Now we know why we came

Serafina
Rob & Sarah Bell
Sun 20 May 2012 22:05

Thurs, Fri, Sat & Sun – 17th, 18th, 19th & 20th May

Well I was wrong, the grocery store (Harris Teeter) was out of this world – think Waitrose and then some.   No worry about sweet bread – all sorts of artisan numbers, and anything else you might like to imagine.   Unfortunately being accompanied by Rob and Gary, once they had ‘done’ the drink section I couldn’t indulge in a real explore, but I have been promised that someone will dump me there and I can have a real merchandise scrutiny by myself.   Yes I know this is sad.

Gary joined us for a drink in the evening as Greta had gone to a baby party given by a neighbour who has just ‘had’ by surrogate mother, twins – and along with the 3 nannies in attendance, mother and babies are doing fine.  Oh and she is also a multi-millionaire single mother.   Gary seems to spend a bit of effort avoiding social events:  their next stand-off is over another neighbour’s wedding to be held on the pretty Norfolk Boat Club dock alongside us.

The following morning Rob went back for an in-depth discussion about Ipads (we are finally biting the bullet – it will be even easier to take ashore to upload if no wifi can be found afloat and the navionics charts are brilliant on it, costing a mere £30 for the USA!) and I found someone to cut my hair – not too bad.   Rob then cleverly YELPd hairdressers and found loads of alternatives.   YELP is the company Ewan has just joined in London and here in the US it is an impressive tool (there, good plug?).   And of course on the way we picked up a coffee stop and salads for lunch –it’s no wonder Americans are a slightly different shape from us, but probably not for long!   Greta has explained the tipping here:  15% is average (10% if it’s not great service, but that doesn’t often happen) and if it is a self-service place, leave $1 per head.  And by the time you have also added on the tax (varying in each state) you have to be on your toes in calculating the real cost of a meal.

We have been amazed to find that if you are waiting in residential streets to cross, the cars will stop and invite you to carry on;  but at main road junctions you must cross at the designated spots.   Waiting for the signal can take ages and our minds and eyes start to wander around the sights, until we suddenly spot that the signal has changed and we have a counted-down 20 seconds to sprint across a six lane highway plus wide central reservation.   Rob has a theory that this is why we do not see any elderly people, it is a culling system!  And added to the fact that cyclists use the sidewalks rather than the roads, because obviously there are no pedestrians, we really should be paying more attention.

All around the city are statues of the same mermaid shape (which is also Norfolk’s logo) which is the depiction of a children’s story page by page, but each is decorated by different artists, so I am enjoying spotting them – another distraction apart from the architecture.

On Saturday afternoon I took a wander around the local area to do the Freemason Historic District walking tour.   The oldest house dates from 1790 and the houses are very varied in the styles of “Italianate, Greek, Georgian, or Richardson Romanesque Revival, Adamesque, Beaux Arts, High Victorian, Federal, Queen Anne, Tudor, and Second Empire”!   And we are beginning to get the hang of the history:  Norfolk was razed during the Revolutionary War in 1776 (what we know as the American War of Independence), this was followed by the 1812 War (this seems to have slipped under our radar) also known as the Second War of Independence (Gary flatly told us “you lost this”) and then the Civil War in 1861 where the Hampton Roads inlet into the Chesapeake was blockaded.   Unfortunately this ended in somewhat of a stalemate as the two opposing ships were heavily armour plated (a new technique to change naval shipping henceforth) and neither could inflict the winning wound!

There is also lots of interesting river traffic (the road traffic is surprisingly similar to European – none of the massive wide American cars we had expected, but great trucks though):  some interesting sail craft and a paddle steamer amongst others.   Some of the other ‘traffic’ I am less keen on:  there is a patrol of Canada Geese that paddle past at 0530 and I can’t decide if the honking relates to the stragglers catching up or the shepherding of a harem, either way it wakes me up every morning.  I have invested in another bird identification book (no 4) and we have seen among others, Ospreys, robins (not as pretty as ours), Black-crowned Night Heron, and Yellow-crowned Night-Herons (do untold damage to decks we are reliably informed!).

The weather is still cold – we have even unearthed our duvets after a particularly cold night.   This is not helped by an east to north east wind, which is also piling up the tides so that it is sometimes quite a feat to get on and off the boat as we are on a fixed pontoon.   Oh and isn’t Rob enjoying that other aspect of sailing (tides) that he sort of entrusts to me, but wishes I was more focused.   But we seem to have the warps (Rob was ticked off for calling them ‘ropes’ – Gary informed him that “lines are for tying up boats, ropes are what we use for hanging people”!) well balanced.

Last night, after Gary had taken us on an emergency run to a hardware store and West Marine (his emergency not ours, which was his excuse to avoid the wedding), he then dropped us off at the cinema that has just started showing ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’.   This was a great experience as the cinema is an old-fashioned one just kept from extinction by donations.   You weren’t able to buy tickets until 20 minutes beforehand and as we watched some vast bottoms waddle past we felt it might be sensible to get in early, so were lounging against the old ticket booth.   No it wasn’t the relic we thought, promptly sliding up the screen and selling tickets.  We then squeezed into the tiny foyer next to the old fashioned accoutrements for selling small (yes really) traditional snacks until the previous showing very slowly tottered out.   Rob mentioned to our up-close neighbours that the demographic didn’t look good for a swift evacuation if the fire alarm went off and was told “oh no, you’re dead”!   And after we had enjoyed our first film for 7 months, we walked the couple of (lonely) miles home to be greeted by the still-continuing wedding with all the sorts of records Rob enjoyed in his teenage years – although he was showing less enjoyment at 0100 hrs…..

Today (Sunday) we were taken by Greta to the Stockley Gardens Art Show which is held over three blocks with each artist in a small booth – luckily all covered as it has drizzled or rained for much of the day.   This show has a very high standard of paintings, photography, pottery and jewellery – heaven!   Rob was deeply relieved that as we are on the boat he would not be trekking back with large amounts of breakables.   And the jewellery I was really drawn to (being made of pebbles, again) was way out of the price bracket…..

After that we went to the Chrysler Art Museum which has a world class glass collection amongst other things.  I was particularly taken by the Aztec figures something I suppose we rarely see in Europe – and of course the compulsory Degas ballet dancer.

But almost the most exciting thing of the day was finally rediscovering the Ben and Jerry’s Coffee Coffee BuzzBuzzBuzz ice cream which was fleetingly introduced to the UK five years ago and which I have been seeking ever since.   I knew there was a reason we have sailed 18,000 miles!

We are beginning to look at our plans for the next bit:  and are thinking to do a swift belt up the Chesapeake, probably to spend 10 days or so in Washington up the Potomac River, with a side trip (by car) to have a look at a possible boatyard to haul Serafina out for the winter.   And then head north to enjoy as much summer season as Maine has to offer, escaping the apparently horridly humid weather here (particularly as it is well known for appalling electrical storm activity) – not much sign of it so far – then probably ‘doing’ New York on our way back down.   But as ever things are fluid (in so many ways….. rain, indecision, heads problems again, tides etc!).