Powell Cay, Abaco to Norfolk, VA, 99.9 hrs, 742 NM

Sylvianne is still off in Taiwan and we need to get north of Savannah by June 1.  Brother Dave & Brother Bill join me in Abaco.  May 21 at 7 am we weigh anchor at Powell Cay.  99.9 hours later we are tied up at Waterside Marina, downtown Norfolk, VA.

Great crossing and what a great crew!  Thanks guys.  We really got lucky. We had a good "window", got into the Gulf Stream and rode it north.  We ran mostly 1500-1600 RPM, 1.7-2.0 GPH, had ground speeds of up to 10kts at times.  We could have cut 6-7 hours off the crossing but we made such good time we rounded Hatteras late in the afternoon and that would have put us into the approaches to the Chesapeake at 3 am.  I was concerned about commercial traffic and some weather (T-Storms) so we slowed down and actually went back and forth off Virgina Beach, trying to dodge the squalls.  They caught us anyway. The squalls were gusty from all directions at 30-40kts with buckets of rain.  I was a bit anxious with zero visibility in the dark and the rain "blinding" our radar but we managed OK.  Really loved the AIS. More on that in the next post.  At about 4 am the weather cleared and we headed into the Chesapeake. No big deal, now that I have done it in the daylight, a night "entry" would be fine, as long as the radar and AIS are working!