With fuel and cigarettes, we are now ready to move on up the Bay! WHEW!! Next stop Solomons Island. Mercy sakes we have never seen so many marinas and so many pleasure craft (especially sailboats) in one place!!! We picked up a mooring here and made use of the bicycles to explore this pretty gem. While we were there, we went to the Calvert Maritime Museum. The museums just keep getting better and better. This one did not disappoint!!
We were able to spend some time investigating the problem with the windlass and got it fixed. It was an electrical issue that was hard to track down but we did get the gear oil changed while we had it off (usually a major PIA!). Now we can sleep a little easier - lol.
We made a couple of stops on our way to the next destination - Annapolis. One was exceptionally pretty in South River. One day, we put a few extra travel miles under our keel. We were motor sailing north when we heard a mayday call over the radio. We quickly discovered that we were close to the boat on fire! We turned and quickly headed in their direction. Since sailboats are so slow, they were assisted by faster and closer boats before we could reach them so we turned back on our path. Glad it had a good outcome!
After researching in our travel books, we decided to view some of Annapolis from Back Creek - a little less busy they said. We spent Labor Day weekend on a mooring here. We made the hike to get groceries which was a little over one mile each direction. Not bad but those groceries get heavy on these treks!! After the crowd started clearing from the holiday weekend, we moved around to Spa Creek for a couple more days. We were rewarded for our patience. We spent a glorious two days enjoying the tours of Annapolis Naval Academy. Wow is that an impressive place!! We plan to encourage Lyric and Linley to consider trying to make this their college choice!! If you could see the formation for meals to get all 4,500 students into the cafeteria - jaw dropping!!
So, with Devil Dorian no longer wreaking havoc on the Bahamas, we needed to figure out where we were going to go.
The path when it finally started moving again would take it across North Carolina (near where we made close friends in our extended time there) and a few hundred miles within our current location. With the predictions, we decided to return to the South River, up Harness Creek. The anchorage is so beautiful and protected. The shore excursions to walk Roxy are to Quiet Waters State Park and they were! We had very little wind and rain from Dorian. Thank goodness!!
Temperatures are not as hot as they had been in July and August. Plus we want to find a place that we can safely leave the boat for a few weeks - if there are no hurricanes threatening! We hope to take a road trip and drive to Texas for a visit. Pray for good weather! It's time to head south and explore the eastern side of the Chesapeake Bay..
