Our Newest Crewmember

As we travel down The Ditch, we decided that we needed a little help keeping track of our position. After several hours of travel, with one buoy looking just like the next and and ever-changing but consistent rows of houses, docks, sand dunes and trees, it is easy to forget where we are on the chart. Accordingly, we enlisted, or should we say Shanghaied, one of Amelia's toys named "Meat" (yes, an odd name, particularly when the namer is a vegetarian six year old.) Meat is a two-inch tall meat-eating dinosour who now moves accross the chart each time we pass a navigational aid (buoy, day mark, turn, etc.).

Thanks to Meat we know know where we are on the chart at all times. Now if Meat could only tell us where the US Corp of Engineers has neglected to maintain the ICW water depth at more than six feet. This would enable us to avoid running aground when the chart says the water should be deeper, as we did leaving Oriental and three times yesterday. We had hoped that buying unlimited towing insurance would mean that we would not need to use it. We were wrong. Perhaps forward-looking sonar should go on Dave's Christmas list.

We are now in Southport NC, near Cape Fear. Southport is famous in Civil War history for being one of the few ports that the Union blockades could not keep closed, foiled by the tenacity and skill of local blockade runners (known locally as shoal runners). We will try to follow their good example and avoid runing aground (again) on the ever shifting Cape Fear shoals as we cross the border into South Carolina tomorrow, provided the weather cooperates, with the goal of Charleston by Christmas, or maybe New Year's Eve.

The Town Dock – Oriental, NC

We are waiting out a rainy weekend in Oriental, NC. Oriental is a friendly little town on the Pamlico Sound with 3,000 boat slips and only 850 permanent residents according to the experts at local coffee shop, The Bean. On The Bean’s front porch, the locals have an excellent view of transient boaters attempting to land and tie up at the Town Dock and the marina across the street. There, they rate the navigational abilities of arriving boaters using Olympic-style placards. As you can see, we got an average score of 4.7 (out of 10) but hope to do better upon departure.

Oriental has a fascinating website www.towndock.net which has a harbor webcam. In the current HarborCam, Serendipity’s mast is visible on the left behind the low building in the foreground (The Bean).

Over the past week we made good time motoring down The Ditch except for two nights and an entire day spent at anchor on the Little Alligator River waiting for dense fog to lift. The fog had not been predicted and we awoke at 5:30 AM to be ready to weigh anchor and set out at first light in order to cover the maximum distance during daylight and arrive at our planned destination before dark. As it gradually got lighter, we realized that we were in fog so thick that we couldn’t see more than a few yards from the boat. We spent the entire day expecting the fog to lift any minute and regularly adjusting downward our travel expectations. About 2:00 PM we finally realized that we would be staying at anchor for another night and relaxed. A good reminder to pick our anchor locations well.

One of the interesting challenges of traversing the ICW is dealing with the many lift and swing bridges along the way, as well as some locks, each with its own schedule. After going through the Alligator River Bridge we heard many complaints on the radio that the bridge had just closed (right after we were through), apparently for at least a day, for repairs. It underscored the importance of schedule flexibility when traveling by boat.

The canal down the Alligator River has been another eye-opener. While the canal itself is wide, the sides are shallow and littered with tree stumps and debris so the navigable portion is very narrow – in places potentially too narrow for two boats to pass. We were worried the entire time about running into one of the wide river barges that routinely use the ICW going in the opposite direction. In fact, the canal had us so spooked that when Dave lost his favorite hat to a wind gust, we didn’t even think about turning the boat around in the narrow channel to retrieve it. The area is quite beautiful and much more rural than expected but very remote. No cell phone access for three days was quite a surprise!

We expect to leave Oriental tomorrow to continue to Beaufort NC to pick up our mail and then continue south. In the meantime, we have some time to prepare to try to improve our docking score for the regulars on The Bean’s front porch.

Digging "The Ditch"

After leaving Annapolis last weekend, we had a brisk and boisterous sail down the Chesapeake Bay, with winds gusting to 35 knots, 8- to 10-foot seas and temperatures in the 30’s. We stopped over in Deltaville (running aground on entry and on exit) and had to chip ice off the cockpit cushions each morning. Then we ran aground entering the harbor at Hampton, just north of Norfolk.

We have finally made it into the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW), and are finally experiencing some sunny, warm weather with temperatures in the 60s. We had a fascinating trip through Norfolk VA (seeing all kinds of naval and commercial boats) and since have experienced a lot more nature as we wend our way down “The Ditch” as the ICW is called. Today we saw a lot of birds including a bald eagle. We stopped over in Great Bridge VA last night and are now in Coinjack, North Carolina, poised to continue south tomorrow to take advantage of the fair weather.

We celebrated Dave’s birthday yesterday and I am finally getting the hang of baking a cake which is more or less level (thanks in part to a little modification I made to the oven). Amelia is having a blast and we are enjoying being underway.

On Our Way (Finally!)

A month ago, someone posted a message on the Seven Seas Cruising Association Discussion Board asking if it would be crazy to leave Annapolis on December 1st and go south on the Intracoastal Waterway to Florida. While they got mixed response, we looked at each other and said "Yes - absolutely!" Well here we are on November 30th planning to shed our dock lines and shore power (with it our electric heat) and depart Annapolis at 6:30 AM tomorrow morning (December 1st) for points south.

The mechanical issues seem to be resolved and Dave is preparing a multipage saga of the work. If anyone wants to know the ugly details, just drop him an email at davidcarlson1@msn.com.

We will update the blog again as soon as our fingers thaw out.

All the best to you all,

Amelia, Carole and Dave

Mid-Atlantic Explorations

While marooned here in Annapolis, we’ve been trying to make the most of the time and learn more about the area. So for the past two weekends we rented cars and explored. This past weekend, we set out for the eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay and saw some interesting harbor towns, visited the Museum of the Chesapeake, ate some good seafood, hiked around a wildlife sanctuary and chilled at a local café.

Last weekend we explored Baltimore and Washington DC, both less than an hour away. In Baltimore on Saturday we explored the inner harbor and spent the day at the National Aquarium. The Aquarium had some great exhibits including a re-created rainforest and the dolphin show, which Amelia loved.

In Washington, Amelia and I went to see Congress in session. Explaining the three branches of government to a six-year-old was a little complicated, but I think that she got it based on a lot of fantastic questions. We also visited the National Zoo and the Museum of the American Indian. Last week, we rounded out our visit to the Smithsonian with a day at the Air and Space Museum, where we saw wonderful exhibits on the origins of flight and ate lunch in the McDonalds where the staff didn’t believe we were really Americans because we didn’t know the menu by heart.

We have also had a lot of time to read over the past few weeks. I’m reading The Sea by John Banfield, a beautifully constructed novel about memory and loss. I just finished (and Dave will soon start) Beautiful Swimmers, which won the Pulitzer Prize twenty years ago for its nonfiction account of crabbing in the Chesapeake and the families who pursue a traditional way of life as watermen. Our visit to the Museum of the Chesapeake this weekend helped to reinforce the challenges of scraping out a living from the Chesapeake Bay waters. Before that I finished Water for Elephants, a story of a depression era circus, and also read Eat, Pray, Love, an autobiography that chronicles a young women’s search for meaning post-divorce. Dave and I are regularly reading together with Amelia. We are currently reading Matilda, and just finished James and the Giant Peach as well as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, all by the same author (thoughtful gifts from Dan and Pam). Dave is reading technical manuals for the boat (in hope of channeling the repair gods to complete the repair work) and chart books (plotting our course southward once we are set free).

So best wishes to all and, with luck, the next blog entry will be from somewhere south!

Amelia, Carole and Dave

The Last Boat in Town

While we wait in Annapolis as the engine repair work slowly proceeds, we have found interesting ways to entertain ourselves. Amelia has become an even more serious boater and is exploring alternative nautical sleeping arrangements. This week she hung a hammock in the main cabin and is sleeping in it nightly.

There are a lot of fun things to do in Annapolis and we’ve tried to take advantage of them all: visit the two-room Children’s Museum, take a historic house tour and take advantage of the many excellent dining options. I got a temporary membership to a local gym, figured out the local bus system (not easy), restocked the pantry and did a little early Christmas shopping.

Technically, our boat is not moored in Annapolis proper but rather is in Eastport, a community with a distinct identity despite the fact that it is a five minute walk away and was annexed by the City of Annapolis in 1951. It retains its identity through fierce local pride, a flag, an unofficial name (the Maritime Republic of Eastport) and a town motto: “We like it this way!” (also printed on the flag). It is an interesting community with a blend of maritime service industries, fine dining (thanks to spectacular harbor views) and the pretty little homes of local residents who maintain a strong sense of Eastport identity. Indeed, it has the feel of a mid-Atlantic Key West. Last weekend, we attended a venerable local event – the tenth annual tug-of-war, street festival, chili cook-off and benefit for the local elementary school. They were short of participants for the Annapolis side of the women’s tug-of-war, so I jumped in. Despite excellent coaching from the lady in the green baseball cap (“Ladies, just put your butts into it, and when they count down 3 – 2 – 1, start with a little tug on the two-count just to get us started”) our team lost to Eastport’s local team as it apparently does every year.

We’ve been counting down our time in Annapolis by the number of masts left in the City mooring field every time we walk across the drawbridge to go downtown. When we arrived, it seemed that there were fifty boats there and every mooring was taken. As of last week, there were only two masts and, after a run of nice weather this week, none are left. We have the lonely feeling of being the last boat here as all of the other transient boats have continued south to warmer weather. At our marina, and most others, about half of the boats have been pulled out for winter storage. We took a dingy ride yesterday across Back Creek for breakfast at the Wet Dog Café where they apologized for a limited menu – they are closing this week and only had a few things left. Café Guru, the café down the street that I visit every morning post-run for a latte and newspaper, closes (permanently, in fact) at the end of this week leaving a huge hole in the community, since it serves as the local gossip and tip-trading location for residents, boaters and racers.

Our mechanical problems are on their way to resolution and we hope to leave in a few days, but as with all things "boats" even that is uncertain. We may well be the last boat leaving town.

Waiting in Annapolis

It is fortunate that Annapolis is such a lovely town, since we are stuck, stuck, stuck here until our boat is fixed. The boat has been parked in the marina for nearly four weeks now. We were in Boston for the last two weeks of October, but returned to the boat last week, only to watch the weather get colder and colder. It is down to the fifties during the day and near freezing at night but we can’t leave until the motor is repaired. At least the mechanics were here today, making slow but steady progress.

We’ve been having a lot of fun exploring, and were even invited today to a local arts event. But we are itching to continue south, both because of wanderlust and the weather. I just hope we get to leave before the snow flies!