On the way to Chesapeake Bay
Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Sun 30 Sep 2007 15:47
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38:54.603N 74:51.689W
We left the NYC area at sunrise last Monday (9/24),
and headed south down the New Jersey shore, past Atlantic City, around Cape May
into Delaware Bay, and through the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal (C&D Canal)
to Chesapeake Bay. The trip took us about 34 hours.
Aside from the ferries bringing all those poor
working stiffs to Manhattan bright and early on a Monday morning, the
Hudson and New York Harbor waters were pretty quiet. We had a great view
of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty as we motored by (see Lady Liberty in
the first picture below). The view up the East River as the
sun appeared was also very nice - especially looking through the Brooklyn
Bridge (picture 2). Our last glimpse of NYC came as we went under the
Verrazano Bridge and headed out to the Atlantic (picture 3).
We motorsailed most of the way to Cape May -
the wind was on our nose just enough to make sailing a no go.
We could have done the zig-zag sideways crawl all the way down the New Jersey
coast, but if we had done that we would probably still be out there sailing
around aimlessly. Along the way, we had two encounters with
wildlife. Nope, not whales or seals or dolphins. This time it was a
bird and a bat.
We were about five miles off the coast when a
little green bird (picture 4) decided to hitch a ride to Baltimore with
us. He pretty much inspected the entire boat, left a couple of
times, came back, and finally decided we would do as a mode of
transportation. Later in the evening we lost track of him and thought he
had decided to move on. The next morning Don found his dead
little body on the deck. Ugh. Maybe he was expecting dinner as part
of his transport deal? If so, he sure got the raw end of that deal - no
dinner, and to add insult to injury, burial at sea.
Now the bat. As we were doing the
motorsailing thing down the coast, dinner time arrived and Don was sent to the
stern [non-boater translation: back of the boat] to get the grill
ready. He reached down to open the back locker (where the grill resides)
and felt something strange. As he lifted up the locker cover, a nasty bat
flew out from under the edge of the locker cover and into the locker.
On his way into the locker, the bat took the time to bare his teeth
and hiss at Don (Don does a nice impression of the bat hiss, but it's too
difficult to try and put into words - you'll just have to use your
imagination). Don yelled for me to get the boat hook, which I did, and got
it back to Don just in time for us to watch the bat crawl deeper into the dark
abyss of the back locker. Let me take a moment here to describe
this back locker. We call it 'the garage'. That should give
you some idea as to the amount of stuff we have crammed in
there. To name just a few of the items: our sad, dead dinghy,
about 5 boat fenders, fender boards, two bikes, numerous dock lines, power
cord and associated array of electrical adaptors, several water hoses, etc.,
etc. So you can imagine our joy when the bat crawled out of our reach and
into those dark recesses. Rather than emptying out the garage then and
there to find the bat (and run the risk of mistakenly sending some of our
prized possessions overboard in the process), we decided the best course of
action was to leave the locker cover open so that when it got dark, the bat
would simply fly out like any normal bat should. All of this happened
Monday evening. Since that time, we anchored in the Sassafras River
(off the Chesapeake Bay) on Tuesday night, sailed down the Chesapeake Bay
to Baltimore and arrived at Anchorage Marina on Wednesday. Then
on Thursday, since we were securely tied to a dock, Don decided it
was time to clean out the garage to ensure the bat had indeed departed.
Well, the bat must have enjoyed the dark confines of the garage because he
stayed there until Don found him in the deepest corner. Armed with leather
gloves and towel, Don was able to whisk the bat out of the locker and send him
on his way. Aside from giving Don another view of his teeth and another
hiss, the bat behaved himself. All of this was done so smoothly by Don
that I didn't even know the bat was still around until Don announced his
departure. Had I known, I most certainly would have attempted to
get a picture.
Ok, so back to the trip. After we rounded
Cape May, we were able to sail down the entire Delaware Bay, which was quite
lovely. I was on watch when we rounded Cape May at about 4:30 Tuesday
morning. The full moon set shortly thereafter, and it remained dark until
the sky started to brighten around 5:45. Around 5:20 when it seemed the
sun was never going to make an appearance, and I was nervously squinting into
the dark to see the lights of the boats radar told me were close by, while at
the same time making sure the sails were set properly as we sped along at 7-8
knots, the radio started cackling with all kinds of what I assumed to be
fishermen talking. Apparently 5:20 am is about the time that the Delaware
Bay fishermen head out sea, and when they do, it seems they feel the need
to make animal sounds over the radio. No kidding. I heard a
pig, a sheep, a cat, a dog, a cow, a wolf, and a few others that were
unintelligible. The Coast Guard and others get very prickly when the
airwaves are abused, so there was some back and forth about that. Like
'Hey you idiots, get off the radio!" and other, less polite remarks. Too
bad for Don, he missed the whole thing. Good for me though - nothing like
a few animal sounds and some nasty talk on the radio to make night watch go
faster.
The rest of the trip to the Chesapeake went
smoothly. We entered the C&D Canal around 11am Tuesday morning
and a short two or three hours later arrived in the Chesapeake. Along
the way we ran into the giant car carrier pictured below (we didn't actually run
into it - I don't think we'd live to tell about it if we did, but we did get a
little up close and personal).
Anne
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