Well...I Never Did Stop in Ocean City That Night

The last you heard from me, I was planning on going to Ocean City.  The problem was that we got there about an hour before sunrise, and the entrance to the harbor was very tricky: narrow and shallow.  So rather than a) risk the entry or b) hang out and wait for daylight, we pressed on.  We finally arrived in Chesapeake Bay at 3 am the next morning.  By the time we dropped anchor near Little Creek in Willoughby Bay, I was literally falling asleep standing up.

I was solo sailing since Maggie was in Toronto, so I found it very difficult getting any quality sleep since it was all so new an experience for me.  As it turned out, I probably got about 4 hours sleep in 3 days.  But when I finally hit the sack, I slept the sleep of the dead.

We had made it to a safe harbor refuge near Norfolk, where the U.S. has its major eastern naval base.  I was surprised at how close I was allowed to get to the ships.  One really feels the might of the U.S. military as you pass by the yards in Norfolk and Portsmouth. 

These are just a couple of the ships that I saw.  Damn stinkpots!

REBOOT taking a  run at a U.K. warship

U.S. fighting trimaran

One heavy bird

From this point, we had decided to follow the ICW.  We chose to take the Dismal Swamp route.  It is straight, narrow, shallow and 45 miles long.  It is long and boring and what's worse is that you can not trust your autopilot to steer you straight in the narrow channel, so you have to hand steer all the way.  For Roger and I as solo sailors, there is no relief from the helm and no where to stop and take a break, a leak or a snack.  Of course, you can try to aim the boat, lock the wheel and do a quick scramble.  It works, but just barely.

This is what the canal is like for miles

There are a couple of canals and lift bridges that must be timed correctly, which we failed to do.  So, in order to make the last bridge lift at South Mills so that we could tie up on the wall in the canal, we had to run at 7 knots (engines not far from red line) for over an hour.  H2OBO draws 5.5', loaded the way she is probably a couple inches more.  When you are gunning your engine, the stern sinks down a little more.  So now I am probably drafting 5'9", travelling at over 7 kts. with 1 to 2 feet of water showing under the keel.  Every once in a while (15 times but who is counting) I would bump something.  Later I was told they were logs and that there are no rocks to hit, but at the time I was sweating bullets recalling the damage we did to the keel when we hit the rock in Tangier Bay while only making 1.5 kts.

Right now I am swinging on the anchor in New Bern, NC.  Maggie is flying in from Toronto this weekend, and then we will head for Beaufort, NC, to stage for a offshore passage farther on down the coast.  I have been using the down time for some maintenance and repairs.  But mostly I am just taking it easy.

The days are warm, the nights are cool.  How are things where you are?