wonderful sail down Long Island Sound where I was able to goose wing the sails for quite some time.

Sunrise on the sound was surreal knowing that a huge city lay just around the corner.

And finally Execution Rock Lighthouse was the scene of many tragedies before it was built in 1850.

Nantucket to The Hamptons

Yesterday I set off at 3pm for Three Mile Harbor in New York and arrived today about the same time. The yellow line shows my path.

Hurricane Danny has developed in the Azores and as yet it's path cannot be predicted so I took advantage of a weather window to get me into Long Island Sound. I had a near perfect sail here with winds out of the SE of 5 to 15 knots.

Here was Nantucket as I was leaving.

This was sundown off of Matha's Vineyard.

Here is one of many houses that grace the foreshore of where I am anchored in East Hampton.

Martha's Vineyard to Nantucket

Had a beautiful 25 mile sail over here today. My track is the yellow line.

Winds were out of the SW and started at 9am around 5 knots increasing to 12 knots when I put the hook down at 3pm. Beautiful sunset here.

Here is a short video of my trip.