To Monticello

12 June 2019

Now that we were finally in the Chesapeake our first real road trip from the boat was Monticello. There were no real interstates going our way to Charlottesville, from nowhere to almost nowhere, so it was almost all two-lane byways all the way there. We saw a lot of the countryside, then had a late lunch at Croby's, within sight of Monticello at the base of the mountain. After that we went up the hill.

I was here maybe three decades ago, and much of the property looked very different. When I went before you drove to the top of the mountain and parked in a field maybe a 100 yards from the house, just to the right of the first picture below. Then there was little else around. The wings on the sides of the house were being dug up at the time, so you peered over what remained of the the walls down at the gridded floors.

Now you park well down the mountain at the visitor center, which I guess is about a decade old. It is wonderful, with exhibits, a cafe, gift shop and more. You take a tram up to the top of the mountain, where things started to look more familiar.

Below is the front door, where the tour started.

We wandered the grounds a little bit while waiting for our time to tour the interior of the house. No pictures were allowed while you were inside, ostensibly because many of the items inside were on loan from a variety of entities, and visual rights to all those items from all those sources was not established. Very worth it anyway.

The back has a large lawn, and one of the wings coming off of each side can be seen to the left of the house.

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Wildlife and Water Lines

Early to mid-June 2019

Since the Solomons Island Calvert Marina area was somewhat rustic there was a lot of wildlife. The marina itself was once the site of the first amphibious landing base, rapidly created during WW2, training many of the folks who applied their new skills in Normandy, and coincidentally, the Solomons Islands in the Pacific. Some of the facilities may be newly painted but original.

After we arrived we saw a fox that had just had kits, then saw a nutria (or a pudgy woodchuck?). Since it was our first day it didn't strike us as unusual so we didn't take pictures, but then we didn't see them again all month.  Days later we saw deer across the road, and daily we saw lots of Canadian Geese.

A nesting box had been built atop a pole at the foot of our dock, currently inhabited by some sort of bird of prey with a four foot wingspan and one or two little ones. She didn't like me taking pictures, expressing her displeasure with a high pitched keening sound.

I'm thinking the picture below, taken at the base of the pole, is of a woodchuck. I'm honestly not sure, because I don't really ever recall seeing a woodchuck in person before, zoo or otherwise. We're not used to these cat to dog sized mammals that are not cats or dogs running around.

One evening we were a little bit lazy, and we had gotten into the bad habit in Brunswick of just pushing a full trash bag into the cockpit to be walked to the dumpster on our next foray from the boat. Not really an Alice's Restaurant kind of situation, but enough for said local wildlife to open a pop-up buffet while we slept below.

Over the next few days we hit up a local Tractor Supply still looking for gangway options that weren't $2k and in Ft. Lauderdale. We had a late lunch at a Cafe Rio of all places before grocery shopping. Those mormons get around. I really like the mormon angle in the Expanse TV series.

I swapped out the heat exchanger anode (right) for only the second time. Despite a similar amount of time having passed it looked much different than the first (left). I'll have to keep an eye on this. We rarely had the 10 pound zinc fish hanging while we were traveling, and we were hooked up to several dock power pedestals of questionable condition.

The next day the water pressure pump kept cycling on unexpectedly. It looked like a leak in the forward head. The original cold water line finally gave out after the last work done, with a slight crack at the end spraying a tiny stream of water. I hadn't cut it back because it was just barely long enough as it was and we were in the middle of nowhere at the time. The original tubing was now two decades old and really stiff, very hard to push onto the barb. Off I went again to West for some supplies, then spliced some clear reinforced hose at the end after cutting back the old hose a few inches. The day after that the water pump was cycling again. The hot line was leaking a little now, but I tightened up the hose clamps some more and that seemed to finally be it.

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Car Run

03-04 June 2019

We were quickly annoyed by having a fixed boat and no land based transportation, so that became a priority. We rented a car again online, but when we went to pick it up none were to be found, and there was a line of other folks also waiting for cars. One poor guy rented a box truck he didn't need in desperation. This makes me think of that Seinfeld episode. "Yes sir, we understand how a reservation works. I don't think you do." Some of this is on us because the Enterprise app is famous for renting cars they don't have, especially on short notice. After almost an hour of lounging around we finally got a nicer car than we needed for the same price, so okay I guess.

We trundled back to Southport, by land this time, stopping by civilization in Richmond on the way to look for used DVDs at one 2nd and Charles store, then the other one across town.

Hungry, we stumbled upon Luther's, of Vandross fame. Think soft rock from the 70s. Of course, Heather tries very hard to avoid thinking of soft rock from the 70's in spite of my playlists. The full name is Luther's Burgers and Sugar Shack Donuts & Coffee.

The (probably apocryphal) back story is in the picture below, but it's a good story. I'm guessing recreational drugs were involved in addition to the apparently poor shopping habits.

Since a burger Luther style is between two donuts they needed to develop expertise in donuts big enough to be large hamburger buns. This led to another pretty good side business. Heather wouldn't go for a burger with a donut bun. Despite that loss the burger was pretty good, and I can say the donuts themselves were great. If they had been together I probably wouldn't have chosen the Fruit Loops flavor.

We then went on to Raleigh, spending the night after having dinner at Beaseley's Chicken and Honey (not a typo) downtown. Really good chicken but maybe trying a little too hard to be different.

In the morning we had breakfast at Angie's Restaurant before proceeding on to Greenville to pick up our car. Angie's had an interesting menu (at least for us, maybe not for the area), with meat choices like brains and pork chitterlings (we stuck with bacon), and a molasses squeeze bottle on every table. After some good and surprisingly cheap food we hit the road, where for once I slept while Heather drove. When I woke up a light on the dash caught my attention, telling us we were running on fumes, but we made it to the nearest station somehow.

When we got to the tiny airport parking lot our car needed some oil but started right up. I've been carrying around a new battery since before Xmas waiting for this weak-ass one to die, but it never quite does. We drove back to Richmond, this time stopping at Costco for more motor oil and snacks and such. We then made a mandatory check in at Harbor Freight, looking for, among other things, a potential gangway for boarding the boat.

Once we had exhausted our shopping needs we headed back to Solomons, turned i the rental car, and returned to the boat.

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Getting Settled in Solomons

01 - 02 June 2019

Once the marina realized its mistake in placing us on the floating dock they urged us to move to the longer term fixed wooden docks. To make up for the inconvenience we got to shop for our more permanent slip, which turned out to be a good thing.

After reviewing a few we picked a slip at the south end at an inside corner next to a park area. It was a nice spot, but tough to get in to, which is probably why it was available.

To avoid towing the dinghy into the slip while docking we left the dinghy at the floating dock. It was a good docking despite the difficulty, warping from midship to get the rest of the way in. The dock hand was impressed with Heather's driving. Later I walked back to the floating dock and drove the dinghy over to our slip, just tying it up alongside for now.

We tied and retied the dock lines, letting us get just close enough to get on and off fixed wooden docks despite the tides, but not too close to bang into the pilings. Once again, doing this soon after our arrival turned out to be a good investment. A quick storm came into the area the next day with wind gusts reported up to up to 60 mph, and we definitely saw some 40 plus gusts. Since we had been traveling for a while we spent most of our time cleaning up and organizing the boat for living rather than traveling. Below is the view across the dock from our boat.

Since we didn't have a car yet we frequently walked over to the marina restaurant the next dock over. This is the view from their deck. Combined with their cheap little buckets of beach drinks it was a fabulous, if somewhat rustic, atmosphere.

The picture below is looking back from the bridge seen in the previous posting.

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To Solomons

31 May 2019

As we crossed into MD some of the fauna seemed to follow, a few of which seemed less than pleased to see us again. I'm not blaming my heel in the picture below on any of the many insects. I'm pretty sure it was a spider bite of some sort. It looked like this, and worse, for a few days, but eventually it cooled, the swelling went down and it scabbed over.

We went all way up to the Pax river, just past the Naval Air Station, to Solomons. We told them we would be staying for 30 days, but there must have been some confusion because they put us on the floating docks usually reserved for shorter term transients. The good news was the pump out was already in range once we walked the boat a little farther down the dock.

Since we didn't have a car yet we took the dinghy into town and tied up at one of the docks. After a nice little dinner on the island we enjoyed the sunset walking back to the dinghy.

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Up the Chesapeake

31 May 2019

 The next day we crossed into MD, passing lighthouses such as this all along the way north.



After a full day we proceeded on to Back Bay. Our first choice for anchoring was taken, so we moved a little farther up the river, but had some trouble anchoring amongst the crab pots. Once we got settled it was a nice spot.

Again, a beautiful sunrise, but as we spun with the tide and wind the crab pot float seen in the foreground is a little too close for comfort. But off we went again.

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Into the Chesapeake

30 May 2019

The entrance to Back Creek behind Langley was a little skinny and shallow, but we made it with no drama. We anchored where it showed on the chart, but it seemed a little weird because it was between two marked channels. It looked weirder when a huge barge came through in the morning, but it was okay.

We were anchored behind Langley, and had front row seats for the fighter jets chasing each other around.



In the morning there was a beautiful sunrise. I made a quick trip in the dinghy to a marina for more ice, over four miles round trip, but everything worked fine. After topping up the ice we headed up the Chesapeake towards Solomons.

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Through Norfolk

29 May 2019

Well going through Norfolk we had bridges and more bridges. All shapes and sizes were represented. Only one talking bridge really slowed us down.

Then we got to the shipyards. The military ones were patrolled by MPs in fast boats, shooing us tourists away, first on the radio, then in person if that wasn't enough. Lots of warships in work or having work done.

We passed a downtown waterfront are that looked fun if we come back by land.

Finally on our way out we encountered one of the big boats moving. We got out of the channel and watched it go by. All in all a pretty easy day for passing through Norfolk.

Once we passed most of Norfolk and were in the river we passed a tunnel station. This is the only area to cross the Chesapeake south of Annapolis, but it goes under instead of over. There's not much to see in the picture below, but this is a tunnel station on the Norfolk side. It was weird to watch this nonstop train of cars disappear under the water as we crossed over the tunnel.

We were finally in the Chesapeake!

We didn't want to go much farther that day. Hampton looked a little crowded, so we headed up to Back Creek behind Langley.

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Up to Norfolk

28 May 2019

While checking the details early in the morning I realized that most of the Norfolk obstacles were going to be encountered on the day before we actually got to Norfolk. We had several bridges and talking bridges, and even a lock. Once again we kicked our departure plans into gear a little sooner than planned.

As we went through the day, some of the bridges had very innovative designs. The counterweighting on the one below is pretty slick.

The lock was stressful just because of the unknowns. I'm pretty sure one of the power boats that was jockeying to get ahead of us in the lineup to enter the lock was the prick who had waked us so bad on our way to Oriental. We continued to hold our position while I gave him the stink eye. He finally had his wife call us up on the radio and we let him by. Once we got into the lock the preferred west side was already full, so we had to quickly adjust and go to the east side which had substantially less protection from the concrete walls for smaller boats. But it worked out fine and the lock couldn't have raised us more than a few inches.

Soon after the lock we crossed into Virginia, finally making it to the Top Rack marina just south of Norfolk central.  We were apparently the only transitting boat stopping there.We had dinner at the deli instead of the fancy restaurant upstairs, and it was great if only because of the icy cold air conditioning. 

In the morning we were gently awakened by the soothing sounds of the gravel yard on the other shore. We made our departure preparations and cast off. It was finally the day to pass through central Norfolk.

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