Day 16
Begin: Great Chazy River (NY)
End: Burlington (VT)
Yesterday my parents arrived and we spent the night on the boat at the marina. We made plans of sailing to Burlington on Saturday and meeting up with Leila and her family for a picnic on Sunday at Valcour Island.
Day 16 started very early, we wanted to make it to Burlington by the end of the day, with time for my parents to go ashore. My parents who were still on real-world time and woke up before 6:00am much to my disliking. We got ready and headed out down the river into the lake.
We started sailing and there was a gentle breeze, which picked up as the day went on. It was a north breeze which meant that we flew the spinnaker for most of the day. The much over-sized spinnaker was perfect for this lighter air, as it kept the boat going at hull speed. We made our way south, and were eventually being passed by a 40′ Hunter that was running jib only, supported by the motor, properly named ‘Money Pit’. We talked with the owner at the marina the night before and he was heading to Burlington as well, this is my fathers’ new dream boat. We don’t have many boats this size on Oneida Lake.
We passed by the ferries and were one of the faster boats on the water due to our over-sized spinnaker. Once in the open water between Plattsburgh and Burlington the wind increased and we were making great time.
Clinton County Community College across from Valcore Island on Lake Champlain. Whiteface Mountain and the Adirondacks in the background.
We sailed into Burlington and headed to the docks. We saw an open slip and pulled into to see how this marina worked. We were greeted by a gentleman that said that this was a private slip and that we could use the 6 slips in front of the floating boathouse for free for no more than 30 minutes. This was a joke, there were dozens of boats waiting to use these slips, and moreover there were some slips reserved for the sailing races that were going on. Furthermore they had no docks for overnighting either. Very discouraging!
The Burlington Lighthouse on the north end of the break wall.
We decided that my parents would get off the boat and go into town while I go anchor the boat nearby. They would call me when they wanted to be picked up. They went and walked around while I anchored nearby, this worked out well and I met up with them later, again using a private slip as a place to pick them up. We anchored just south of the boathouse area, still behind the break wall for the night. This was a good sailing day, turned somewhat sour by the lack of docks at Burlington.
We watched some TV and headed to bed.