Atlantic Highlands

 After bidding Johannah an emotional farewell I welcomed Ron back aboard. We had a really nice rousing sail down the bay to Atlantic Highlands. I am relearning the NOAA weather peoples style for forecasting the wind along the coast. They called for southerly winds of 5 to 10, all day. On the lake, this would translate to almost calm. So I assumed it would be 10 to 15 and bent on the working jib. But initially, for about an hour, we motored through the flotilla of commercial traffic. Hoisting sail finally, we tacked under the Verrazano Bridge. Simply sublime. We had the tide in our favor and fairly flew down the bay in spite of the wind being against us. The wind continued to build and I eventually had to put in a reef. At this point it was clearly blowing over 20, probably up to 25. As we neared our destination we were near a large ship terminal complex, with a ship tied up. There was a buoy that we were sailing by that proclaimed it to be a restricted area. As we passed we noticed some more writing on the other side. It said keep out and that lethal force was authorized. Ron and I decided not to loiter in the area and tacked immediately. We had a good nervous laugh about it. No idea what goes on there.

Today we got some fuel and a pumpout. Walked into town and came up with a solution for the failing inverter. And we might sail down the shore in the morning, depending on the weather. Cold front tonight, NW winds tomorrow.

All the best, Charlie