New Jersey Coast

We hoisted our anchor off the Coast Guard station in Cape May at 6.30am and followed several other sail boats out the channel. We headed north once again in mild conditions and left the possibility open to go all the way to Sandy Hook if we felt the conditions allowed during the day. Two of the boats leaving with us were planning to go on a direct course to Block Island on an overnight passage. We gave it some thought but after several long days we decided it was better for us to stick with our plan and go the New Jersey coastal route.
 We passed Atlantic city by 11am and Barnegat Bay by 3pm and on we went. At times the current, wind and waves favored us and at other times they slowed us down. We were racing sun-down to the hook but eventually Mother Nature won the race once again and we found ourselves navigating in the dark into the anchorage at Sandy Hook. We were exhausted and were in bed within the hour. When we woke up in the morning we found ourselves within a few hundred yards of a massive fish trap area. We had a reading on our radar when we dropped the hook and we never approached the area even though we could not determine what the bounce was from. New York City once again as in 2009 looked awesome across the bay with a million lights blinking in the night sky.
Just a couple of observations to finish for today. The water of the coast through the mid-Atlantic northward is in so much better condition than that in the southern states. The pollution from the Georgia Pacific plants along the coast and probably the run off from the farm land is devastating to see. The New Jersey coast was alive with fish and of course lots of happy fishermen catching them. It was good to see such abundant sea life.