The trip over to Connecticut Sunday aboard Cerberus was lovely, if uneventful. Getting back made for something more of a story.
Without wind on Sunday, we had to motor, and the 14-horsepower Beta diesel had us moving along at about 5 knots without noticeable strain.
We overnighted in Niantic and watched the moon as it rose in line with the red-and-white-striped smokestack at the Millstone power plant. On the other side of the bay, the cloudless sky turned lemon yellow.
In the morning, we were carried west on a rising tide toward Saybrook. There was wind by then, and, after we turned north toward the mouth of the Connecticut River, we were able to turn off the Beta and ride the wind and current until passing under the I-95 bridge. After Essex, under power, we ran aground briefly on an unmarked mudbank but were able to reverse, turn the boat toward deeper water, and continue on our way.
We made the 2 p.m. opening of the East Haddam Swing Bridge and were tied up at our destination a short time later. Getting back to Amagansett was another matter altogether.
The plan had been to get on a shockingly expensive Amtrak at Old Saybrook, then change at Penn Station for the ride to East Hampton. If the $100-a-seat train ever arrived, we never found out, deciding after more than an hour delay to take an Uber to New London to walk on the ferry.
At Orient Point, we had to wait 20 minutes for a taxi to Greenport. After taking one ferry to Shelter Island, we waited another 10 minutes for a second taxi to take us to the other. Arriving on North Haven, we took another Uber to East Hampton and then drove to Amagansett, roughly the same time we would have had — had we gone by way of Amtrak and the Long Island Rail Road — for less money but much more of an adventure.