August 14, 2022
Trip Summary:
Sunrise Shore Marina to Ballantyne's Cove
Total Distance of 62 nautical miles
Departed at 0915 hours, arrived at 2030 hours
Well, the good folks at the Sunrise Shore Marina, sure know how to make this old couple feel special. We will be forever grateful for the wonderful turnout for our departure. Sadly, Judy is still dealing with the lingering guilt of shoving off the dock at the exact moment one of her best friends arrived at the marina. Blame it on the lengthy repairs to the Barrachois Bridge.
In addition to our dock sendoff, sv Destiny and sv Scott Free Too escorted us out Tatamagouche Bay.
After a slight deviation to sail past some VIPs on Malagash Point, we set sail for Ballantyne's Cove, one of our favorite stops on the Strait. While we enjoyed a comfortable sail out of Tatamagouche Bay, the winds lightened and we motored sailed most of the way. We were treated to a spectacular sunset off of Cape George Point.
Cape George Point, Nova Scotia
All day we were receiving reports of squalls hitting Pugwash and Brule Point, however we experienced light winds and no rain for the duration of our trip. We learned that things got very bad in the evening. sv Second Wave, en route to Shediac, NB made an emergency stop in the middle of the night after getting hit with some extremely bad weather coming across George's Bay. We felt very fortunate to get in when we did.
Despite being a largely uneventful first day (always a good thing), there was one coincidence that will forever remain in our memory from that day.
We arrived in Ballantyne's at 8:30 pm, long after staff or local boaters had gone home. Luckily there was one lone sailor on the dock on board sv Eventide, en route back to Baddeck from Pictou. As we tied up, he asked "Is that a CS33...did it have the name Elizabeth M on it when you bought it?". Yes, we replied, why do you ask? "That used to be my brother's boat!!". Turns out, the only person in Ballantyne's Cove to catch our lines, was the brother of the guy we bought the boat from. What a treat!
sv Eventide V, a 1965 Pearson Alberg 35, skippered by Jean LaBrie
We spent the rest of night doing what sailors do, talking about boats, the work that needs to be done to their boats and sailing adventures that are in our futures. Jean's dream is to sail across the Atlantic to the Azores next year.
It's a small world in some ways and a very large one in others.
Truly a small world, amazing story.