Day Six

My Last Day!

This whole day the sailing was amazing! Every minute of it savored! The weather that day was crazy great and so was the wind; well except that it was slightly on the nose again. Not caring! Erie Yacht Club was getting closer, and there were dreams of showering! 😝

Getting Closer to Erie!

Feeling great and sailing fast. I re-adjusted my course on the GPS and just kept tacking. I remember being a tiny bit worried about getting too close to shore, but that ended up being no problem. That worry about getting too close to shore ended up causing some of those extra tacks; but it was just so nice out! Blue sky, no humidity, and perfect wind!

Pennsylvania Shoreline as seen from my view!

Everything seemed great, well except for the slight anxiety that began building upon realizing my need to cross the line and finish in the right spot! Finishing in the wrong spot and getting disqualified or worse yet sail into a shallow spot near shore, became the a bad daydream! Planning a successful line to the finish, quickly became a new obsession! Finishing the course successfully, one can sail just to the outside of the green buoy that marks the channel (the Presque isle Channel) but thinking it would be good navigational practice, my line was to go right between both buoys. Well I thought so!

I Finished! I DID it!! 🙌

I will never forget how great the sailing was, as I really started to get closer; in fact it was such nice sailing that pulling a Bernard Moitessier, and just keep going, crossed my mind, heck wasn't even feeling tired! I was excited though to finally get my little boat; S/V Eloxy into Presque Isle and dock at Erie Yacht Club! (one of my favorite places, and to have sailed there on my own boat, after FINISHING the Lake Erie Solo Challenge!! ) YAY! I was getting really excited!

Right on My Line to the Finish!

Setting the boat up to sail right between the green and red as planned seemed perfect except for this large sailboat sailing what seemed like painfully slow right in my path! It was right in between the green and red markers; and it was big! No room! Falling off to port, and passing the green buoy on the left worked!

I crossed the finish line at 3:10pm doing a little over 5 knots! 🏁 After crossing the finish, we tacked back over across the entrance channel, and took my sails down! WOOT WOOT, I could almost taste that rum.....

Here's a photo of me crossing the finish, never in a million years would I have thunk it!

• This picture has the time an hour off, it says 2:10pm but it was actually 3:10pm!

Chatting With Other Competitors

I keep saying 'I will never forget' but well, that's how it is in my mind and I will say it again. I will never forget how amazing it was to be finally approaching the finish and having some of the other racers (that were leaving Erie) call me on the radio.

They were expressing their encouragement to me, and commenting on my persistence and determination to 'stay out there' for over 5 days to finish! It was just really cool lacking a better description! They called me I did not call them! It was also very powerful, not being as experienced as they are, I was just being tenacious and stubborn. Coming to Erie without finishing, was not an option! At one point in conversing with John; explaining, it will be reward enough just to finish so, everyone can go home, my arrival will take a long time! People don't need greet me it's Ok! I did say that but, it's kind of a lie, I wanted someone there, plus it's hard to get the rum if nobody is there to give it to you 😂 !

Motoring into Presque Isle Bay! Never to be forgotten!

The BEST Greeting Ever!

Motoring into Lake Erie Yacht Club is forever indelibly imprinted on my brain! There were people yelling, singing, and cheering for me! Amazing feeling! Who put them up to that??

Photo: Almost to the dock! GLSS, Erie Yacht Club support staff and others waiting. Don't hit that shiny red boat! Feeling like some sort of celebrity or something; which of course is not me! Not getting within a foot of the dock everyone was grabbing my lines and helping me tie Eloxy up! Happiness does not even explain it! Not surprising, it was a overwhelming, especially after sailing alone for almost 6 days. Getting my boat back into port in one piece, that was my main goal, well that and to finish.

Photos: more of my wonderful 'greeters'

Hard to see but I'm just rounding the corner into the final fairway! YAY!

A big nod of appreciation and gratefulness goes to Jack Jamison (S/V Nebesa) and the wonderful Solo Challenge support staff for being present at the dock at Erie Yacht Club when I finally made my appearance! A few of which made special trips back to the marina for my 'arrival'! Thank you, Erie Yacht Club and thank you, Great Lakes Solo Sailors! The place doesn't get any better does it?

I was even luckier to have some of my wonderful, immensely supportive, Toledo Beach Marina Family: Pete and Joni Zillick there to greet me along with my beloved avid sailing John; whom sat the race out so that he could hang out in Erie and await my late arrival! (and do some worrying about me) He was done with the worry now, my dream was achieved! Without them; ANY of them, this would not be possible!

IT TAKES A VILLAGE! This is an understatement! I'm lucky to have the best village!

The BEST greeters 😁

Rum!

I Sailed A Long Way To Get That Rum!

I sailed 5 days, 8 hours and 455 nautical miles to get that bottle of rum and nothing has tasted better since! What an amazing experience! Who would have thunk it! My little 28' Oday that I rescued from certain demolition, worked on for 8 years and then sailed to Buffalo! Wonder where she will take me next!

In the months before the Challenge there were numerous comments about me only doing it 'once'; "that's the only one I want to do". Humm, not sure about that now. 😉 Time will tell it sure was an amazing experience!

Parting Thoughts 👌⛵

Thank you for reading my story! It was fun putting this site together! My last post is filled with thoughts, thanks and some miscellaneous photos; so please continue reading!

Little S/V Eloxy proudly wearing her 'flag' !

Screenshot taken from my Garmin InReach app of my complete track; looks a little cluttered from all of the message icons, but it was the only one I could find that had the complete track. My InReach was not turned on for the first fifteen miles 🙄, Opps!