Annapolis Revisited

26^th September – 6^th October

We went back into Annapolis for a number of reasons: to see what hurricane Maria was going to do; attend the Annapolis Sailing boat show; to go to the Salty Dawg seminar in Mears marina plus their barbeque the following evening; attend the OCC Annapolis dinner; and spend a day in Washington.

We were advised by the harbour master which buoys could be used as half of them in the main mooring area, and all of them further in Spa Creek on the other side of the bascule bridge are out of action when the boat shows are on. More on that later.

On Sunday 1^st October we took an Uber cab to Washington.  We had been to Washington before about 30 years ago, but then it was covered in about 6 feet of snow and apart from the White House and the Smithsonian we didn’t see much. So this trip was to catch up with the rest.  As we were only going to be there for a day we decided the easiest thing to do was take a get-on-get-off bus which goes round all the famous sites – the Capitol building; Lincoln memorial, Jefferson memorial, Arlington cemetery etc.  After an exhausting day we took an Uber cab back to Annapolis.

On 4^th October we went to the Salty Dawg seminar. We are returning to the Caribbean and have joined the Salty Dawg rally to get there. It leaves from Hampton Virginia around 2^nd November and goes to Antigua. Usually the rally ends in the BVIs, the Bitter End Yacht club on Virgin Gorda, but because of the devastation caused by hurricane Irma, they do not want 70+ boats arriving, so the rally will end in Falmouth, Antigua.  The seminar was very good and covered all aspects of blue water sailing. Plus we met our hero Chris Parker, the weather guru!

That evening we attended the Annapolis OCC dinner with lifts arranged for everyone by Westbrook Murphy, the OCC port officer.

The following evening we attended a bar-b-que organised by the Salty Dawg people, and it included an amusing talk by a circumnavigator, who is taking part in the Global Challenge, where the boats have to be equipped the same way as when the first race was held in the 1970’s, so no GPS etc, but can gave modern safety equipment.

The preparations for the boat show are quite amazing to watch.  Piles are put in the mooring field and floating docks attached to them.  The three car parks around the City Dock area are out of action and are used for the exhibits.  All the boats are in the water. Then the few days before the start of the show the sailing boats start to arrive.

We attended the show on the opening day, Friday 6^th October.  Lots of boats to see; we went on the new Elan Impression 45. Same hull as ours but a few differences.  Also went on a Discovery 58 – very high driving position!  Chris also bought a part for the satellite phone from Ocens at half the price Ed a Mailasail was going to charge! Penny bought a Thermal Cooker (like a hay box!!)

The next day we left early and set for Solomon’s, then Reedsville, then Deltaville where the boat will come out of the water.