Manteo to Chesapeake

Manteo to Chesapeake – June 29 to July 10, 2006

Fun with the Grandkids...

After leaving Edenton 6/29 we headed for Manteo with an overnight stop at Alligator River Marina. They have inexpensive fuel so we added 400 gallons to our tanks with the hope that we won't need to fuel up again until we head to the Caribbean. One of the nice things about a trawler is the great mileage we get. We were recently chatting with a captain who mentioned that their Hatteras burns 210 gallons an hour when they are cruising. That must hurt compared to our 2.5 to 3 gallons an hour.

When we arrived in Manteo 6/30 we awaited the arrival of our daughter Nellie and granddaughters Katie (age 16) and Jessie (11). They arrived laden with a case of wine and the many packages of goodies we had ordered and had routed to their address. Chuck was especially glad to get his new more-powerful wireless network card. And Barb was pleased to get the screening she had ordered, so that she could make screens for the pilothouse doors. All of the windows and doors on Tusen Takk II have screens except for the pilothouse doors. There were a number of times on the cruise up the ICW that we wished for screens so Barb decided she was going to make some. One of the other packages Nellie brought was HyperVent material to put under the mattress in the master stateroom. Steve Bruckner on Duchess had recommended it some time ago, but we hadn't acted on it until we recently replaced our master stateroom mattress. Barb felt the original boat mattress was too hard so we replaced it with a normal queen-size mattress. When we took the old mattress off we discovered some mildew on the bottom of it, so decided it was time to break down and put the HyperVent material under the mattress to keep things vented. There is always a project to be done on a boat. (And something to buy!)

We spent the first day of the visit exploring Manteo and checking out all the shops. With four females Chuck was outnumbered but he hung in there with them for a few hours until he could take no more. They later found him comfortably seated in the local book store catching up on his reading. That evening we all went to see the play "The Lost Colony". It was very professionally done, and we all enjoyed it. The next day we headed to Jockey Ridge for hang gliding lessons for Nellie, Katie and Jessie. In addition to a lecture and a video, they each got five flights while Chuck and Barb photographed. We had a great time with them. Nellie brought along a number of interesting and entertaining DVDs, so bedtime tended to come rather late. One afternoon we took the dinghy over to a small island nearby for some swimming. Since they left on the afternoon of the 4th -- Nellie needed to be back to work the next morning -- they missed an awesome fireworks display that evening. We were docked on the outside face dock, and the fireworks were just across the river. We invited our dock neighbors to join us on our upper deck for what had to be one of the better vantage points along the river front.

After leaving Manteo 7/5 we spent a night at Coinjock, where we enjoyed their 32 oz. "prime rib for two". I'm sure that's why many boaters stop there, since it is awesome. (That, and the fact that it is a.) at a natural stopping point in terms of distance, and b.) in the middle of nowhere.) The next day we had extraordinary luck as we made it through the many bridges between Norfolk and Coinjock in record time. We had planned to stop and anchor at Hospital Point in Norfolk, but decided to keep going as we were passing through only shortly after noon. When we entered the Chesapeake we found fairly rough seas, since the wind was howling out of the north, but we plowed through it all with our stabilizers keeping us reasonably comfy. We ended up anchoring in the Severn at the southwestern end of Mobjack Bay that night and made it to St. Mary's the next night. We had a layover day in St. Mary's before heading to Washington, DC. As we've written before, what a scenic and peaceful anchorage. Chuck got in a nice long run, we got some boat chores done, and on the evening of 7/8 we dinghied in to enjoy a jazz concert on the patio of the student center of St. Mary's College of Maryland.

Our trend toward especially expeditious travel continued on 7/9, and so we went right past our intended destination of Point Tobacco on the Potomac, and continued on up to Mattawoman Creek, where we huddled in along the southern shore, well protected from the southerly winds, and well away from the shallow waters further up the Creek. The extra progress meant that we arrived 9/10 in Washington Channel around noon, and were able to find in front of Capital Yacht Club an anchoring spot in which to squeeze.

And that, gentle reader, brings us to the present. We plan on moving over to Capital Yacht Club tomorrow, and fervently hope that our Norwegian friends somehow find a way to join us on 9/12. That is the date of their scheduled arrival, but they are to fly out of southern Spain, and the breaking news on the radio is that Spanish airlines have just gone on strike. Oh me! Oh my! Stay tuned to www.tusentakk2.com for the end of the story!