Since we brought the dogs to shore at 4am, we spent the morning catching up on a couple hours of sleep. We had breakfast and coffee, hung the tarp for shade and I took a shower in the cockpit with one of our ‘solar bags’. They warm water in a bag with a house and spout and are super convenient for a good wash down.

We checked in with the harbormaster about going through the Annisquam River and asked for any advice. He told us to go mid-tide and hug the green markers in the channel. Perfect!

After checking the tides and weather forecasts we decided our best time would be around 3:30pm. We took the dogs to shore and walked to the dog park around 1pm and then headed back to secure the cabin and hoist the anchor.

Going through the river was smooth and pleasant. Although on maps and charts the river looks very narrow and the shoals unforgiving, we didn’t have any issues at mid-tide and very much enjoyed the cruise!

We ended up anchoring off of Crane Beach in Ipswich. We found, according to Navionics and Noaa charts, a sweet spot amongst the shoals that boasted 14ft at low tide and was relatively close to shore. We were fine here until around 3am when we started rubbing ground. We started the motor and tried to pull out of it but decided we’d be best to let the tide go out and come back to refloat us. True low tide was just before 5am so we waited until around then to see how far over the boat would lean- only about 25 degrees. We were both able to go back to sleep for and hour or two at slack tide and were woken up by our hull riding a combination of swells and sandy shoals. Eventually, after I had pulled the anchor and reset it at least five times in the process of trying to make some ground, we made it off the shoal and found a secure anchor spot around 7:30am.

We took the dogs to shore, Crane Beach is amazing! We wished we were in a better spot to be able to wander the paths and trails but we were happy just to enjoy the beautiful sandy stretch of beach for a bit.