Going South, 2010

Our Southern journey began on a beautiful sunny Saturday, November 11, 2010 from Reedville, VA.  We reached Titusville, FL on December 7.    We traveled along the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) part of the way and offshore for two legs of the journey. 

Traveling the ICW, we often saw bald eagles among the wilderness.  Bridges, barges, locks, long canals, currents, tides and sometimes shallow spots make navigating a sailboat with a 7 foot draft, well, intersting. 




We enjoyed peaceful anchorages and also some charming towns like Coinjock, Belhaven, Beaufort, Wrightsville Beach and Carolina Beach in NC. 

Sometimes waking up before 5:00 AM is worth it!  A foggy morning in Alligator River.

What a treat to visit the beach on a warm sunny day in November! Wrightsville Beach and Carolina Beach are both great spots for 'beachin it' in the summer.


Doing the laundry is one of the typical activities when docking the boat at a marina.

It's nice meeting other people along the way. Lucy, the 21 month old daughter of the couple on "Ambition", served us some tea one afternoon. She has lived on the boat since her birth.

Our next two legs were offshore.  From Cape Fear River near Carolina Beach, NC to Charleston, SC (Nov 24-25) and then on to Fernandina, FL (Nov 27-28).  We docked the boat at each port for a couple of days. Sailing offshore is a bit tiring, but with our wind vane "Becca" to steer, the cockpit enclosure to keep the wind out, no channels, bridges, or shallow water, it is pretty easy going.  Wow, we are in Florida already!

Back to "the Hard Life"

The time had come to take the boat back to it's berth "on the hard" to escape hot weather and hurricane season. We wanted to get back to the marina while there was a break in the heat, and we arrived at Jennings Boatyard just in time for several days of beautiful cooler weather.

We set up our sewing shop under the shade tree to add some finishing touches to our boat cover, and John added grommets to complete it.  Hope it fits!


While waiting for Alexandra to be hauled out, John found time to replace some pipes, add new bathroom faucets, and he even installed a new head! 

Soon, Alexandra was back to her spot in the boatyard, and it was time to cover the boat for the summer. The new cover pieces fit pretty good, but we decided we will add some "skirts" to the bottom edge, as they were not as long as we would like. Something to do when we get back later this fall to re-do the bottom paint and other odd jobs needed before our next extended cruise.

Goodbye for a little while, Alexandra. We'll see you later on.

Colonial Beach, Virginia

Colonial Beach (inc. 1892) is a penninsula that is flanked by the Potomac River on one side and Monroe Bay on the other, lending itself to both fishermen and beachgoers. We were told the town's population is 4000, except on the weekends when it swells to 10,000.  It was the first city in Virginia to allow golf carts on town streets. 

We arrived at Colonial Beach Yacht Center on a hot Monday afternoon, got settled in our slip, turned on the air conditioner, and booked a golf cart for two nights.  A lot of places in Colonial Beach are closed on Tuesday, including the marina we were at, and the Golf Cart Rental store.  We picked up the golf cart and went straight to Fat Freda's for a juicy, messy, loaded cheeseburger. 



It was fun getting around this nostalgic town in our golf cart, and sure beats walking when it is sooo hot.  The A/C paid off, although it did give us a little scare one afternoon when it got an air lock and stopped cooling.  John got it working again soon.

When John saw these birds contemplating the impending heat (this was taken at about 9am), he said, "Reminds me of race day on Kentucky Lake".  One could not even discern the sky from the Potomac River.

Charming beach houses line Irving Avenue along the beach side of town. 

On the other side of the street.... the beautiful beaches that run all along Irving Avenue. There is also a city pier.

While in Colonial Beach, we shopped at the Beach Shop, got some iced cinnamon rolls at the bakery, went to the hardware store, did some laundry, and visited an art gallery.  We sampled mussels and a shrimp Po'Boy at the Happy Clam and had an old fashioned breakfast at Ola's Country Kitchen.  

And last, but not least..... we visited the truly authentic Tiki Bar at High Tides on the Potomac. Some people have asked me "What is a Tiki Bar?"  At a minimum, a tiki bar must be next to water, have music, and be outdoors.  This one happens to have it all:  Outside, ON the beach, which serves as the dance floor for the band, also located on the beach.  OK, the band wasn't playing on Tuesday when we were there, but it was great just the same! 

Chesapeake Cruising Part 2

After several beautiful days at the dock, the weather became very hot so we decided it would be a good time to return to West Virginia and do some work on our boat cover. Thanks for the wonderful air conditioned garage "sewing shop" Mom! AND for feeding us so well for a few days. We completed most of the cover, leaving only a few parts that needed fitting from the boat.



Next stop... Solomon's Island, Maryland, near the mouth of the Patuxant River.  Smith Point Light marks the shoals of one side of the mouth of the Potomac River which stretches over ten miles.   As you can see, there wasn't very much wind -- the "iron ginny" moved us along most of the way. We anchored in Mill Creek which provided views of wildlife on one side, and boaters traveling down the channel on the other.  The Chesapeake is a great place to see many differnt types of boats. 

We ate lunch at a Boomerang's BBQ resturaunt near the dinghy dock, visited the bar at Solomon's Pier where we got some fresh tuna, and found a fine cigar store near the Tiki Bar.  After two nights here, we decided we would explore the Potomac River,  just to our south.  This time, we had a wonderful wind to sail by, flying along with some gusts to 30 knots.

 We ended up at peaceful Coan River where we enjoyed one of our favorite passtimes - working the crossword puzzle.

The next day we hopped over to Smith Creek on the Maryland side of the Potomac River.  The Fisherman's Marina has been here for a long time.  We ate Rock Fish sandwiches at Scheible's Restaurant located behind the boathouse.  We anchored just outside the channel to be near the resturaunt and to catch more of the gentle breezes.  The beachfront cornfield can be seen just off our bow.


Sometimes the wind does not behave according to predictions.  That night the wind piped up and turned around straight out of the Potomac, yeilding a roly-poly night mixed with a little rain.  Our anchor held fast, but sleeping was a bit uncomfortable.  Memories of Key West filled our dreams, although we didn't actually get rocked out of bed.

The next day (Independance Day) we opted to go around the corner, and discovered why Barking Dog Bay was so popular with locals.  

Ahhh... No worries. A beautiful day AND night. Happy Fourth of July!

Boats

OK,  We've seen a lot of boats on the Chesapeake, but for now I am only going to put a few that have reminded us of our loved ones.  So far these are what we've found...  Can you guess who they remind us of? 

More to come soon.  Cheers, Family!

P.S.  If you need a hint, look at the filename in the titlebar of your browser.

Boat Work

While docked in Reedville, John installed a deck washdown system on Alexandra. It will be used to wash the ground tackle with sea water when it is hauled up from the muddy bottom.  Sweeet!  He also helped our friend John on "Reunion" go up his mast to do some maintenance. A bosun's chair is attached to a halyard and then John is raised up with a winch.

 

And what was Cindy doing while all the work was going on?

Around the Corner... Urbanna, Sandy Point, and back to Reedville

After two nights at Fishing Bay, we ventured up the Rappahannock River to Urbanna, VA.  We got a slip here and explored the town.  An excellent Greek Pizza place, Colonial Pizza, was the closest eatery and it alone was worth the trip up the river.  We stopped in a couple other restaurants while we were here,  and stocked up on some things at the nearby grocery store.  Alas, no Tiki Bar was to be found, but you can't have everything, eh?  You can see the bow of Alexandra looking through the charming old boat house at the marina. 

We stayed in Urbanna two nights, and moved northward to Sandy Point off of Ingram Bay, where we relaxed and swam at anchor again.  Sandy Point was just around the bend from Reedville, where we would be returning to the following day to drop Larry off for his return home.  A home along the bank of Sandy Point shines in the late afternoon sun.

The following afternoon, we motored on over to Reedville, just 30 minutes away, back to where we started.  We were reluctant to say goodbye to Larry, but he had to get back home to chores of his own.  We hope you'll come back and sail with us again Larry!

 

Alexandra at dock in Reedvile next to "Mundy Point"