27-May-23
Bordentown Yacht Club - Delaware City DE

• Start 7:55 AM
• End 2:20 PM
• Underway 6:30
• Distance 62 Miles
• Total Miles on Trip 62
• Avg Speed 9.5 Knots
• Weather - Partly Cloudy, 56 Degrees, No WInd

We pulled our lines at 7:55am, five minutes before our planned departure time of 8:00am. Our departure was planned to take advantage of the tide. Whenever possible we like to travel with the current, to save time and fuel. High tide was at 9:00 am, and by leaving an hour before high tide, we would have the outgoing tide at our back for most of the trip. We started out traveling at 8 knots, and when the tide did turn, we were boosted to about 10 knots. If we had an incoming tide, it would have slowed us down to 6 knots. (Or we would have had to increase the throttle and fuel consumption) One thing we did learn on out Great Loop Trip, was to conserve fuel whenever possible.

The trip to Delaware City was calm and uneventful. There was very little traffic on the river almost no debris. We did pass a boater that was doing the Great Loop and heading to Philadelphia. Unfortunately very few loopers venture north to Philly. A big reason for this is the lack of dock space in Philadelphia. Since they closed Philadelphia Marine Center, transient dockage is very limited.

One disadvantage of following the outgoing tide is that we arrived at Delaware City at low tide. The water coming into the canal is very shallow, while we did not hit bottom, the depth finder stopped reading the bottom depth and we churned up a lot of mud.

After docking the boat, and getting everything settled, we found not only where there plenty of loopers on the dock, we Barb & Joey from Harbor Lights Yacht Club, were there with several other boats. It is always fun running into friends when traveling.

At 4pm, we headed up to the marina office for Tim's famous Delaware Bay briefing. While I am very familiar with the bay it is always fun to hear Tim's briefing and meet other loopers. Tomorrow we have another 8:00am departure planned to follow the tide down the bay.