Onancock and Crisfield
AJAYA'S CRUISE
Phil & Nikki Hoskins
Sat 10 Aug 2013 23:09
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37:42.66N, 075:45.50W
Having left Norfolk and spent a night in Deltaville on the
western Chesapeake shores we crossed to the more rarely cruised eastern side of
the Bay. We spent two nights anchored at Onancock about four miles
up Onancock Creek just off the town dock. This is a peaceful small
town with galleries, restaurants and not much else ashore. We loved
the tranquillity here with the surrounding shores lined with millionaires houses
set in large gardens with mowed lawns running down to private docks at the
water's edge. The sound of motor mowers was ever-present throughout
the day, but there's lots of grass to be cut in Virginia. Some of the
Georgian buildings could have dated back to the beginning of early
settlements in this area in the 1600's. Many of the place and river names
in the Chesapeake have remained from the days of the native Indian.
The anchorage off the main channel just off the town
wharf had excellent holding but with the sheer numbers of jellyfish lurking in
the water we decided to postpone further investigation regarding the lack
of cooling water through the port drive leg. The engine was working fine
pulling the water through the toilet intake so could wait a little longer before
more underwater exploration was required.
We treated ourselves to a meal at the
charming "Mallards at the Wharf" where an indication of
the type of food on offer is hinted at on the menu which had
the names (foreign sounding) of the chefs printed at the top. Couldn't see
any Mallards though. It looked reasonably affordable for our budget, especially
if you ordered an open sandwich, so we returned at 1830 for something
to eat. You could sit outside on plastic chairs at plastic tables
overlooking the creek as well as a rusty old digger belonging to the seemingly
abandoned gravel quay next door but at these prices we demanded
tablecloths, napkins and elevated views over the creek. We therefore chose
to sit upstairs in the restaurant which was almost empty but quickly filled
up within half an hour. We could just see the boat lying quietly at anchor,
always a treat.
If you didn't want to talk to each other or didn't have i-pads
to independently dab at, (surely one of the most annoying social habits to
surface in recent years) then the restaurant television (!) was
showing an offering from 'Shark Week'. This programme featured the eating
habits of the Great White Shark. So, whilst waiting for our meal to be expertly
cooked, sipping from a glass of chilled house white and eating our house
salads we were treated to the sight of the Great White's own dinner
extravaganza, including, but not exclusively, nice juicy baby seals
pups, being attacked and bloodily torn limb from limb. This was
not for the squeamish amongst the diners as the screen, which was difficult
to ignore from anywhere in the seating plan, was coloured mainly red by
clouds of swirling blood as the unfortunate creatures thrashed around in
the jaws of these formidable predators. Meanwhile the 'Admiral's' portion of
fresh Grouper arrived. As a meal for a Great White it would have just
about filled the space between two of it's numerous teeth but this was true
Nouveau Cuisine in a remote corner of Virginia, meaning that there was
more white plate visible than that with food occupying the
surface. 'Skip' decided to forego fish and have a big
juicy T-Bone steak set on a doll's bed of mash potato with four string
beans (verts?) straddling the mash. Meanwhile the televised shark was
threatening to devour wet-suit clad surfers somewhere in Australia. Our meals
were excellent if not a little lost on the natty 12" square plates and it's
simply amazing how a 16 once T-Bone shrinks down in the expert
hands of a locally acclaimed chef. The 'Admiral's' Grouper was very tasty
with it's Quinoa accompaniment and all in all it was an excellent
dinner which we rounded off (due to latent hunger) with a Chocolate Brownie
to share, which was, we have to admit, the best we have tasted this side of
the pond. One thing that does puzzle us is how quickly our American cousins
clear through a restaurant, as we were nearly first in and last out. We don't
eat out that often to rush the experience but our American cousins seem to just
see it as a 'fill-up and get out' process.
We stayed put the next day as the forecast indicated some
windy stormy weather. Later in the day we ran port engine to charge the
batteries and unbelievably the cooling water suddenly just stopped flowing. We
shut down the engine and left it overnight and in the morning it was fine,
indicating we'd sucked up an unfortunate jellyfish against the intake grating
which would have floated free when the engine was stopped. The evening into the
night was punctuated by lightening and torrential rain again.
Today we have moved on to Crisfield, a larger town also on the
Chesapeake east shore - not so charming but we'll take a run ashore tomorrow and
see what's to be seen.
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