Category: 2017-18 Voyage to The Bahamas

It has been very warm during the day and even at night since we got to Annapolis. Still no rain but it is supposed to arrive on Sunday (it’s Friday) We went to the  show today, toured a few amazing sailboats that we could not afford in our wildest dreams. We met up with our Belleville buddies Joan and John for lunch and got caught up. They are anchored near the Naval Academy no plan to stay at least until Monday.

There is an amazing amount of money tied up in the boats in this show – boggles the mind. For example, the 75′ Oyster sailboat was $5.5 million. Our most exciting purchase was a boat hook to replace the one that went missing on the New Jersey leg.

Last night here, off to St Michael tomorrow morning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Had to see saw a bit to back out of our slip as more boats had arrived making it a bit more challenging to get out but Bob did just fine. We passed our Belleville friend’s boat anchored in the harbour on the way out. We left around 9am and got to Saint Michaels around 3pm. Saint Michaels is quite a long way in from the Chesapeake.

We followed Chris into a small bay to anchor but in the time Chris was investigating depths, another boat pulled in and anchored – more on them later. We decided to go into the previous bay to anchor, however, once we were anchored, Chris phoned and suggested we come back and raft with them. So, up comes the anchor and we head back. I wish someone had taken a video of me driving the boat as  Bob was setting the anchor to line us up with Even Keel. As we went past the boat that “snuck in” before we could anchor earlier, a man on the boat called out asking if we were technologically savvy, Bob yelled yes and kept working with  the anchor. Chris meanwhile is watching, that as we and he swing, we don’t hit his boat. There were several sudden lurches forward as Chris warned me we were getting too close and I pushed the throttle forward big time. But there was success without any untoward touching and after a bit of tossing of lines we rafted up.

Once that was done and we were relaxing a bit in the cockpit, the fellow from the other boat radioed us with his technical question. He needed to text some photos to a vendor in Annapolis and didn’t know how to do it. He rowed over on his dinghy and then proceeded to climb onto the boat from the side of the boat !!! This was Lew and he and his wife Anne had bought the motor yacht they were on about a year ago having had to give up their sailboat on which they had sailed to Europe going west from the Bahamas. Lew told us he was 83, now had a few health issues and reluctantly had to give up the sailboat. Bob showed him how to text the pictures and Lew invited us over for drinks tomorrow and then climbed over the side of the boat to row back to their boat! Did I mention he was 83?

It was fun having our cocktail hour with Chris & Cindy without either of us leaving our boats. Dinner on board tonight, we had the last piece of wild salmon bought from Tara before we left Kingston.

 

 

 

 

The plan today was for the four of us to go into the village and stock up a bit on fresh veggies and fruit and generally look around. We meandered a bit trying to find the public dinghy dock and found it near the Museum. When we asked where the grocery store was, we found out that the village’s only grocery store was closing and had very limited supplies left. They weren’t kidding but we did manage to pick up a few things.

Saint Michaels is an old village, very pretty and also touristy. The oldest house we saw was from the mid 1700’s . We failed in our attempt to get bread, the only bakery in town was closed today so we’ll try again tomorrow if it doesn’t rain all day as the current forecast says.

Unfortunately Chris has picked up a nasty cold so he stayed   behind when we went to Anne and Lew’s for drinks. They are an amazing couple. When Lew retired at 62  they decided not to sit around. They sold their house and embarked on a 20 year sailing journey on their 48 foot Camper Nicholson that started with spending 2 years sailing in the Bahamas. Then they headed to Europe, going west as the prevailing winds are easterlies – that was Lew’s argument. They are both avid sailors. They sailed around the world but also made many land stops along the way and came home for special occasions and I think often for Christmas – hence it took them 20 years but made it they did.

Tomorrow is supposed to be rainy and very windy most of the day so we may just be staying hunkered down on the boat.

 

We moved to the Marina around noon today. By the time both boats were settled in their slips blue sky started to appear and the sun came out. Maybe it rained all day somewhere in the Chesapeake but we were happy it didn’t in Saint Michaels. Bob and I tried the bakery again, got a loaf of bread and some cookies. We then went to the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum which we had been able to see from our anchorage. Much of it was outdoors so we’re lucky the weather improved. There was a large working boatyard where shipwrights were restoring and building Chesapeake Bay boats.the area had and still has and a large fishing/clam/crab industry. A highlight was the 1879 Hooper Straight Lighthouse which was rescued and restored.

I/we decided to give up on the Thanksgiving day dinner on board and ate at one of the restaurants at the marina. Bob got the last piece of pumpkin cheesecake in honour of the holiday.

Left around 9am in very calm conditions. We passed a sailboat whose engine was smoking big time, felt sorry for them, they looked to be heading into the harbour where at least one of the marinas does repairs. We ended up motoring all the way to our anchorage on the Little Choptank River, there was minimal wind.

As seems to be the norm, part of the trip included avoiding crab pots, here is a sample of one that has a flag, most just have a float. It is not fun to have a crab pot line caught in your rudder or propeller!

The temperatures continue to be surprisingly warm for October,  even the night time temperatures don’t dip much. Just need a sheet as cover at night.

We rowed over to Even Keel for cocktail hour – Bob had to get his workout.

 

 

 

 

We were anchored last night near a river entrance so although it was a calm anchorage, around 5am the boat started rolling with the wake from fishing boats heading out. It rained overnight and continued pretty heavily for a while right after we left this morning. We somehow missed the forecast that predicted rain for today or we might have continued to Solomons yesterday.

The winds were forecast to be around 5 knots but as has been the case most days in the Chesapeake, they were higher and we were able to sail. We were doing the usual dodging of crab pots when all of a sudden the prop started making nasty noises – the engine was not on!  Bob quickly realized we had snagged a crab pot – the air was not blue, it was purple for a few moments 🙂

Nothing else to do but put out the anchor and Bob had to go diving to remove the pot. Luckily the water temperature was 76F and also luckily Bob was able to quickly remove the pot & rope which were wrapped around the prop, without cutting the rope. He said the water was pretty murky. We hope not to repeat this exercise. We’ve been looking out for the pots which mostly have a float, the odd ones a flag on a float to mark them but they can easily get hidden by waves. We were hyper vigilant after this.

It didn’t rain much the rest of the day but winds and waves kept increasing. We got to Spring Cove Marina at 1:45 and then had the fun task of trying to “dock”. It’s a narrow harbour with pilings and stupid med mooring style docks, they are a bit longer than the med docks at KYC. We almost made it in but the wind caught us and we had to back out to avoid hitting the boat on our port side. We intentionally had no fenders out because of this dumb piling system, can you tell – I’m impressed. We made it in on the second try, not easily but we got in.  There was help on the “dock” but because it’s not a real dock we had to get really far in before I could toss them a line. Getting on and off the the boat is like at  KYC med moorings – only worse as pulling the boat close enough to climb off is not easy – grumble, grumble.

The marina is a couple of miles from shopping – we needed a grocery store – so they have a courtesy car you can book, which we did. Dinner on board tonight, with real vegetables – yea!

Woke up to rain during the night and  it continued on off most of the day. The is a marine maintenance yard beside the marina so we talked to them about someone to look at our wind instrument problem. To our pleasant surprise a techie was available to look at it in the afternoon. The answer was, we need a new unit for the top of the mast. He was able to order it to be delivered tomorrow so we hope that really is the fix. We had thought about leaving tomorrow but it’s well worth a one day delay if this fixes it.

We had planned to walk to the village of Solomon and look around but the weather wasn’t cooperating. We booked the courtesy car  and drove to an early dinner there with Chris & Cindy who are planning to leave tomorrow morning.

Another grey morning but at least it’s not raining. We helped Chris & Cindy get out of their slip, they left shortly after 9. We walked to the post office and met up with Joan & John who had moved their boat from a marina to an anchorage close to us. We had lunch at a local grill and by the time we got back, the guys arrived at the boat with the new part, earlier than we’d expected.

There were two brawny guys taking turns hoisting the techie up the mast. And yippee, the new part did the trick. Yes, that dark thing at the top of the mast is the techie.

It’s laundry time this afternoon, we leave tomorrow. Fingers crossed that the weather forecast stays as predicted for tomorrow, we hope to do about 40 miles.

 

 

We had a perfect departure from our not-so-favourite slip at 7am and there was no one around to see it. Bob gently backed out of the slip, we didn’t touch the pylons, or any other boats! We were really surprised at the number of other boats also heading out that early, it was a veritable flotilla for a while.

Our plan was to try to make it to Deltaville, VA, about a 50 mile trip, but if not, we’d stop at Mill Creek and anchor there. That was a 40 mile trip counting going down the creek to reach the anchorage. We made great time, had a following sea and the current was with us.  We were motor sailing as there wasn’t enough wind to make good time for the distance we wanted to go. Happily some crab pots to avoid but not nearly as many as when came into Solomons.

When we reached the turn off for Mill  Creek it was a no brainer to keep going. We got to Deltaville around 3:15 and Chris was waiting for us on the dock. He and Cindy anchored at Mill Creek last night and arrived at Deltaville earlier this morning to look at a boat.

It’s nice marina with floating finger docks – no gymnastics required to get on and off the boat. Spring Cove was a nice marina, friendly staff, good facilities but the slips sucked. No floating docks and at high tide in the morning the jump to get off was so big even Bob with very healthy knees wasn’t willing to try it. When we came back from dinner out Bob had to boost me to get back on the boat – no video available!

We will probably be here until Tuesday, the weather is supposed to be nasty on Monday. Unfortunately almost nothing is open so if we want to have dinner out tomorrow we have very limited options and they involve a 20 minute  cab ride.

 

Although the day started overcast, the sun was out by around 11 – finally. I figure all that cloudy weather was payback for the the first month+ of nothing but sun.

About the only thing open in Deltaville was the grocery store, a seafood store, and one little cafe.

There was also a sports bar but the marina staff said  “you don’t want to go there”. There were  a few more eateries but all of them closed. The most highly recommended place didn’t open again until Wednesday. Ursula & Jeb warned us that a lot of  places in small towns on the Chesapeake had very limited hours by October.

The marina provided a courtesy car so Chris, Cindy, Bob & I had lunch at the cafe, picked up some seafood for dinner and stocked up on groceries. That was as exciting as it got.

We had late afternoon refreshments on the marina’s very nice patio/verandah.

Chris and Bob found some interesting weather forecast differences between Deltaville on the west side and the east side of the bay. Basically, a lot more wind predicted for the east side as the wind is coming from the north – hmmmmm, we’ll see.