The wind howled all night long. Later we heard people saying they saw gusts to 50 knots on their wind meters. That's why I don't have one, it would just scare me to know that. I like pretending the wind was lighter. When we got up the wind was nw 15 with gusts to 25 (NOAA). We left the mooring around 7:15 and rolled out a little Jenny. It was fine until we turned the corner of City Island where it was slightly ahead of us. It lightened up around Execution Rock ( love that name for a hazard) so we put a reef in the main and away we went.
   The motor had a strange odor to it this morning and so when I checked it out it turned out the alternator belt had burned up. Fortunately I had a spare which I threw right on.
    We cruised along with the wind on our beam and being pushed by the tide. About 3 miles outside Port Jefferson the wind lightened up and the waves were odd. The sails were flogging away so we dropped them and motored into Port Jeff. It must have been some sort of tidal rip. We turned left (west) just inside the entrance channel and anchored in about 25 feet of water. 37.5nm in 7:30.
    Met a couple of boats here. One from Milwaukee doing the great loop and another from Montreal. They keep their boat on Lake Champlain. It was pretty windy to start the night but it calmed down later. A good test for the new anchor which performed admirably.

June 14th.  It dawned a bright sunny day and the winds were still NW so we headed off across the sound around 7:30. Broad reach sailing!!! We had 10-15 knots of nw wind for about 20 miles before it dropped off. We bounced around for a while until it picked back up and we raced down the CT shore. It shifted SW so we gibed and broad reached again. 40 miles in 9 hours now that's sailing. We motored into the mouth of the CT River around a point into North Cove. We picked up a free mooring. This is a federally designated harbor of refuge so you can tie up to any mooring for free. However if the person renting that mooring comes back you are expected to move. The lines on the one I picked up were so shabby that I was positive no one had been on it in years.
    We dinghied in to the town dock and walked into Old Saybrook. This is a nice neat little town.
    One thing about ocean travel is the salt. It gets everywhere. The boat is covered in a layer of salt. The lines, dodger windows, even us are just encrusted with salt.

June 15th. It was a very quiet and still night. We left at 8:00 in order to catch the tide. And catch it we did. It swept us right down the sound. Of course the 10-15 SW wind right behind us helped. Around New London after gibbing a couple of times we rolled up the genny and went with the main alone. We hardly even slowed down and now we could go directly down wind.  We pulled into Stonington/ Westerly around 1:00 and anchored behind Napatree in about 5 feet of water. We walked on the beach and into Westerly where they have plenty of shops selling the same overpriced crap as everywhere else. We watched a fleet of Herrshoff 15s race. Had to move the boat into deeper water as we would have hit at low tide but holding is good everywhere in here. Finally switched water tanks to the bilge tank.
    One thing that I'm still having trouble getting used to is the pace of this life. You really have to slow down. If something is a mile away it takes 20 minutes to get there. 20 miles away is 5 hours. We've only been out two weeks so hopefully the adjustment is near.

June 16th.  After a very calm night we got up and walked down the beach again. Around 10:00 we hauled anchor and motored up the river to the Westerly Yacht Club. My brother-in-law John had arranged a slip for us for the weekend. The slips here are pilings and while everyone else is stern to we put in bow to. Mostly because this boat doesn't back up and we have never done this kind of dock before. We got plenty of advise from all the kibbutzers about how to tie her up. Anyway she's spider webbed in here.
    There was a big vote at the yacht club last night about whether to allow women members. It was all the talk on the docks. It was defeated!!?? It was a very calm day and we walked a ways down the road. My niece Emily stopped to visit with us before her sailing lesson.