Well, we planned on staying one more day in Cape May due to weather when I got a call from our friends Tom and Diane on “Beachside” and they asked if we were willing to make the run today with a 60 mile inside run to Atlantic City. We agreed and set a time for a rising tide around noon. We fueled up and pumped out and met Beachside and two Canadian Loopers and started our trek up the ICW semi protected from the high winds but subject to sand bars and shoals. We were fourth in the flotilla and trusted our lead boat as they were gold loopers and traveled this route before.
After passing under the Two Mile Bridge our slow moving adventure began. Running on the inside was a snaky arduous task trying to stay in line with the other boats hoping that if they didn’t bottom out, we wouldn’t. Beachside hsd one close call as we had to avoid a delivery captain racing his boat up the channel .We ran past Wildwood, Sea Isle City, Ocean City then into the Canal through Ventnor City around the west of Atlantic City then towards the Inlet turning to starboard into Frank S. Farley State Marina, formerly Trump Marina. We made it in just at sunset after an 8 hour journey.
The Golden Nugget Casino is located right in front of the marina so we attempted to get some dinner but there was only one choice. Since COVID all the buffets were shutdown and the casino itself was quite dead except for the geriatric gangs meandering through the slot machines. It was far from my old memories of a loud exciting casino with packed tables and screaming bettors spending their last penny. We spent a couple days in AC waiting for a shot to run on the outside to NY Harbor.
We visited Harrah’s Resort and the Borgata Casino, both of which were quite empty. We did meet up with fellow loopers on the docks to include Bruce on “We Got This”. It was a great learning experience but not one in need of repeating.
It is off to bed for a 0530 start on the Atlantic Ocean.