Wednesday, November 25, 2009 Adams Creek to Swansboro NC

I got up and made coffee about 6:15am and sat around playing on the computer, went up top to check things out and then back below to play solitaire some more. We left the anchorage around 8-8:30. I don’t really know when and it was overcast out but not windy. I saw a couple of dolphins for the first time this trip. It was actually in the same area as last year, when we saw dolphins for the first time on our way south. It makes sense that we’d see them in the same area. While the air temperature is cold, we’ve entered an area where the water is a little bit warmer, which allows the dolphins to come further north.

A few hours later I decided it’d be a good time to start making my pumpkin pie – it seems calm out, so I made tuna sandwiches (homemade bread yum) then started on the pie. As soon as I started to get it into the oven it started raining and getting foggy so I took a break to turn on the radar and make some tea. I know how cold and tiring it can get at the helm in weather. Then I went back to making my pie. We passed a little blue sailboat that came by our anchorage last night at twilight – I guess that he wasn’t a local like I thought. He appears to be heading south in his foulies too. I waved and went back below. Wayne said we both didn’t need to be up top and I like being below in the foul weather for a change :)

We put into Swansboro around 2:30 off Caspar’s Marina near the bridge in 15 feet of water. The Current runs strong here and we had to reset the anchor in the rain.

I made flatiron steak with mashed potatoes and gravy for dinner. Wayne loved it of course – steak and potatoes.

The broadband connection is excellent here so I checked out face book and am trying to see what the heck I’ve done on my blog. There are numerous errors I see (in past postings). Hmmmm….

Tuesday, November 24, 2009 Pungo Creek to Adams Creek

From: Pungo Creek Anchorage NC (N35*30.576, W76*39.128.400) 9.2 ft deep 7:45am
To: Adams Creek Anchorage NC (N34*56.039, W76*39.017) 3:45pm
Miles Traveled: 49.2 miles (122.5)
Weather Conditions: Cool, 50* winds NW10 patchy drizzle

We left the Pungo Creek Anchorage about 7:45 this morning and it was cold and drizzly but we had no problems. The anchor came up right nicely and it was an uneventful day. We motor sailed across the Pamlico River and Neuse River in 1 foot or less waves. By the way, the Neuse River is the widest River in North America at 6 miles across at the mouth of the river. The free dockage at Oriental was full and we decided that with weather coming our way, it’d be better to head across the Neuse and duck into Adams Creek. After crossing it we entered Adams Creek and anchored near the sunken sailboat by the range that boats use to line up on. I made grill cheese sandwiches on my homemade bread and a creamy tomato basil soup for dinner. Quiet evening.  Watched a sailboat come in and anchor after dark on the other side of the wreck.

Monday, November 23, 2009 Pungo Creek Anchorage NC (N35*30.576, W76*39.128.400) 9.2 ft deep

Weather Conditions: wet, cool, 50* winds NNE10 rain on and off

Today we’re staying put and letting the weather pass us by. It’s our anniversary today :) WOW I actually remembered! We caught up on reading our email and sent Brad our affidavits, paid bills, downloaded my pictures from my camera and ate bread, bread and more bread with tuna salad for lunch. I was looking at Wayne in his snazzy long johns the girls got him from LLBean. They look good on him and he looks nice and cozy in them. Wind generator worked well all night last night. But stopped this afternoon

Read some, watched a trawler go back and forth across the creek from one side to the other several times. Hair washing day, then made chicken, corn and salad for dinner and read some. Quiet day. The weather should be clearing this evening so we can head towards Oriental tomorrow. More weather is supposed to be heading in on Wednesday.

Sunday Nov. 22, 2009 Deep Point to Pungo Creek

From: Deep Point Anchorage NC (N35*40.460, W76*03.400)
To: Pungo Creek Anchorage NC (N35*30.576, W76*39.128.400) 9.2 ft deep
Miles Traveled: 33.3nm (173.3) Time leaving 7:30am Time in – 1:30pm
Weather Conditions: Clear, cool, 50* winds NNE10

Hailed Jade East at 6:30 to let him know we just got up and wished them fair winds. We got out at 8:00 am and into the Alligator Canal. It’s a straight cut so I’m catching up on my journal, making fried egg sandwiches and hoping my bread dough will rise now that it’s warming up out. It didn’t do much rising last night. Its kind of funny because I have the radio on scan and some guys are talking about growing cotton and how in some areas it’s still to wet – they need chains to harvest it. Interesting discussions on channel 18 none of it very nautical. I’m learning that the neighbor of the guy that’s talking grows the best cotton and just uses potash as fertilizer. They can’t pick it when it’s to wet and some of the area that he’s gone over looks like there’s more left standing than what they cleared (per his discussion).

We anchored in the Creek past Belhaven (in the Pungo Creek). It’s a nice quiet little creek that’s a little more open than the one going into Belhaven – there are 3 ft shoals in there so we came to this one. It’s fairly well sheltered. When we dropped anchor, it stuck pretty good into the mud and went zipping out of Wayne’s hands. I heard “stop, stop, stop… Reverse” and threw it into reverse – hard. It shocked me to see the chain go zipping out of Wayne’s hands so fast. I hope we didn’t snag something we shouldn’t have. I’m not ready to give up another anchor already. We had hotdogs for dinner and my bread came out of the oven a little after dinner. I wanted to see if I could fit 3 loaves in the oven and they did fit but the one to the left side was way over done – TOAST – yum. It looks like my broadband card works here with a 20% signal so we may be able to catch up on email here. It’s starting to sprinkle and rain is called for tomorrow so we’ll be here for the next day.

Saturday, November 21, 2009 Elizabeth City to the Alligator River, NC

From: Elizabeth City NC (N36*17.924, W76*13.095)
To: Deep Point, Alligator River, NC (N35*40.460, W76*03.400)
Miles traveled: 48.7nm (140.0)

I’d have liked to stayed another day or so to explore Elizabeth City but if we do, then we’ll probably be here for a few more days since there’s weather moving in. Theoretically you’re only supposed to stay on the free dock for 48 hours and since it’s calling for high wind and rain on Sunday or Monday, then we both thought it prudent to head out. Jade East and Hampshire Rose said they were heading out at 7 this morning but at quarter of the hour I noticed they were gone. We pulled out around 8am under partly cloudy skies and cold air with patches of fog breaking up. We passed by the blimp hanger (where they make blimps) and it’s amazing to think how big that hanger when compared to a house. Imagine living near a blimp factory… I’ll leave the jokes to the imagination along with all the hot gas.

We hooked up the auto helm and Otto seems to be doing okay. We left him on for a while testing him out. As we approached the Alligator River Bridge we met up with an Island Packet (Oceanis) and a tall ship (Fritha). The tall ship Fritha was a beauty! I recognized the bridge tenders voice from last year when we were stuck here during the gale. He’s a very friendly sort and something about him was reassuring even though I knew he couldn’t open the bridge for anyone. The guy has got patience…

Around 2:30pm we pulled around to Deep Point, where we were going to anchor for the night in 7-9 feet of water.  I noticed that there were two boats already anchored there. It was Hampshire Rose and Jade East! That caught me by surprise because for some strange reason I thought they were pushing on for Belhaven. It was nice to see them again. 4-5 boats could fit in this anchorage easily. Rob from Jade East dinghied by to say high with Tiva – he’s looking for a landing to take her ashore but I don’t think there’s much here. He told us they’d be heading out in the morning at 6:30 for Belhaven and they’d be on the radio in the morning if we wanted to head out with them. I said okay and then went below to see about making dinner. Sausage and egg noodles were on my menu only I couldn’t find my egg noodles anywhere… Quick change in menu – mac & cheese and sausage for dinner tonight.

Friday, November 20, 2009 Dismal Swamp to Elizabeth City, NC The friendliest Town

Dismal Swamp Visitor’s Center to Elizabeth City, North Carolina.

Sunrise 6:47am Sunset 4:54pm winds 6mph from the NW and light rain/drizzle at 6:30am.

After making coffee I grabbed my camera. I noticed that Rob and Tiva were up so asked permission to cross his boat and he said to come ahead, I didn’t need to ask. It just feels weird to walk across someone’s boat without permission though. I walked over to the visitor center and noticed it doesn’t open until 9:00am but noticed that the bridge going across the canal had closed again so foot traffic could cross to the other side. After taking pictures on this side, chatting with Spray, Hampshire Rose and Jade East, I headed over to the bridge.

The bridge tender’s name is Jennifer. She’s a nice young lady. We chatted for a bit and she kept covering her mouth periodically which was distracting until I figured out she was trying to hide a tongue stud but for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why… A lot of the kids back home have them but probably not so many here in the middle of nowhere. I learned that she read her first full book here and was starting her second one. She was amazed that people wanted to know about this area where she grew up. I guess she never really appreciated it. She was telling me that it amazed her when a boat from Washington State came through. They were so thrilled to be here. They thought that the stories that they’d heard about the Dismal Swamp were nothing but fairy tales and were enthralled that the place existed. This gave her a totally different outlook on the area so she decided to read up on it. I’d asked her about the Halfway house and she said that she thought it hadn’t been around for quite a long time. I’d told her I was bummed about it not seeing it – it’s in brochures about the canal and she said that she was surprised that it was still in the books and brochures because she couldn’t remember ever seeing it. She told me about the trails etc… around here and we talked about the area before I noticed that it was approaching 9am. I wanted to visit the Center and sign in before we left otherwise I could have probably stayed another hour chatting with her. She told me to use care up ahead towards South Mill, a boat coming through there had broken a mast on one of the overhanging trees (that must have had a lean to it from the storms). I thanked her and got a picture of her before taking off.

I learned over at the Visitor Center that the Halfway house had been gone for at least 20 years! I’m thoroughly surprised that someone didn’t try to save such a historical building.

What a shame. The ladies at the visitor center and I all decided that if they’d rebuilt or even built a place near there they could make a lot of money selling tickets and/or opening a bed and breakfast to all the tourists that came through… hmmm… a new career.

We untied from Jade East and backed and turned back onto the canal, then Jade East untied and turned and then Hampshire Rose. We look like a little parade going through the Dismal Swamp Canal, timing our arrival to the 11:00 Bridge and lock opening. Spray (the trawler with a terrier similar to a Jack Russell), Hampshire Rose, Jade East and us all locked through together and when we got to the Pasquotank River the depths changed from 6-9 feet to 12-15 feet. This is really a much nicer route than the path through Coinjock. There are a lot of places to pull over and anchor and the scenery is beautiful.

At 12:00 our mast hit some tree branches overhead but there doesn’t appear to be any damage to the antenna or anything.









3:00pm we made the Elizabeth City Dock. You pull nose in to the pier and there were several people there to catch our lines. Hampshire Rose came in first, then Jade East, then us (Spray came in way earlier – he’s a faster boat).

We had a welcoming committee of a WWII vet named Sam and a younger gentleman named Gus. Both wanted to give us the lay of the land and it appeared that there was a little generational animosity between them. Sam walked off in a huff and we learned about where to go, what to do and how to get groceries and showers, etc… from Gus, then later Sam came back and gave us all kinds of information too. He invited us to a wine and cheese party for the boaters and told us about the best place in town to get a Ruben sandwich if we like Rubens (You know I like Sam now – Rubens!). He also told us about a Dinner Theater where you could get dinner and a movie – you just call from your table to order the food via phone and they bring it to you, then you can kick back and watch a movie. Sounded good to me!

A little after 4pm another person was standing outside our boat so we came up and chatted with him. We talked about boats, heading south, and he pointed out his boat to us. I told him he should go south this year with us – a little blue trawler across the way - and he smiled and said he had commitments, so couldn’t, but was looking forward to boating more in the future. He asked us if we knew about the wine and cheese party for the boaters and we told him that Sam had told us about it. He said he hoped to see us there and was going to invite the rest of the boaters and hoped that they all knew about it from Sam too. He was really interested in knowing if Spray was going to be there – I guess that they’d run into each other before and had both been laid up in New Jersey during the storms last year. We all headed for the wine and cheese party (the four boats plus 2 more) and that’s when I discovered that I’d been trying to convince the mayor of Elizabeth City to head south with us. Oops… my bad… New title for today’s blog: How to feel stupid without trying. Now I know why he was smiling at me, and what his commitments are. I’d heard that the Mayor came out to the docks to greet the boaters and was surprised to learn that this was he. I don’t know of any other city where the mayor comes out to greet its visitors and invite them to a wine/cheese gathering…

Pictured from left to right is the Mayor, Rob, Holly, and Rob

He gave a nice little chat to all of us about the amenities of Elizabeth City and its history of giving roses to the boats (I got 3 and Holly got 3 – we were the only women there) and trying to cater to boaters. It was a very nice gathering & I have to remember to send some of my recipes for use in a cookbook that they’re trying to put together. After the Wine & Cheese party I dropped my roses back at the boat and we went into town to go to the dinner theater.

The city streets are old and the houses and shops are historic. They have Christmas wreaths on the lights that line the street with sailboats inside them – very cute for a boating friendly town. There was a host of great looking places to visit. But with dark upon us, and thoughts of Ruben’s and dinner theaters in my head, I was on a mission. We were told that because it was a first run movie tonight (plus date night) there might be a line-up and we should get there around 5:30pm to get a good table even though they don’t open the doors until 6pm. When we got there, there were 3 couples already in line ahead of us. The movie that was showing had a star-studded cast of: Jeff Bridges, George Clooney, Kevin Spacey, Ewan McGregor and… a Goat. It was called “The Men who stare at Goats”… Huh? I can’t say as I ever heard of that one and I like all of the characters – even goats… We stood in line and chatted with the couple in front of us. We were told it was a comedy and that it was about the military?

I decided to explore up and down the street while Wayne held our spot in line – we were couple 4 of about 10 couples. When I spotted the sailboat wreaths I had to line up to take a picture of one on the alley near the theater. Two teens (a girl and a guy) were in the alley doing something – I guess I disturbed them because after I got my shot of the wreath they were gone. Across the street there was a wig shop with some outrageous wigs. Good thing they weren’t open or I’d have been all over this one full-bodied, brilliant blue one. A longhaired purple one was really WOW too! I got an eye roll from Wayne on that one but, I know, he was just grateful that the shop was closed so I couldn’t try any of them on… Quite frankly I think either would keep my head warm in the cold weather.

At 6pm they opened the doors and we got one senior rate, one not and were seated in the center section near the railing. It was a cute little theater. The section before the screen was like a regular movie theater and the back section was divided into 3 areas/rows of tables that had lamps on them and phones to call in your order once you were ready to order. The low light setting and roominess was fairly romantic and the menu items were all very reasonably priced with beer on tap, wine, soft drinks and on the back page they had a menu of the theater candies, pop corn, and “sodas”. After scanning through the menu, Wayne got a Yuengling beer and French Dip and I, after much thought, got a Ruben and chocolate malt. We both got onion rings and coleslaw. Then the lights dimmed and we watched the movie. Wayne thought it was worse than “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes” and I thought it was kind of funky. Can’t say as I’d really recommend it but it was kind of a humorous tale of our military trying out a “psychic-friendly approach” to winning wars with LSD and hippy philosophies. It was overall an entertaining evening. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world – a very unique evening.

Getting back to the boat we discovered that there was no easy way to get back onto the boat other than trying to catch the bow from topside (we’d had to jump down from the bow to the small dock at the bow, below the wharf, to get off the boat) and climbing on over the railing of the wharf. I managed to get back on, then Wayne discovered that he couldn’t climb on from the dock below – we were to high off the water. He had to climb back up to the wharf and grab the bowsprit to bring her back to him and I guess we were being kind of noisy trying to get back on because all the sudden there were two guys and a German Shepard on the boat next to us wanting to know what the problem was and if we needed help. We told them no, and the Shepard stayed at the bow to watch us as the guys returned to the back of their boat to go below. I couldn’t help but say “The things I gotta do to get a man aboard my boat!” This cracked Wayne up, but we managed to get back aboard without going into the water. I put my roses in water.

All in all it was one of those wonderful days from start to finish. We need more like this.

Thursday, November 19, 2009 Norfolk VA to Dismal Swamp NC

Hospital Point, Norfolk Virginia (N36o50.658 x W76o17.979) to
The Dismal Swamp Visitor Center North Carolina (N36o30.396 W76o21.360)

We got our anchor up at 9:45am and got through the bridges with no problem this morning. The one bridge waited for us to come through – we were the last in line behind 3 tugs and a mega yacht. We could see traffic backing up and turned up the speed to almost 3500 rpms and were going at 7.1 knots. The bridge tender gave us a salute as we came past his shed so I blew him a big kiss and got a big grin and wave in return. Then the whistle blew a warning that the gate was coming back down.

We knew we weren’t going to make the Deep Creek Lock for the 11:00 opening (they open at 8:30am, 11:00am, 1:30pm and 3:30pm) but had a nice leisurely anchor in front of the lock and waited for his 1:30pm opening.

Deep Creek Lock is the northern end of the Dismal Swamp Canal off the Elizabeth River. There’s another lock to the south at South Mills, NC and the two locks help to maintain the depth of the water to 6 feet in the canal. The source of the water that feeds into the canal is from Lake Drummond. The Dismal Canal is the oldest continually operating “hand-dug” waterway in the country and runs about 22 miles along the Dismal Swamp. It connects the Elizabeth River in Virginia and the Pasquotank River in North Carolina and is quite a historic landmark. The Dismal swamp at one time covered over 2220 miles and is one of the few places on the N. American Continent where peat (precursor of coal) is still being formed. Once a huge treasure trove of formidable swamp it is now about 600 square miles in size. It still contains a varied assortment of insects, mammals and plants and I’ve been told there are over 200 species of birds that still inhabit the Dismal (along with black bear, deer, bobcat, otters, frogs, turtles, etc.).

The bridge/lock tender opened the lock for us so we were able to tie up to the lock wall. Once the lock doors close, the chamber floods to lift the boats up 9 feet to reach the same level of the water on the other side of the lock. At the other end the lock tender drains the water from that lock to lower us back to the level of the river/swamp on the other side of the South Mills Lock.

The lock tender got us in the lock a little after 1:00pm. He asked us if this was the first time we’d come through the Dismal Swamp and we told him “yes. We’d decided since they’d had flood conditions recently that it seemed a good time for us to come through, so there’d be enough water so we wouldn’t run aground.” He asked, “What do you draw (ie what is the depth of your boat)? “5.8 feet.” “Oh oh…” “What? What???” “Ewww, oh nooo…” To late now, we’re in the lock. He told us to keep our eyes open, that we’d bump because there’d been a lot of high water so there’d probably be a lot of debris. “Keep your eyes open.”

We moseyed along between 3-4 knots until about 3pm when we figured out that at that rate we wouldn’t make the visitor’s center (where we planned on tying up to the wall for the night) before dark and we really didn’t want to transit the canal in the dark (sunset is at 4:47pm) so we turned the speed up to 5-6 knots.

Once we approached the Virginia and N. Carolina border I was all alert looking for the infamous Dismal Swamp Roadhouse built in 1802 and the Lake Drummond Hotel (also called the Halfway House established in 1829). Both were popular but infamous places. Lovers wanting to take advantage of N. Carolina marriage laws would meet at one or the other place; fugitives seeking the isolation of the swamp would also collect here along with other shady characters that were fleeing justice. Because the “Halfway House” was built on the border of Virginia and North Carolina, if the law came looking for them in one state, they’d just shift sides to the other state where the lawmen could do nothing about it and the patrons wouldn’t allow it if they tried. Both houses were notorious for sites of duels, lover’s trysts and outlaws hiding in the swamps. Edgar Allen Poe was reputed to have written “The Raven” at the Halfway House. I kept my vigilance at the bow of the boat, ever ready for that camera op that never came. I’d seen pictures of the places but there was nothing along the canal. I was bummed that I couldn’t capture a picture of it with my own camera it looked like a great old building in the pictures I’ve seen of it. Oh well… The scenery is lovely.

It’s a much prettier route than the Virginia Cut where all the larger powerboats are transiting in a hurry and waking the slower sailboats (like us). Somebody around here is burning leaves or wood and it smells good. The eek, eek, eek, and tweet of a bird high in one of the tall pines draws my attention towards the treetops lit by the sun as our mast seems to part the trees along this narrow, shallow canal. Turtles sit on fallen tree trunks that lay or float in the tannin stained water, basking in the remaining light, as the sun gets lower in the sky. I look at the depth sounder and it registers between 5.5 – 9 feet. I know that our transducer sits about a foot and a half below the water level and feel assured that we still have a foot of water under our keel, but my stomach still lurches when I see that 6 ft. mark and lower. We continue to maneuver around the floating logs and trunks left behind from the recent storms and finally make the Visitor’s Center at 5pm just after sunset.

There are 4 boats tied to the wall already – one catamaran, one trawler and one sailboat with another sailboat rafted to it. They’re all facing the way we came from so their noses are pointing into the current. The trawler offers to let us raft to him, as does the sailboat that’s already rafted and we try to back up in the current. Wayne does a decent job of it until the current starts swinging him and we have to go forward again and try again. After several attempts we end up going through a bridge that opened for us (it connects a visitors center on the other side of the canal to the main part of the canal visitor center and swings open to allow boats to go through). The canal is pretty narrow but I volunteered to try and pivot us around to go back through the bridge so we can raft up to the other boats pointing the other way. I learned how to do this last year and discovered that I can still do it, so we snugged up to the sailboat and said, “we’re your entertainment for the evening”. We rafted up to the two sailboats and thanked them for helping us and allowing us to raft to them. They’re very nice people. Rob (a single handler) and his dog Tiva are on the boat we’re rafted to called “Jade East”. He’s buddy boating with the boat he’s rafted to “Hampshire Rose” owned by Holly and Rob. They told us all about the visitor center and we need to make sure to go and sign into their book in the morning when they open because that’s how they get their funding for operation – by the amount of boaters that stop by. I’d like to go explore but don’t want to traipse across all the boats so will wait until morning to see what’s around. They’re both heading out at 9:30am so I’ll jump ship when I get up to take pictures, etc…

Wednesday, November 18, 2009 Deltaville to Norfolk VA - Mile Zero.

Sunrise 6:46am/Sunset 4:53pm - Low Tide 5:23am/High Tide 11:22am - Winds predicted: 15-25 knots gusts 30 - Waves 1-4 ft building to 5-6 ft

Heading out for Norfolk today (the largest Naval Base in the world) – We’re finally on our way?! Sunrise approaches.


I’d forgotten how much I love sunrise on the water. It felt good to feel the sun on my face and the helm beneath my hands. I watched a fat black cormorant dancing across the water as he ran on top of the water trying to take flight and then saw my first pelicans of the season flying next to us dipping and buzzing along the lowest part of the air above the water. What expert fliers!

As soon as we followed the trail of buoys out of Deltaville (stayed 10 feet off the green marker so we didn’t run ashore – thank you Ed) and got safely into 15-20 ft depth and deeper waters, Wayne took a Dramamine and we were off into the sunrise. Those 8 ft depths make me nervous, especially when we look like we’re about to run into someone’s front yard.

The Dramamine didn’t seem to help much. Wayne didn’t look too good and he was seasick the rest of the day. We did manage to get the main up and motor sailed all day. At one point I actually hit 8.57 knots in speed - Wow! As the day went on, the wind and waves grew. It felt rough being a one-man show, difficult to do anything with the sail, or read the chart or chart plotter while handling the boat in the wind and waves. Unfortunately anytime poor Wayne had to change position he was sick so I tried to bother him as little as possible. Coming into Norfolk the Coast Guard made us move over a bit (outside the channel) for one of the Naval Ships coming into the harbor. It was neat seeing the little orange zodiac with the machine guns coming up to us to talk to us – they were pretty cool. Next came a larger Coast Guard boat leading the way for an Aegis Missile Cruiser – the latest vessel in electronic warfare. They don’t look impressive on the outside but from what I hear they look like a video arcade on the inside. A big plain gray floating fortress of missile and electronic might!

We got in and anchored at sunset and I hate to say it but it’s hot tea, sun chips, cookies and fruit snacks for dinner. After setting the hook (anchor) I went to shut the motor off and it wouldn’t go off. So we had to take the panel apart to shut it off – the button would not push in… Hopefully it was just a wire or something blocking it from when Mack had it apart.

I just don’t feel like cooking anything after standing at the helm for 10 hours. My arms and wrists are sore, my feet are wet and cold my hair looks like a rats nest since I wasn't able to put it up, and I’m just plain tired. Now if we can just not drag tonight. Last time we stayed here next to Tidewater Marina at Hospital Pt. We drug into the channel (with perfect timing though).

Tomorrow it’s on to the Dismal Swamp. No pictures taken today – the camera never made it up top.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009 Deltaville finishing up

Well we’re still at Deltaville, this time sitting in a slip. Mack got here around 9:00 after a sea trial on another boat. Then had to go drill a hole for a set screw (which ended up in the bilge so he had to go find another one because he couldn’t pick this one up with a magnet (stainless steel). He then got the engine aligned and when all was said and done it was to late for us to make good time today so we decided to stay put until tomorrow, even if today had the better weather. We couldn’t have made it to Norfolk. We thought we’d be out of here around 8 or so, but it wasn’t to be. Mack checked with Ed on where to move us and we’re up against the shed until morning. Interesting to note that the wireless here is nil.
Showers, reading charts and kind of a strange kick back day. Tomorrow they’re forcasting 4-8 ft waves – don’t know if I’m ready for that. We’re talking about making track for Norfolk then taking the Dismal Swamp route instead of the Virginia Cut this time. So tomorrow the push for Norfolk, then the following day into the Dismal Swamp IF things go as planned LOL.
Time to make dinner (pork roast with apples and corn). I’m reading up on the history of the Dismal Swamp – interesting place.

Monday, November 16, 2009 Deltaville

Well the guys came for us right before 7:00am and put us in the water. The bluebirds were here once again this morning to watch us go back into the water. It seemed fitting considering they were here when we came out of the water. Hope this is a good sign because it’s the first I’ve seen of the little guys since we’ve been here now. How exciting to be back in the water! Even if the engine doesn’t start LOL. We were lowered into the water and went to crank over the engine and nothing… Mack had to go back to the office to get his electrical tool bag then came back and took off the starter/engine panel to check and see if there was any power getting to it. It turned out to be a faulty relay switch. He said they usually last about 20 years so we were definitely due. Good to know our starter is still good (we have a spare one). When he started the engine up we had fuel spraying all over the engine. One of the hoses got damaged from crawling all over the engine I guess. So he went and got another hose. We also had a pinhole in the outboard motor oil container (stored in the lazarette) so we need to get that cleaned up. Now she sits in the water for 24 hours then Mack will align the drive shaft and we’re outta here (?)…

We wandered around and I showed Wayne a little green Bayfield 23 or 25 Called Madcap. It was so cute. Chatted with a few people then Ed from the Marina. Grommit was videoing him so I gave him cudos and homage (LOL). He really is a terrific person. After that we came back and put the main sail up and the reefing lines in. I made a ground meat, mushroom and onion sauce and through that over mashed potatoes for dinner. It’s really nice to be back in the water even if we haven’t gone anywhere yet.

Oh I found another Plum novel – “Plum Lovin” – and killed that one off.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Wow it was so good to see the sun out again this morning. It felt warm and welcoming as I climbed down the ladder to head for the showers. The birds were singing again and people were milling about working on their boats. There are 14-16 boats scheduled to go in tomorrow. Everyone has been backed up due to the storm that Ida had generated over the area.Took showers and they were nice and hot this morning – nobody was here they were all working on their boats. I must confess I stood there and let the water beat on me (water waster – but delicious). It’s one of the luxuries that you miss when you’re away from home and have to keep your eye on the water levels in your boat.

Worked on the boat, decks cleaned, stuff stashed for our launch tomorrow morning.

Went into town with Patrick – we shared a ride because there are new loaner car hours on Sunday (1:00pm because the office closes at 2pm – winter hours). We stayed long enough to encounter winter hours here. Last minute groceries – can’t believe that Thanksgiving is breathing down my neck already and one last water fill at the fire station. We chatted with Patrick for a while about sailing across the channel and going to the Pacific. He had some friends that had built his boat (it’s done 2 circumnavigations and been to Antarctica). Quite inspiring. He donated a book called Pacific Crossing Guide to us to help inspire us to make that S. Pacific trip that Wayne’s always wanted to make. We also got quite a pep talk from him.

I made some hamburgers for dinner and finished my last Stephanie Plum novel until I can find book 15.

The world is our neighborhood in a parking lot

The world is our neighborhood in a parking lot

Interesting note here. We’ve now been living in the boatyard – READ that as parking lot – for about a month now. It was only supposed to be 2 weeks maximum. It’s interesting to think of… us living in a parking lot. As fellow boaters, we’re all parked next to each other on a layer of gravel – essentially a parking lot. Some boats are occupied and some are not. Some neighbors are here doing repairs, some are heading south after working on the boat, some have already gone elsewhere and the boats are covered for the season. It’s quite a multicultural experience. Probably like living in the parking lot of an airport. We’ve met people from Germany, England, France, Holland, Australia, Canada and Quebec, Denmark, and of all the exotic places – Michigan.


Life here goes something like this. Climb down ladder to visit the facilities (showers, laundry, restrooms, lounge area for the television or to swap books), visit the next boat owner out sanding their hull or painting or varnishing. Sometimes you can’t understand each other. For instance there’s a Quebec boat here (a Westerly) that I admire because I used to know someone with a Westerly (actually it was the first sailboat I ever stepped foot on). I went to go chat with the gentleman only to discover that he spoke no English, an I spoke no French. We both spoke a little spanish and a lot of hand gesturing. Other discussions go something like this: “So almost done painting?” “Yep 5 more coats of varnish aught to do it, then we’ll start tearing the engine apart to see why it isn’t working” “Cool we’re taking the loaner car to the grocery store and West Marine. They have fenders on sale and we could use another chart. you need anything?” Oh hang on! Let me get my water jugs and jerry cans. Okay. So the 4 of us are loaded into the car with the jerry cans and water jugs. Oh hey – Martin said he needs us to pick up his alternator at the auto parts place– do you mind? Um, no… sure… Oh hey can we stop at the deli and pick up some lunch? Um, okay – but we only have the car for an hour… No problem. you sign it out for an hour and I’ll sign it out for an hour… then we get two hours. Hey we can stop at the hardware store too and see if they have any cleaner to get the gunk off the engine”. After the discussion we pile in to the car, leave the parking lot and head into town. After filling the 3 jerry cans with fuel and 6-5 gallon containers with water, theres’ not much room for the groceries or fenders from West Marine, so we head over to the marina across the spit because we hear that you can get parts for everything from them woosh – it’s a boating mechanics dreamworld over there even though this wasn’t on our planned agenda. How come we can’t get this stuff at our boatyard? Okay, hey guys I really need to pick up some food. Okay but we’re late already – we need to go sign the car out again. Okay. Then we can drop some of this stuff off and we’ll have more room and time too… By the time we finish, we’re banned from signing the car out again, I forgot the eggs for breakfast (remembered the beer though), and our water jugs got punctured by something sharp in the back of the car and the car is all wet, and 2 water cans are ½ empty. We had a successful outing. We discovered a great new deli, a marina parts store that has everything, a way to keep the car out for longer than you’re supposed to, and a fire station that shares its water with you (that doesn’t have a limey taste).

Oh oh, we forgot to get the fenders from West Marine.

Think Ernie can sign the car out this time?

Saturday, November 14, 2009 Kaaaachooo... oh no...

Mack came by bright and early this morning to put our new bilge pump hose on but Wayne told him to come by a little later so he could empty out the lazerette for him first. As the day went on we still hadn’t heard from the boatyard guys about going into the water. After Mack came back we discovered that we wouldn’t be going in today – we still needed to paint the bronze fittings and and dings before going into the water so the barnacles wouldn’t be taking over. What did I say? Time to scribble that off the calander for tommorrow. Soo it was time for a trip to the hardware, auto supply and West Marine in that order to see if we could find some bottom paint, a new zinc, transmission fluid and plumbing fittings. The picture was taken by Jen Holloway of some of the damage here at Stingray Pt.

I’m finally coming down with Wayne’s cold. As the day wears on, I feel worse. Here comes the sneezing and running nose. Yuck, I hate that. Wayne painted the bare spots then we both took a nap. I know I’m not feeling well now. It’s been all day and we haven’t eaten. Time to see if I can order pizza. I know Bella’s doesn’t deliver but it seems to me Dano’s does. Now if I can just stand in the right part of the boat so my phone works…

Wow. It’s really dark out. Went down the ladder in the dark wishing I’d have brought a flashlight with me on the trip to the marina lounge to pick up the pizza. Bagheera plus Frosty were sitting in the lounge when I got there and a preteen was watching some teen show of the rich and famous teens living in luxery. Interesting. Someone earlier had pizza in the lounge and it smelled soooo good but I’ve been craving pizza all week. I told Wayne that’s why we were still here. We couldn’t leave until we’d tried Dano’s Pizza. Bagheera was working on her computer and Jim was killing time since there still was no power on A Dock. When the pizza finally got there, I had to walk it back in the dark avoiding the puddles as best I could and the pizza was no longer piping hot but it was tastey just the same. Hot tea along with it feels good on the throat. Ah-ahh choo! Bah humbug… It’s 7:30 and looks like midnight out there and feels it too. Time for bed, sniffle, sniffle, sniffle.

Oh, by the way… we’ve come to the conclusion that since we’ve been in this boatyard for about a month now (and still counting) that we’ve been across the Mason Dixon Line long enough to switch from “you’se” to “ya’ll” so – gnight ya’ll… Yah, yah I know, I’ve always used ya’ll any how. It’s the hushpuppies that get to me here. I saw hushpuppy mix in the grocery store and hushpuppies in the deli the other day and that started me thinking of North vs South, then we visted the battlefields at Yorktown… well ya’ll get the drift.

Stretch, yawn, sneeze, cough, gnight ya’ll.

Friday, November 13, 2009 The remnants of Ida persist with this blasted NorEaster...

Dun dun, dun dun, Friday the 13th. Between the wind, pelting rain, slapping halyards (the ropes that raise the sails) it was a restless night. I don’t think either of us got much sleep.
As twilight finally approached, I got up and made some coffee, wrang out the wet towel around the drippy mast, swiped up the condensation around the port windows that like to drip, then threw on my jacket to go up top, then headed to the marina lounge to look around. I figured I’d better see if anything had blown onto us (branches, spare parts), or off of us (sail covers, spare parts). The mainsail cover had been laying up top on the butterfly hatch (from when we started to put the sails up) and I noticed that when I looked upward at twilight that I could see light – no sail cover laying on the butterfly hatch.

The rain stopped. The wind’s still howling and it’s cold outside. The little heater is working well! Didn’t quite realize how well until I went up top. Brrrrr… There’s quite a bit of long pine needles, oak and maple leaves, bark and other debrii all over the deck area but everything still looks intact. Down the ladder and avoiding the puddles I made my way towards the marina to see if I could walk the docks.  Here's a radar picture of the weather  patterns - note how we're in the red area.

Nope. The docks are all still under water. Joe & John asked if we were ready to go into the water – they were by the boatlift and I told them they must be kidding right? Yes they were kidding. Chatted a bit with them and I’m almost afraid to say “we’re going in the water tomorrow”. Everytime I say that, something comes up.The tides were still flood stage at 5 ft above high tide. So nobody will be going into the water until tomorrow. The area where the boatlift operates is still under water. Here's one of the boatyard guys in the covered dock area clowning with me - but in all seriousness, note that you can't see the dock he's walking on. Saw Jim (Frosty) and we were talking about how we could all probably get out of here without worrying about staying in the channel LOL but heck, who wants to go fight all those waves out there. Besides with our luck we’d probably hit somebodies pier just below the surface of the water. I considered taking a shower but while I was in the womens room the lights went out then back on. Maybe I’ll wait until later.

The boatyard and marina did a terrific job of handling all the boat lines, etc. through this mess, to prevent damage to the boats and docks (well most of the dock area – some are floating) with all the storm and tidal surge.

So far we haven’t been anywhere but here for a month and it’s been interesting. Once we got here, we had to return home to pick up our forgotten instruments, we had to do unforseen repairs to the boat, I got to become a village witch (quite successful at that), Hurricane Ida said hello and decided to become reactivated over us colliding with a NorEasterly, and held on top of us by a high pressure system moving in from the Great Lakes, and we encountered record high tides and floods with 50-60 knot winds. Check out the wind map again to the left for today. The purple areas are 50-60 knots.Score one point for our first month of our second season out. Now if we could just get off land and into the water without sinking. I struggle to say that “we’re scheduled for launch tomorrow”. Every time I say this or write it on my calendar, I have to scribble it back off. Tomorrows another day.

Thursday, November 12, 2009 Ida has made landfall and is growing as an unnamed storm

     Noisy, blustery night last night. I didn’t sleep much & got up a little after 6 this morning to make some coffee. A little after 7 I heard the tractor that pulls the trailor of jackstands (the moveable legs that hold the boats upright on land) stop next to our boat and thought oh no, they can’t be serious – it’s a mess out there. Wayne jumped out of bed in a state of disbelief also thinking that they were coming to get us with the boat lift, but the guys were just out tightening all the jackstands to make sure they held up against the predicted 50mph winds blasting the boats along with the torrential downpouring of rain that has the ground quite saturated with standing puddles that look like mini-lakes. If you look at the wind map follow the directional pointers as they circle inward toward the Chesapeake. we're located near the orangish/pinkish area with the red moving in towards us.

     Wayne called the boatyard at 7:20 to tell them we didn’t want to go in the water in this mess and was told that there was no way you're were going in. Nobody was going anywhere today unless it was an emergency. The docks are all flooded and the marina has no power. I guess some of the lines are underwater along with the gas pumps and docks and it’s a mess down there. I was in the process of putting on my shoes and foulies (raingear) to head for the lounge/restrooms for my morning constitution and decided I’d better grab my camera. I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to take any pictures in this mess without destroying my camera but thought “you never know”. In the pic to the left the posts sticking up out of the water next to the sailboat is where the travel lift drives on to put the boats into the water. Its GONE!

     You couldn’t see the docks – they’re all underwater and the area where the boat lift operates to lift and lower boats into the water was not visible – the entire area is under water. In the picture to the left one guy is standing on the dock and the other is standing on the boat. Note that the dock is about a ft under water.The forester I chat with and Jim (Frosty) were in the lounge – they had to wade through the water on the submerged docks to get to there. What a mess. The weather forcasts are calling for more of the same throughout the day with wind and weather warnings up all over the area. The tides are 4 ft above high tide and 5-6 ft above high tide in the Norfolk area. The wind warnings are calling for 40-50 knot winds with gusts to 60 still. Good day to hunker down and hope that the boat doesn’t get tipped over in the winds – that would be quite a domino effect in the boatyard. I can see why they were checking the jackstands this morning. The NorEaster and remnants of hurricane Ida are feeding off of the warm water to rejuvenate Ida and it’s wreaking havoc along the North Eastern seaboard. In looking at the weather maps the air is all swirling around us like we’re the center of the low pressure area. The forcaster at Accuweather called it a crescendo of wind and waves that will be building through the next high tide with sustained winds of 50 knots and better.  These are the worst weather conditions in 20 years for Virginia Beach and the Norfolk area. Some areas have higher than high tides of 5-6 ft higher than the high tide level. Wayne said it’s that Aben mojo happening again and tomorrow we’re expecting more of the same. The flooding along the coastal area due to high waves is expected to continue after the winds and rains have stopped.
     What a day. The winds at times are very scary – they keep clocking around rotating the wind generator on the next boat over in irratic patterns. The rain sounds like hail on the hull of the boat. The little heater has been running nonstop, all day and I’m about to turn the oven on and heat up the rest of the meat pie I made last night for dinner tonight. It will be interesting to see what tomorrow brings.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009 Getting ready for Ida to take over the VA coast

     Wet day out today. The remnants of Hurricane Ida have been pelting the coast of VA all day and more of the same is forcast for tonight and tomorrow. Winds of 35 gusting to 45 at times with pelting rain are expected to continue tomorrow. Higher high tides with the new moon cycle starting tomorrow. The winds are a howling out. The guys came by bright and early this morning in the rain to tighten the bolts on the bottom of the rudder and saw off the excess metal. The propeller is back in place and secure with a cotter pin. Now if the high and low would lighten up a bit so the weather gets better we might be able to go into the water tomorrow. I seriously doubt this is going to happen though. It looks like the pressure gradient is going to get steeper creating very high winds along with the rain. Yuck.
     Made eggs, sausage, potatoes and toast for breakfast – needed something warm and homey for breakfast to chase away the chill, then we put on our foulies (weather gear) to head over to the marina lounge and catch the weather. After watching it I’d definitely say unless it moves out of here quickly we’re not going into the water as planned.  Time to put on my mermaid gear and get ready for the storms - hey it looks better than storm gear aye?
     I messed around on the computer most of the day then made a beef meat pie for dinner. I’m so glad we bought this little heater from Walmarts – it’s been a life saver in this cold wet weather.
     Alli if you’re reading this – be strong – you’ll get through this. You know what you have to do. I wish I could be there to help you. I know this is a painful process for you…

Tuesday, November 10, 2009 Houston - we now have a rudder and prop back on!

Chatted with Frosties Fantasy and Grommit this morning. Jim said he’s supposed to be put in the water today so it sounds like the engine is back in and time for trials. His 12-volt isn’t working though so they may need to do some more work on his alternator.

Mack is installing our shaft and Wayne is below the sink again. Looks cloudy out and rain is predicted for the next couple days. Looks like we may be shooting for a Friday launch if the weather is correct and all goes well with putting the boat back together.

I polished off book 12 and made hotdogs for dinner… The big excitement of the day was getting our rudder back on the boat YAY!!!

Monday, November 09, 2009 Quiet day at the boatyard & a bikeride

Went down to take a shower and started chatting with Marie from Cattiva (Cattiva means bad girl in Italian). Discovered that our name also means hummingbird in Italian. It’s interesting to find out that it means the same thing in several languages.

Mack didn’t make it in to work today but our parts came in this afternoon. I saw our shaft and prop sitting in the boatyard plant. So YAY! The parts are all in now!

Wayne took the car back to Enterprise and I started putting some stuff away on the boat. When he got back I absconded with a bike and went for a bike ride into Deltaville to the post office and then ended up at a bakery. Chatted with a couple from the sailboat Alpha Tango that is anchored over in Fishing Bay (where we picked up the old anchor last year). They’re one of the few remaining sailboats at anchor there so we’re not the only late stragglers still here. Bought some chicken noodle soup and brownies and when I got back to the boat discovered there were chunks of homemade focaccia bread thrown in the bags with the soup. Ymmmm… I thought that Wayne would like some soup but nope. I sat up top and ate the soup and made him a couple of hot dogs. It looks like Foxglove is also in the process of trying to remove his propeller shaft to replace his cutlass bearing. Watched him and was about to go see if I could help but the watermen from a few boats down came over to help and when they brought a sledgehammer with them I figured I’d better butt out.
It was a nice day out 70 and calm. I guess the rest of the week is supposed to be a bust – the remnants of hurricane Ida are making its way here. So it should be a wet and windy couple of days. That must mean we’ll be getting into the water soon. I think its time to check facebook and see how things went back home with Alli, then a little light reading (Janet Evanovich here I come) and call it a day.

Sunday, November 8, 2009: History revisited at Williamsburg & Yorktown

Wayne had a rough night, coughing, sneezing, stuffed up. He took a decongestant, had a muffin with his coffee & I had toast :) then we headed for Williamsburg, Jamestown and Yorktown today. What a trooper! We never made it to 1 of the 3 historic places. We missed Jamestown because the road was closed at the bridgeway but Colonial Parkway Drive was a beautiful road to travel  to get to the three places. The trees were tall and there was quite a bit of color. It was a lovely fall drive through a park setting as opposed to going through the middle of town. The picture to the right is a shot of one of the places in Williamsburg.

Colonial Williamsburg is quite a bit larger than I expected. It's a 300-acre living history museum. I was surprised to see the tour buslines and posted entrance fees to gain access to the shows, exhibits, etc. $56.00! It's like paying to go to an amusement park like Cedar Point. It seemed a bit steep to me to get a history lesson, so... since we’re lacking funds, we did the foot walking tour around the town square. It was nice to see people walking around and standing around in their 17th century garb (they also have costumes you can rent for the day). As you take the walkway bridge back through time, across the valley to the old town they have bronze plaques embedded in the cement with dates and sayings i.e. you are now leaving the 21st century; 1820s you cannot travel over land more than 70 miles a day (heck we can’t travel over water that far STILL!); 1776 – from this date back you are a subject of his majesty the king; They were pretty neat to read going back and then returning to the Visitor Center.

The cemetery at the church had quite a few old graves going back to the 17th century – some quite difficult to to read. It was interesting to think about the patriots sitting around the tavern debating the merits and pitfalls of creating a new democracy.

The Yorktown Battlefield was thought provoking. As you stand there looking out over the battlefield in the quiet afternoon with the sun setting to the west, you get an eerie, feeling thinking about the many lives that were lost here. Standing in the quiet air near the cannons I could hear the battle raging in my mind, I could picture the fallen and dying soldiers as I looked out over the empty field, to be finally brought out of my reverie by the singing of a bird in a nearby tree. The battle that was won here ensured our freedom to become citizens of America and no longer subjects of the British crown.

An amazing 300 years of history along here and the York River. Victory Monument was erected out to commemorate our victory over the British and to memorialize the fallen that fought so bravely for freedom; Commissioned in 1781 by congress, it was finally completed in 1884. America won her independence here at Yorktown during the last major battle of the Revolutionary War on October 19, 1781 when the British surrendered to General George Washington and our French allies.

It was an interesting day exploring some of the history of the U.S. We fought for so much and gained so much and now it seems we’re frittering our freedoms away, giving them slowly away once again. I almost bought a “Don’t tread on me flag” today” still want one…

Nov 1st to Nov 7th, 2009 Deltaville, VA

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Wow, November already…

Rainy, drizzly day out today. My bread dough rose fairly well, so my bread making is still good to go! After I punched the dough down and transferred it to bread pans to let rise again, I headed to the marina lounge. I worked on getting Outlook Express operating on Wayne’s computer while Wayne tried to figure out the plumbing on the boat. He didn’t have much luck other than figuring out the plumbing looks like a god-awful mess (his quote). After I got back onboard I finished making the bread. I don't think there's anything better than the smell of freshly baking bread & we ended up just having bread for dinner. Not a well-balanced meal day, but tasty – especially on a chilly day. While polishing off Janet Evanovich’s book 9 in the Stephanie Plum series I was wishing I remembered where I stashed the peanut butter while unpacking. Bet that would go good on the warm, homemade bread I was munching on.

Monday, November 02, 2009

Mack showed up this morning with Joe and John boat lift driver extraordinare (pic at right), and the boatlift to take the rudder off. Mack is not having a good 24 hours. A large dog attacked him while his wife and he were out riding on his motorcycle last night, and he has no heat at home. He broke a tool on our rudder shaft this morning and hurt his hand. But he got it all taken apart. He told me that I had been a big hit on Halloween. Oh? I guess I came up in their meeting this morning. Wayne said, “Yep, I told you she was quite the witch”. Um, yah… It was good to know that I was a hit though because I really did have fun.

We still don’t have all the parts in and later in the day got some more bad news. The propeller shaft is worn down where it hits the cutlass bearing so even with a new cutlass bearing there would still be wobble. So we now are waiting for a new propeller shaft too. Mo money… but at least its only 3 ft. long - so not as costly as some others. It looks like we’re going to be here another week. I sure hope we get south farther before the snow starts flying. It’s been cold again at nights and our heater is now… not working… Wonder if they’d notice a witch sleeping on the couch in the lounge.

We ran to the hardware store to find parts for the foot pump for Wayne’s plumbing job but after searching around awhile, decided he didn’t have the diameter of the tubing on the boat so we nixed that and went and got another load of water at fire station and came back to the boat.

Made chicken & stuffing with some green beans for dinner now for some more reading – “Ten Big Ones” and Wayne’s on Number Nine of the Plum series. It’s funny to hear him chuckle so much.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Cool day out today. I ended up staying in my sweats. Mack came by for a bit this morning to clean up the bottom of the rudder foot (where the rudder attaches to the keel) and to let us know what the latest was on our parts. Theoretically they should be here today sometime (mhmm). I took some pictures of the guys then got some more coffee. Went to the Marina lounge to check out my settings on the new blog and to see if I could pull it up on Wayne’s computer – success, then added a few weather sites to his favorites menu on Internet Explorer. Freddy was there at the table doing his school work with his mom (from the English boat Shiver) and wasn’t real happy this morning. Somebody made away with his chili pepper plant last night. The mystery of the missing chili peppers.

Wayne was still trying to figure out which way to go with installing a foot pump at the sink when I got back and was not happy with the way the plumbing is set up in the boat. While Wayne went to the showers, I went and chatted with Jim on Frosty’s Fantasy then came back and worked on the blog settings, and downloaded my camera pictures. Patrick from Foxglove was going into town to the hardware so we waited from him to come back then went into town for water, fuel and groceries.

When we got back, Wayne decided that we needed to do something about bowsprit so went to the office to see if someone could look at it for us. The backing plate is angling up into the wood and it looks a bit splintered. It’s not looking in very good shape when we looked at it from below and we’re trying to figure out a way of keeping it viable until we pull the boat in the spring again. Wayne would like to have some sort of backing plate made for this winter and then dismantle it and redo it during the summer. The guy from the boatyard showed up to look at our bowsprit. After climbing up a ladder and looking at it, the gentleman from the boatyard said “you have one of them there hollow bowsprits and from a liability standpoint, I couldn’t make a backing plate for it”. From the liability standpoint that made sense, but the bowsprit being hollow didn’t make a lot of sense. Wayne and I looked at each other, then Wayne went up the ladder and couldn’t figure out what he was talking about – the bowsprit is solid wood except where it’s splitting and crushed by the old backing plate. After fingering around the damaged area and feeling wood all around, I don’t either of us would be comfortable with him making a plate for us or doing work on the sprit if he really thinks that this is a hollow bowsprit. I’ll have to check online with the Bayfield group and see if any of them have any ideas. After the yard guy left we stood around chatting with Jim and Christine from Baroness and Patrick from Foxglove of Meon. Patrick came up with the idea of perhaps epoxying it for now – Wayne seems to like that idea.

Christine and Jim are going into the water bright and early tomorrow. Time for them to get rid of extra stuff they don’t need. We took a boat hook they were pitching and it was a shame we couldn’t have used one of the 3 anchors they were getting rid of – they looked in pretty good shape.

I heated up last night’s spaghetti and sautéed some mushrooms in butter and wine to go with it along with some broccoli spears. It’s getting dark earlier and with the time change, that makes it worse. Time to polish off book eleven in the Stephanie Plum series.

Thursday, November 5, 2009
Happy Birthday Penelope! We’re still at the boat yard.

Waiting and finding more work to do on the boat every time we look somewhere . Watched Baroness go into the water this morning. Joe and John showed up at 7:30 to lift them up and move them to the water & she started right up. The new holes they put into the hull and the thru hulls are not leaking so it looks like a go for them to Norfolk this weekend and the oyster festival.

There are gales expected for tonight and tomorrow but they’re hanging out until Saturday on the docks.

I tried working on linking the blog to my site again, after watching Baroness go into the water, then ended up undoing all my work because it was still giving me errors. Then Wayne and I took a couple bikes to the hardware store to look for parts for the foot pump. After an hour of browsing there, I left Wayne and went next store to the second hand shop to browse a bit and then back to Hurds Hardware. Wayne still wasn’t having any luck and someone directed us to go to Walden’s Marina over near Cocomo’s Restaurant. That turned out to be a very good lead and Wayne ended up getting his fittings and tubing there.

Back at the boat, I tried unsuccessfully to work on the DNS settings again while Wayne napped. I think Wayne is starting to feel poorly – hope it’s not the flu. It seems to have hit Virginia pretty hard.

The internet/broadband connection wasn’t very good and I finally got frustrated and packed up my computer to the marina lounge to work. Thought I was making good progress – it was nice and quiet until a family of kids came in and turned up the T.V. and then I lost track of where I was with the CNAME/ANAME and other settings. Somehow I ended up directing everyone from my website to some Spam page that said “YOU WON…Pick your prize”… needless to say I deleted all the work once again and reset all my settings back to the original ones (I hope).

I was going to do some laundry, but Christine came in and after a discussion I found out the laundry machine was broken. She was going to head into Gloucester for laundry since she wouldn’t be able to do it in Norfolk.

Heading back to the boat I ran into the guy that handles the boat yard stuff and he told me that our parts wouldn’t be in until Monday. He also said I should check out the oyster festival in Urbana this Friday and Saturday since we were still going to be here. He said it’s a big to do here and they get 30-40,000 people that show up for it. They have fritters, patties, stews, and every other way imaginable to serve oysters. I didn’t have the heart to tell him I’m not overly fond of oysters. He was talking about going there after work tomorrow. I’m just exasperated that the parts still aren’t in. He said the guy that works on this stuff is usually pretty good at getting things to the boatyard and didn’t understand what the holdup is. After listening to the guy at Walden’s Marina talking about all his guys being in Urbana today and tomorrow, I think I know what the problem is – oysters.

Came back to the boat and gave Wayne the bad news. He was laying on the floor in the dark looking under the sink trying to connect the foot pump to a hole he drilled under the cabinet.

Gin and tonic for him and I swept up the wood shavings and made dinner – chicken, stuffing, broccoli and carrots. Hey maybe we can rent a car and explore some of Virginia since we’re going to be stuck here… Wayne agreed that we should get a car if they had weekend specials and Enterprise does so we reserved one for the weekend. They’ll pick us up around 11 tomorrow and we return it on Monday by noon o’clock. $23.85/day will let us do a tour of the surrounding area in Virginia.

Friday, November 6, 2009

I got up & made coffee before light, then went down to the shower for a quick clean up and called Enterprise to see if they could pick us up. Joe and John came by this morning around 8am to move the boats around to get Mistral out from the back so they moved us across near the trees and closer to the power outlet. It’s more of a shaded location but we get the afternoon sun to help warm us up before nightfall. Picture to the right is Joe directing John into place at our new location.

Enterprise said they’d be here around 10:00 but when they got here, there was no room for us and we had to wait until 11:00 am. When we got into Gloucester, Enterprise printed out a map for us to get to Williamsburg, Yorktown, etc… Then we went to Walmart for odds and ends. I got a small heater and toaster for when we’re in port. The little heater seems to be working okay. It doesn’t put out much, but maybe it will keep the dampness and cold to a minimum in the boat. These 35-45 degree nights get a bit nippy without heat. I can’t believe that our heater decided to kick the bucket. We can’t figure out what’s wrong with it – the wires we trace seem okay. Can’t find the bloody fuses for it but with the smell of burning plastic and exhaust fumes the last time we ran it – I’m not sure what the problem is. Wayne will like his snuggies that the girls got him when he’s standing in the cold at the helm this year. There’ll be no running below for warmth. I think he’s starting to catch a cold – oh no… He’s coughing a lot and starting to get stuffy.

Saturday, November 07, 2009
Pretty looking day out. We decided to take a run into Norfolk today. We visited to Nauticus, the Battleship Wisconsin, took a tour of the Naval Yard and then went to Sam’s Club over at Newport News.

Nauticus is a contemporary museum along the waterfront that uses the setting of Norfolk's harbor to showcase global maritime commerce and the world's largest Navy. In a way it reminded me of Navy Pier. It had various exhibits, shops, and things to visit. They put on various programs, educational and entertaining, so there’s always something going on. We’ll have to return sometime and do some more exploring.

The tour of the Battleship Wisconsin was amazing. We took a self guided tour around her decks. The anchor chains are huge – each link weighs 120 lbs. I couldn’t imagine trying to stop those chains from being let out. The armament is impressive – tomahawk missiles, harpoon missles, nine 16” 50 caliber guns in 3 turrets each weighing 3000 tons with a range of 23 nautical miles (each gun going off is like hurling a small car 23 miles), twelve smaller 5” 38 caliber guns and a close in weapons system. I don’t think I’d want to tackle her in our little 36’ sailboat with flare guns… actually I don’t think I’d want to tackle a battle ship in any vehicle. It’s like a city within a city – you could get lost (I did) on this ship! Built in 1939 and launched in Dec. of 1943, she saw her first combat at Iwo Jima in 1945. In 1948 she was placed out of commission an in reserve in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet in Norfolk and then was later recommissioned. She served in Okinawa, the Korean War, and in 1990 made the 8500 nautical mile trip to the Persian Gulf in 16 days. 25 knots is a whole lot faster than we move (6 knots for us). She was decommissioned for the 3rd time in 1991 after leading the “Parade of Ships” for Fleet Week in N.Y. Harbor and in 1995 was removed from the list of active ships. In 96 she came back home to the Norfolk Naval Shipyard then moved to the Naval Base in Norfolk. In 2000 she was finally berthed next to Nauticus and from what I understand can be brought back to life if needed, but for now she sits proudly here for visitors to get a glimpse of her history of service.

After the tour of the Wisconson we took the Norfolk Naval Yard tour. They only give one a day so we had to make sure that we were there by 1:15pm for the 1:30 tour. We missed the initial turn into the tour area and ended up going through gate 5 to turn around and go back to the tour pick-up area. Impressive entrances to the base though.

The yeoman that signed us in saw Michigan on our licenses and groaned “oh no – Michigan!” She was a buckeye and we went back and forth about MI vs OH State. She was fun and said don’t worry – I’m not the one running your tour. LOL

It was a nice tour of the base even if all the ships had departed on the previous Monday. He wasn’t sure why or where they all went, but it was interesting to note that they had carriers, cruisers, destroyers in port that all disappeared so we didn’t get to see many ships at dock. The remaining ships were destroyers, frigates and cargo ships. He did take us by 2 attack submarines when he found out I was into subs. He’d done duty on subs and I think was pleased to see someone that was into subs. Wayne was bummed that all the big ships were gone and is speculating that they headed to Iran since there is no hurricane in the area to move the fleet out to see.

Side NOTE:The USS New York had also left Monday for New York for her commissioning. It has 7 ½ tons of Twin towers steel welded into her bow. We saw it on the news and it was emotional to think of the ship coming into port with some of the Twin Towers as a part of her. Her motto is “Strength Forged through Sacrifice: Never Forget”. This motto pledges an undying commitment to the defense of freedom. The steel in her reinforces that motto.

The Ships Crest

· Seven rays of sunlight signify the crown atop the Statue of Liberty and the seven seas.
· Central focus placed on the Twin Towers and the bow of the ship, forged from Twin Towers steel.
· Breastplate of the phoenix bears the colors of first responders from the New York Police Department, New York Fire Department, and Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
· Blood drops represent the fallen.
· Three stars for those earned by the battleship USS NEW YORK (BB34) in World War II at Iwo Jima, Okinawa and North Africa.

Wayne was disappointed because he didn’t get to see any carriers up close and personal. It was an interesting tour to see the base from the land viewpoint. Last time we came by it was via water so we got a new perspective on it.

After the tour we went to Sam’s Club for batteries, chips, munchies, etc… then back to Deltaville. Brought home a rotisserie chicken from Sams for dinner. It was quite tasty with salad but Wayne just ate the chicken. I think he’s feeling worse today. Oh no – my glands are starting to feel swollen. Tomorrow’s a new day.