Picton to Kingston – Our best and worst sail so far
We left Picton at 6 am. Beautiful sunrise! The air was cool, but not so cool as to need long sleeves. Once again the wind was at our backs, so we were sailing with the wind. I don’t know how that keeps happening, downhill both ways? Our winds started out pretty light, but after we got out into the Adolphus Reach the wind picked up and the sailing was spectacular. Easy sailing on just the genoa and we were clipping along at 5.5 knots! Amazing.
We had several hours of wonderful sailing. When we got close to the channel between Simco Island and Amhurst Island, the winds started to pick up considerably. Crossing the channel the waves got big enough to get your attention. It was quite a ride and the biggest waves we have seen to date. We thought the waves would diminish as we entered Kingston Harbor, but boy were we wrong! The harbor was bedlam with a bunch of idiots out to brave the waves. Wind surfers, Kite surfers, mini sail boats, a ferry, a tour boat and a whole bunch of us trying to get OUT of the weather.
Two young, maybe 8-9 years old were out in a mini sail boat paddling with the sail up trying to turn the boat. They succeeded – right in front of us. We had to turn left and had to go between the ferry and the tour boat. We were ¼ mile away from each boat, so not up close and personal, but close enough people on the ferry were taking our picture. We were bucking the waves trying to roll our sail in, and trying to get a dock assignment all at the same time. It made for a pretty exciting few minutes.
We finally got inside the marina, got docked and breathed a big sigh of relief! The tour boat turned around and aborted their tour. Another bottle of Mike’s bit the dust. We tidied up the boat and went to get some lunch before the BIG storm hit.
The clouds were looking really dark, so we battened down and went below. Suddenly a gust of wind hit the side of the boat and heeled the boat quite a lot for sitting at the dock. Next thing we knew it was raining like crazy and it started to hail. The hail was the size of jaw breakers. The water looked like it was boiling at one point. I scrambled to get the camera but by the time I got it, the worst was over. I took a couple of pictures, then switched over to video mode. There was a huge flash of lighting followed immediately by really loud crack of thunder. I about jumped out of my skin! We’ll see how that video comes out!
Later in the evening, one of the boaters in the marina told us his wind speed indicator recorded 35 knot winds. We think the winds were about 25 knots when we were coming into port. One more for the record books!
It’s off to Gananoque tomorrow.
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