ST MICHAEL'S, MARYLAND -SEA NETTLES OR JELLYFISH

 We are trying to meander...you know take our time. After all the weather channel is into the Greek alphabet and I don't want to see any angry Greek god's wrath taken it out on Quicksilver.  So everyone said to check out St. Michael's, a nice little Maritime town.   First of all we left Annapolis Tuesday morning and as we were leaving the harbor I thought maybe we should of atleast read the news because maybe our president has wage war on us..there were no less than 15 military boats surrounding the harbor..then I remembered that we were at one of the largest Navy Academies. Whew, just maneuvers....now all we have to do is maneuver through them...Ughh...how close can we get to them??..do we have ask permission??  We made it just fine, of course,  and set anchor outside St Michael's harbor in the afternoon.  By the way, yes there was a lot of "telling time" for crab pots and enjoying the boiling water where the fish 🐟 are all rounded up by some bigger fish. 

Going around Bloody Point Bar Light towards St Michael's. We think is probably haunted. 

St Michael's is adorable and would be especially fun without the Covid restrictions or jellyfish (you would not believe all the Jellyfish/Sea Nettles, check out video below)...there are three or four restaurants and bars along the harbor (the Crab Claw & Foxys were a couple we visited)  you can imagine the fun of meeting new people there, but not this year. They were good in town where mask were required and many many shops to go in and out of if you wanted.  We visited an Italian store to see if we could get pepper cookies and were told that there is a National shortage.  So of course we called our friend Rob to get moving. Our favorite store was the Village Shop. They had a great deli,  groceries, vegetables, flowers and sold our favorite wine for about 3 dollars less than we paid in New York.  You must know already sailors like cheap and they love free.   Which reminds me, they have a pump out boat that is free....yeah free anchoring and free pump out!!  For those that don't know that is one way to get rid of our waste, other than carrying it around until you find a pump out station. . It usually costs between 5 and 10 dollars unless you buy fuel then it might be free. So the only one who is revered more than a pump out man on a boat, is a free pump out man on a boat. 

coming into the harbor from our anchorage at St Michael's 

Did I mention they have their own brewery and distillery 

Sea nettles or Jellyfish? best I could do of still picture at night, try blowing it up

video of the night of the Jellyfish

 Ok, I went off on a tangent,  try to keep up.  The absolutely best thing about St Michael's is the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum. It has 13 or 14 buildings that were so well done that Jon and I spent about three hours exploring. They received a 5 million dollar grant to recreate the sailing  vessel, the Dove, which was a 84 foot 17th Century Trading ship that accompanied the first settlers to what is known now as Maryland in 1634.  Really impressive.   They have all kind of interactive boats and displays.   You can even take a virtual ride on the Dove that could get the best sailor seasick. 

besides "mugging" it up for the camera, we learned a lot about the oyster boat and crabbing boat history in Maryland..did you know most crabs come from Virginia....even the Maryland blue crabs...they are working hard to build it all back up again

The building of the Dove..

the light house that was moved to the museum, we were able to tour the inside and get a real feel for how it must have been to live there.   Sorry can't remember from where..you're turn to look it up

Jon brings up his first blue crab from museum 

We left St Michael's on Saturday morning under patchy fog, drizzle and a north wind of 5 to 10...mostly 5.  We came towards Solomon's Island and wondered why there were so many boats on our AIS...mostly sailing vessels, Jon did a quick Google check and we were heading right in the middle of a 75 boat sailing Regatta..from Annapolis to Solomon's Island. Oh geesh, I wonder if we will find an open anchorage...yeah they probably go to marinas because they don't want to carry an anchor...we found a spot at the end of Back Creek in front of someone's house..it was perfect, especially because it was 5:30 and we were tired. 

It is Sunday morning, still a little patchy fog, drizzle, 66 degrees and light wind.  We are motoring towards Deltaville, Virginia (about 50 miles)..we'll see how far we get. Until then, stay warm and dry everyone. And don't forget to leave your name if you make a comment so we know you reading this silly blog.

Eastport is part of Annapolis -"WE LOVE YOUR CRABCAKES BUT NOT YOUR CRABPOTS!"

"Watch out, crab pot 11 o'clock....ok you missed it, there's another on 12:30...ok I see a pattern...turn starboard we should be fine....uggh there's one 1 o'clock..."  That is our conversation for pretty much anytime we are not directly in the channel.  Thank goodness, crab is so delicious and how can you ever say no to crab cakes or crab balls. 

We had left Cape May, Tuesday after Labor Day about two hours after low tide.  We went through the Cape May Canal, where we slid through a bit of mud at the mouth out to the Delaware and headed up the Delaware Bay.  Weather reports, including NOAA seemed to be wrong yet again..they predicted 5 to 10 from south west..it was actually north east.  Thank goodness it was light winds and we had a little current with us, so we didn't have any problem.  In fact, in the C & D Canal (Chesapeake and Delaware Canal) we were motoring through at about 8 knots.  Made good time and put our anchor down at Ford's landing  We slept pretty well and headed for Annapolis....all along the way "Crab Pots!"

 

Going towards Chesapeake Bay bridge, every single time you go under a bridge your stomach hurts

Crab boat-catches in creek we anchored in

It was time for new and bigger batteries. Jon noticed that the old ones were not keeping up with usage.

Dog day afternoon. You can rent paddleboards at the Ellen O Moyer Nature park at the west end of Back Creek.  It was wonderful to watch so many people young and old enjoy this form of exercise and enjoy the water. On any given time of day their would be 10 to 20 paddlers out.

Paddlers at night

Haze-everyone said it was from fires out west

One of favorite things we like about cruising is meeting new and interesting people.  With Covid, we really weren't sure how many people we would meet.  Our niece, Grace, said her favorite part of our trip down the Canal and Locks was meeting the Flying Scotsman.  He was a very interesting man that single handed a small cape dory power boat,, The Flying Scotsman.  He had traveled for the whole summer on it.  He had an infectious British accent and was super helpful and nice.  (A large sailboat lost it's throttle cable in the second to the last lock of the "flight".  The Flying Scotsman went back to help tow the boat out...by that time they had figured out how to control the throttle from the engine, but he was there if needed.) The Flying Scotsman caught up with us at the free town dock in Waterford, NY and talked to us over a cold beer.  We kept distances about six feet.  We also learned that a lot of boaters are just like us, almost always alone and extremely careful when in public places.  I guess we kind of interview and observe people before we spend time with them.  

All that to introduce you to a nice couple, our neighbors anchored in Back Creek, Eastport (Annapolis), Sarah and Lorenzo.  Lorenzo, originally from Hawaii,  was in the Navy for 3  years and has been teaching sailing lessons for J World all summer and Sarah is the dockhand at the boat club.  They just want to live on their boat, Off the Leash, with their cat, Loki, and travel via sailing.... I mean truly sailing as they do not have either inboard or outboard motor.  We invited them to dinner and they invited us to go sailing on one of the J boats from work.  It was all so much fun seeing the Annapolis Harbor from the J boats point of view.  We gave them pickles and an Italian meal.  They gave us Hawaiian snacks and fed us Spam sushi. (You read that right, Spam sushi.  Lorenzo explained to us that in Hawaii Spam is a staple.  They all different kind of seasoned spam that you can buy and people have all kinds of recipes.  We loved hearing about their adventures and they loved hearing of ours. We picked each other's brain for tips on everything from sailing trim to anchoring.  Especially anchoring.  We were up fairly early one morning (9am and we hadn't had coffee yet) because we had offered to bring them to work because the dingy motor was not running properly and wouldn't start.  It was blowing a steady 10 to 15 knots with gust to 25-30 and it was about 52 degrees.  We saw that they were in their dingy ready to be towed to work and the we noticed that their boat seemed to have been moved...I think they noticed it at the same time because all of a sudden they were back on the boat trying to get their sails up and Off the Lease was dragging anchor.  It was no time and they were against the pilings on an apartment marina.  A nice man enjoying his morning coffee came out and before we knew it another boater offered his Boston Whaler to pull him off and tow him to a mooring ball (re-anchoring seemed out of the question when they needed to be to work) We all worked hard to fend them off the marina boats and after work, Lorenzo took Jon's suggestion and went to West Marine to buy 85 feet of chain.  All's well that ends well.  They have lots of plans to improve their boat and are hopping to catch up with us this winter in Florida.

Sarah & Lorenzo

Hawaiian snacks and seasoning

small boats racing and the training boats for the Naval Academy 

Out for sail in J boat.  Thank you Lorenzo and Sarah 

We were met with this guy flying up as we came in then Spam Sushi --Delicious 

Lorenzo and Sarah re-anchoring their boat, -Off the Leash

Our walk on Eastport nature and marine trail.  Ellen O Moyer Park.

  

Measures of different hurricane storm surge and a nice spot to watch osprey and ducks

💕💕💕all over Eastport they have these nice areas to sit and be by the water

EastPort has it's own flag....everyone flies them on their house

BOATYARD GRILL- seriously best crab cakes

more of Eastport

Nice dingy ride in Back Creek.

We are currently in St. Michael's, Maryland anchoring.  Check back in a few weeks for an update.

 

Whales, Whales, Whales to Cape May

 It's always the obvious.  Why did we leave our family and friends and sell everything we own to live aboard our 36 foot Pearson 367 sailboat, Quicksilver?  The obvious, the freedom and peace that on the water gives us.  You live outside from sunrise to sunset...sometimes after both of those (we like to sleep in a bit) and you are in nature 24/7.

We left Sandy Hook on Friday, September 4th after a very rolley sleepless night in back of the Sandy Hook Light house and the Coast Guard station.  The breeze was up, so we hoisted our sails and headed around the hook...there were at least 50 onshore fishermen casting, large fishing boats zooming out to the best spot in the Atlantic and birds everywhere darting to the water.  What a sight and how wonderful it is to be alive.  Then it happened...Jon said, "I must be seeing things because I think I just saw something spout, like a whale or dolphin."  I said I didn't think dolphins were up this far but then he's pointing and I'm looking and right off our port side about less than a hundred yards was a whale coming up then down.  It happened so fast that we didn't have time to be afraid...it was just pure joy.  I'm not sure but I think Jon and I were dancing in place.  We high fived each other and kept saying "we saw a whale" over and over.  

our anchorage at Sandy Hook

sunrise 

light house Sandy Hook Alantic side

Going around Sandy Hook

Our high continued through the day--Jon believes he saw another whale a couple hours later and I saw one surface the next day when we were almost to Cape May.  We aren't sure what type of whales they were, could have been a right whale or a very small humpback. 

  We are pretty sure we saw a North Atlantic Right Whale

We came into Atlantic City after motoring the last 5 hours into the wind....all weather stations were saying it was supposed to be North North West but it was definitely South South East...we kept looking at weather and it promised to be change to the west...it never did.  Anyway, a squall was looming over the City and we were making sure we were ready, just in case (batten the hatches, get rain gear ready and generally preparing ourselves to get soaked.)  Luckily it moved south and the current carried us swiftly into the harbor at about 7pm.  Whew, we made it before sunset.  We set anchor right in front of the Golden Nugget and Harrah's Casino.  After a 12 hour day on the water and no sleep the night before, I think I saw the sunset and not much more.  Jon stayed up for the moon rise and woke me to look out my window.  It was beautiful but I didn't wake up again until I heard the most awful scraping on our hull.  Jon jumped up and went out to look...the current is so strong in the harbor that our anchor and chain was well behind the boat.  The boat was trying to turn because of the wind...It was a "sad god-awful" sound but Quicksilver finally turned.  We might have a couple of marks on the bow...well if we do it right, I guess we'll have the marks to show for it. I mean if we stayed home on a dock we could probably keep her pristine, but out in the real world we will have a couple of scares to show off.

 Approaching Atlantic City 

our anchorage at Atlantic City

Jon inviting one of his friends to meet him at the roulette table 

glitz and glamor 

Leaving Atlantic City 

We pulled anchor about 8ish and enjoyed a down wind motor sail to Cape May.  By enjoy I mean it was better than going straight into the wind.  A lot of sailors, like us, don't love down wind sailing...first of all it can be hard to steer, you end up surfing down the the waves and then slowing down and getting off course.  Second of all, it gives the flies from "hell" the opportunity to come in and bite the crap out of you.  Jon and I took turns with fly swatter and slapping anywhere on your skin was acceptable...anything to get rid of them.  We did enjoy looking for more whales and dolphins and couldn't get over how much of New Jersey's coast is covered with beaches...almost the whole coast.  We came into the channel of Cape May under surf and power.  Half way through a huge cigarette tour boat, ThunderCat, sped past us at a crazy speed.  The wake was so huge and we barely had enough time to turn into it so not to be swamped.  Jon wanted the handheld radio to give him a piece of his mind, but I thought better of it.  We had salt water come into all the port side ports and hatches, but, nothing was broken.

Cape May has been a nice anchorage, right by the Coast Guard Station.  We took a couple days off and did a lot of people watching.  We sat on the top of boat and watched the parade of boats go by....hundreds.  You know the scene in Jaws where all the boats were going out to capture the shark? Yep like that.  The anchorage itself is wonderful and the wakes aren't bad at all.  It all dies down about 8pm or so.  And we sleep well and wake up the the Coast Guards Reveille over a loud speaker at 8am.

Cape May near Cape May Canal

Schellenger Creek.  My favorite area

We plan to leave tomorrow morning a couple hour after low tide to head up the Delaware Bay and into the Chesapeake Bay. I will get back to you on how that goes.  Maybe after we get to Annapolis.