Happy Holidays to All

We jumped from St. Augustine to Daytona Beach for another two nights. Grant Hospital gave me a bundle of Macy's gift certificates as a retirement gift and Daytona has a mall with a Macy's store.

We didn't get any photos of Daytona because of rain and overcast skies. We did our shopping. Mandy talked to Santa between his visits with children and loved the Christmas decorations throughout the mall. After that, the camera broke so we will have no photos until we get a new camera.

Our dock neighbor, John, joined us after dinner on Friday night for a few holiday libations. John is a singlehander and showed me a few unknown anchorages in the area.

We anchored the following night in Mosquito Lagoon, a body of water behind the barrier islands that carry highway A1A to Miami and beyond. It's the biggest anchorage we have ever used, measuring about 3 miles wide by 10 miles long.

We arrived in Harbortown Marina on Merritt Island on Sunday, December 20. We are there still and are spending Christmas with our friends, Jim and Vicki Oneal who live on their boat here.

They have been hauling us around to shop, drink, and dine at all of the best local places. We had the best ever Jalapeno Poppers, the funkiest tacos, and more. They drove us to a Christmas light display similar to Ogelby in West Va but better. We went through twice.

Last night, we all went to hear a musician play his steel drums with recorded backup at the marina bar. He even gave Mandy a lesson.

Jim and Vicki are visiting family today but will return soon. We have a turkey breast, stuffing, potatoes, and gravy on the menu for tomorrow.

I have the dinghy set up to take Mandy for a row in the canal next to the marina to hunt for Manatee. Merry Christmas!! I hope to have a new camera soon so we can resume posting photos.

St Augustine

We left Brunswick on Thursday, December 10th in a punishing 45 degree North wind. We anchored next to Amelia City on Amelia Island Thursday night. The winds reached near gale force that night and even though I had two anchors down, I slept fitfully because of the chorus of noises created by the wind as it screamed through the rigging of the boat. On Friday, we again sailed downwind through rain on a cold North wind. The temperature never climbed much above 50 degrees.

I can hear the folks back home say "wah" to sailing in temperatures above the freezing mark but I can't think of anyone except my brother-in-law, Erich, who actually spends a day exposed to the cold winds and who knows how the wind and rain can cut through the skin like a sword.

On Saturday we sailed into St Augustine into a slip at the municipal marina next to the Bridge of Lions. The rain continued until just after dark, ending just in time for the Christmas parade of boats. A couple dozen boaters had decorated their craft with hundreds of lights. They motored a circle in the basin North of the bridge. Some were so laden with lights that the helmsman must have had difficulty seeing outside of the boat to navigate having been blinded with Christmas lights.

Saturday night we discovered a Cuban restaurant that featured live Cuban music. The lead singer played a standard electric guitar and his percussionist surrounded himself with a circle of drums as we might have seen in the Xavier Cougat orchestra. But we were most fascinated with the accompaniment of the man playing a 10 string guitar. He produced a never ending series of single notes to compliment the singing.

On Sunday we walked the town. We saw the oldest house and ancient churches. We found a military hospital museum that displayed surgical instruments from the civil war era and the purveyor allowed me to ring the death bell--the bell that the doctors used to call the reverend to come perform final prayers for a dying soldier. We visited the University of St Augustine which was originally a hotel built by Henry Flagler who also built the railroad to Key West. The pictures above are mostly of that building and the courtyard.

Sunday night, Rich and Judy Bendick met us for dinner (thanks again for picking up the tab). Rich has been my friend since 1972. He and Judy moved to the Jacksonville area after he retired a few years ago so I don't see as much of them as I used to.

On Monday we cast off lines at noon and ran a short 13 mile sail to the Matanzas River where the old Spanish fort still stands. I'll post a picture of it in my next blog entry.

A Visit to St Simon Island

We left Brunswick last Thursday, December 10 but not before we took our rental car for a visit to St Simon Island.

Mandy had read most of the Eugenia Price novels that depicted life on the island years ago. She wanted to visit the places that she had read about in the Price novels and we both wanted to spend a night off the boat in a real hotel.

We chose a hotel that resembled the old Florida of Spanish influence. It was a short walk to all of the shops and restaurants of the "Old Town" area as well as the lighthouse and the lighthouse keeper's home which we visited the following morning.

We also visited the Christ Episcopal Church and graveyard. Ms. Price is buried somewhere in that cemetery but her grave is difficult to locate.

I drove to Dalonegha Georgia for the weekend of December 5th to visit my son, Matt, his wife, Janet, and my grandkids, Julia and Taylor. We decorated his truck for the town Christmas parade. I only meant to help decorate then watch the parade from the street but when I stepped inside the truck to warm my hands the parade began and I was suddenly in it. Matt handed me a Santa hat and I found myself waiving to the hundreds of children along the street. "Santa has a braided ponytail instead of a beard" the children must have thought.

I returned Monday to Brunswick. Mandy and I drove to Jekyll Island that night to see the impressive Christmas lights. We had a seafood boil dinner at a small shack built out on the end of a pier overlooking the ICW. We would see the same place from the water the next day as we motored further south seeking warmer weather.

Shrimp, Grackles, and Dogs, Oh My

Here in Brunswick, we often awake in the wee hours of the night to hear a disturbing sound. Some nights, I swear that I hear a crackling fire burning in the main cabin. Or perhaps I am hearing Mandy, up in the middle of the night, wrapping Christmas gifts with stiff paper. Mandy says she awakes to hear what she thinks might be me trimming my fingernails. The crackling, snapping, crinkling sounds are shrimp. Locals tell me that they gather along the hull of the boat and snap their tails against the marine growth that collects on the surfaces below the waterline to dislodge it for a quick grassy snack. It's not a loud sound but unfamiliar enough to awaken us even though we are undisturbed by the sounds of trains that run throughout the night on the tracks that adjoin the marina.

Another unfamiliar sound was the invasion of a plague of grackles. That's what a flock of grackles are properly called; a plague. I can see why. The air was still as I sanded the varnish on Foxglove in preparation for another coat when they suddenly arrived screaming and squawking--thousands of them--just like in the Hitchcock movie, "The Birds". In less than a minute they covered every elevated perch in the marina. Every boat's masthead, shroud, forestay, backstay, and spreader, was covered with a thick coating of black, iridescent, grackles. They sat talking and squawking their peculiar song. "UH-oh", a grackle at the head of a nearby mast warned me, over and over. "OH YES" I squawked back at him, over and over.

Grackles have also have a peculiar custom to match their peculiar song. They 'ant' themselves; that is, they capture and cover their feathers with insect juices to serve a variety of functions such as an insecticide and a bactericide. This area of Georgia has no shortage of insects and every evening at dusk, millions of bugs of all types stream from the salt marshes in search of people like Mandy. Mandy is a bug favorite, tasty in every way. As long as she is nearby, I never get stung, bitten, or chased. They all want Mandy's exquisite interstitial fluids--the best and tastiest known to all of bugdom. The grackles were there for a few days to save her from some of the bugs by consuming a large portion of the nightly swarm.

We also have the usual boat yard dogs to greet us wherever we go and, as boat yard dogs often do, greet us in unusual places. Mandy had just entered the marina shower one morning and prepared to step into the shower when Jackson, an Apple Headed Chihuahua, scampered under the doorway and became infatuated with Mandy's toes; so infatuated that Jackson wouldn't stop licking them. Jackson is the pet of one of the marina dockhands and has free run of the place as boat yard dogs always do. I have story about a boatyard dog named Rusty. I'll tell it to you sometime.

Christmas Season in Brunswick

Hello to all.

On Friday night, Mandy and I attended the much advertised lighting of the town Christmas Tree. The mayor was to recite the "Night Before Christmas", the tree would burst alive in a rainbow of color, carolers would sing, a band would play Christmas carols, the shops would all be open for business. We arrived five minutes late and found the tree illuminated but deserted. Can anyone recite "The Night Before Christmas", sing and play carols that fast?

Anyway, the photos are of the tree, the town, and two guys playing Christmas songs on their brass instruments. They were delightfully off-key just like in the opening to "A Christmas Story" as Ralphie and his friends studied the window display at Higbees Department store. Also is a photo of Santa when he wandered into a local restaurant/bar and sang with the guitarist.

Obviously, we were also in that bar Friday night to have captured that image. We had wandered through the shops and decided to have a drink since we had exhausted our entertainment options. Mandy and I have a magic trick that we often perform. We walk down a street then tun into a bar. It's a great trick.

Saturday, we created a Christmas Tree of our own. Mandy had purchased a string of 100 lights, a few decorations, and some scented sticks that smell like pine. We wrapped the lights around the post on which the salon table is mounted and decorated them. A photo of our "Christmas Tree" is one of the photos above. We were watching Tim Allen's "The Santa Clause" on our computer and you can see him on the screen in the photo.

Our dock neighbors left for the Bahamas this morning which makes us eager to get going too but in order to save money we will stay planted here for a while since we have bought a month of dockage. (Pay for 5 days and get the next 25 free)

Our other neighbor will be heading out to sea in a week to cross the Atlantic to their home in Scotland. It's hard to see our new friends leave while we remain in port. I sometimes stand at the end of the pier and look down the river to the bridge that we will pass under again when we continue our journey South.

Thanksgiving in Brunswick

We're still in Brunswick, Georgia on this sunny but cool Black Friday. We discovered that after we paid for five nights of dockage while waiting for our packages to arrive, we could stay another 25 nights for another $35 total. The marina had converted us from a daily dockage rate of $70 per night--$350 so far--to a monthly rate of $11 per foot (35 ft min) of $385. We paid the $35 extra and are now staying here for free. We don't plan to stay the entire 30 days but we will take advantage of the savings by splurging on a few things.

We plan to rent a car for a couple days next week and spend a night shore side in a motel. We will do some shopping and travel to some of the adjoining islands such as St Simon where beaches and restaurants abound. Nearby Cumberland Island has wild horses roaming by the beach.

We also have a few chores to do on the boat and this marina is the perfect place to get them all done.

We spent Thanksgiving here at the marina. About 70 people live aboard their boats here and each couple brought a covered dish to the party house. The marina provided turkey, ham, and prime rib for a $5 cover. What a feast!! We sampled four different types of stuffing, three different preparations of potatoes, and four different types of dressing. We had about 30 different side dishes and desserts to chose from. It was worthy of the prayer that we all bowed our heads to say.

We met quit a few fellow cruisers who gave us more advice about where to cruise and how to best get there. We ate dinner with Dick and Mary who sailed from San Francisco to the Panama Canal where they transited to the Western Caribbean. We are thankful to have their advice.

We also met Joshua who is a vet of Desert Storm. I welcomed him home as I always do when I meet a veteran of foreign war. I don't care how long he has been home. He deserves a handshake no matter how long he's been home. We are thankful to have Americans like Josh in our company.

We also met a cab driver who drove us home from the grocery store. He fell from a dump truck a few years ago and had to have a hip replacement. Since then another accident caused him to have a knee replacement. He could take the disability paycheck but he wants to keep working despite the pain he suffers. He wants to earn his own way for as long as he can. We commended him for doing the right thing for all of us rather than taking the free ride. We're thankful for Americans like him too.

The Christmas Tree lightning ceremony begins at 5:30 today in one of the many parks in the Historic District. I'm sure we will see many of the friends that we have made here in Brunswick. Later, a local restaurant/bar/deli will have live music. Thank God for the friends we make along the way. They brighten our lives. We hope to have the stamina to go and listen for a while and see them.

Last Friday, we went to the same place to hear four old (my age) rockers play two sets of blues and rock music (sorry Sharon Crane. No stompin' country music). Mandy got chummy with the wives and girlfriends of the band and danced the night away with them. Thank God for good music.

Miss you all.

Using All of the Senses

I last blogged at Turner Creek south of Savannah, GA. I failed to mention the fragrance of our anchorage at Turner Creek. We were anchored next to thousands of acres of marsh grass which glistened in the afternoon sun as the tide fell leaving the wheat colored grass wet. The next morning the wind had shifted over the marshlands bringing the flavors of the grasses to our boat. I was surprised to catch a hint of fennel in the air. I don't know if fennel or anise grows wild in salt marshes but the fragrance was definitely in the air.

After we left Turner Creek we ran to Kilkenny Marina on Kilkenny Creek. It's a rickety old marina with wobbly piers but pleasant locals and a friendly old dog who barked at you if you walked by but failed to pet him. The nearest town was Richmond Hill which was a couple miles away so we decided to cook on board. Mandy had started preparing a stove-top casserole when I commented that the locals must be having some kind of fishing tournament. I decided to check it out and after asking a few of the contestants if they had a fish or two for sale, a fellow held his bucket of 12 inch speckled tout out to me. "Take a couple," he offered. I pulled two slimy fish from the bucket and tried to pay him but, as usual in the South, he would accept nothing.

As I filleted the fish, biting gnats attacked me. Thousands of tiny needles pierced my skin from my face to my feet. I had never filleted a fish so fast. We rolled the fillets in crushed potato chips and fried them over the stove. What a treat!

For the past two days, we have been tied to a pier in the Brunswick Landing Marina adjacent to the town of Brunswick, GA. We are awaiting the arrival of our mail and a shipment of medication which should arrive today. We are also enjoying the local restaurants and the friendly smiles and the Y'alls. Last night we shared fried oysters over jalapeno grits with collards; a remarkable dish.

Yesterday we did two loads of laundry then hiked two miles to the nearest Winn-Dixie grocery store. Along the way we walked through the old historic district where the Christmas decorations are already out. Once out of the downtown area we passed over MLK Drive. I suspect most southern towns of any size have a tribute to Reverend King. Even though that part of the town is somewhat rundown we detected traces of jasmine and other wild plants growing in the yards of abandoned property. We stopped into a fortressed convenience store where the strong smell of patchouli slapped us in the nose.

When travelling by water, where the marinas are not conveniently located near a town, we find ourselves walking through fields, lawns, and wooded paths to reach a destination. Later yesterday afternoon, when running an errand to the hardware store, I found myself walking on a railroad track. I haven't walked on tracks since I was a kid when my short stride perfectly matched the spaces between the ties. As a grownup I had to do a silly dance where I bounced every second or third step off of the rail to make my gate match the spacing of the ties.

If our last package arrives today we will head to an anchorage a few miles south then we plan to be in Fernandia Beach on Saturday to find a bar where we can watch the Bucks hand the Overgrown Rats (that's what a wolverine really is!!) an embarrassingly disappointing afternoon.

A Little Retroscective about our Trip South

The photos are taken along the ICW as we passed through South Carolina. We are anchored in Turner Creek just south of Savannah on this Saturday afternoon. We arrived in time to listen to Ohio State play and beat--albeit barely--Iowa. Go Bucks!!!

We are in dolphin country here. We have been seeing dolphin since nearing Beaufort NC but here they are plentiful and playful. As we approached Beaufort SC the other day, two dolphin surrounded our boat and frolicked along beside us.

We are also in the presence of billions of stars. We can all see stars on clear nights but parts of the intra-coastal waterway are so far from towns, cars, homes, and any form of artificial light that the sky of stars that we see at night is unlike any sky that anyone can see from land unless they are somewhere in Montana.

And we are in the South. We have fallen in love with southern dishes all over again. Ever since, Jim and Vicki from Biloxi, MS, who rein as the king and queen of southern hospitality and who are our friends, fed us real southern grits (with cheese) we have yearned for more southern dishes. In Charleston, we chanced upon a restaurant that served grits and shrimp covered with a layer of cheese and topped with a sweet hot sauce. We've been trying to reproduce the dish ever since with marginal success.

And we are now in the presence of more southern hospitality. We were treated well in Deltaville VA but we must comment that a southern gentleman who was cleaning his boat near where we anchored took time from his day to row over to our boat and knock on the hull. When we popped our heads through the companionway he greeted us with, "Welcome to Savannah." We exchanged a pleasant conversation. He even offered to run errands for us if we needed groceries or whatever.

We will continue to run south for the next few days because we are expecting mail to be forwarded to Brunswick GA and wish to arrive there as soon as possible. We are also being stalked by a cold north wind that makes even a day like today--sunny with a high in the mid 70s--a cold day out on the waterway. We can't seem to shake the Yankee curse of cold weather.

I have been remiss in mentioning the enthusiasm here about military culture. Charleston hosted a huge Veterans Day parade with high school marching bands, high school ROTC marchers, dozens of jeeps with soldiers in full regalia, and a long line of bikers--veterans of Korea and Viet Nam wars. One old fellow who watched the parade with Mandy and me remarked that these parades used to feature pretty drum majorettes but now days we have old fat bikers instead.

Near Halloween, Mandy attended a children's parade of costumes in Elizabeth City. Having been the first year of the past ten that she was not trick-or-treating with the grandchildren, the scene brought tears to her.

A Belated Halloween

Mandy and I missed Halloween because of the bee sting. A few days later we found ourselves anchored in the spookiest creek in the world. Trees with bare limbs hung over the water. Spanish moss hung from every branch, their lower ends touching the water. A nearly full moon of a demonic nature beamed down from over head on that night when we found our way into that reptilian jungle. Turtles and snakes bobbled and slithered about. "I don't see much wildlife," I told Mandy. "But they see us," she replied.

Mandy loves my stories. So, after dark, I told her about Gladys the Witch who lives among the bare trees on the swampy island across the river from the small nearby town of Enterprise South Carolina.

Gladys was the daughter of two eccentrics who lived on the swampy island, fishing and trapping anything that might get snared in their lines. After her folks passed on, Gladys lived alone trapping and fishing along the banks of the river. The people of the town of Enterprise could see the dried fish, snakes, and animal pelts that Gladys hung out to dry over the tree branches that extend over the river. She seemed to hang everything on those branches. They saw fishing line, trap lines, ropes, and unmentionables draped over those branches along with the Spanish moss, pelts and snake skins.

Occasionally, Gladys would swim across the river to the town of Enterprise to shop for basic items. She was known to be an excellent swimmer and unafraid of the snakes that patrolled the river. The local children would scatter in all directions as she climbed, dripping out of the water. They called her the witch of Waccamaw Island. And indeed she looked like a witch. Her cheeks had chubbed out to the extent that her tiny nose seemed to disappear between them. Her eyes suffered exopthalmia, a bulging that results from hypothyroidism. Her whole face had a reddish appearance, possibly the result of the home-made sour mash that she created from swampy fruit trees.

The local shopkeepers gave her what she wanted. Their superstition kept their business minds at a distance. If they offered a bill for her purchases, she would cross a few items from the bill and argue about the prices of the remaining few. Then she would simply sign the bill as if her signature would suffice as payment. The shopkeepers were too afraid to protest.

The folks of Enterprise, Southern Baptist Brethren of proper Christian persuasion, accepted Gladys as an eccentric child of God's Kingdom who was perhaps 'affected'. They prayed for her salvation every Sunday in church.

But their opinions of Gladys changed when a single-handed elderly sailor tried to anchor his boat near the very spot where Foxglove was anchored that very night. To the horror of the people of Enterprise, who enjoyed sitting on lawn chairs watching the annual migration of boaters moving south, the elderly man fell, or perhaps dove into the frigid fall water of the Waccamaw. All of the onlookers knew that the water was too cold for anyone to swim out to save him without succumbing to hypothermia themselves so they had no choice except to watch the poor man die.

But suddenly they saw 'Gladys the Witch' dive in the river and swim to save the drowning man. She heroically pulled him from the deep and flopped him like a large fish over the gunnel of his boat. She followed him into the boat and settled him in his cockpit where he could rest. She soon dove back into the water to return home.

The people of Enterprise were overwhelmed with emotion. "Gladys is no witch," they cheered. "She is a humanitarian, a child of God, a hero." They planned a celebration for her. the church collected clothes for her, the hardware store created a trophy for her, the school children planned a parade for her.

The next day, the mayor and his cronies rowed out to tell the elderly sailor about the festivities but found the boat abandoned. They rowed further then saw that the old man had committed suicide by hanging himself from his harness on a tree branch that overhung the river. Then they rowed to tell Gladys about how the town was about to honor her for her bravery.

Gladys was flattered by the town's admiration and boarded the mayor's boat to be transported back to Enterprise for the festivities. But the mayor felt compelled to tell Gladys the truth about the man that she had saved.

"It seems that he was trying to drown himself when you saved him, Gladys, I'm sorry to say. But your act of heroism is none-the-less greatly appreciated by all."

"Oh he didn't hang himself," Gladys said with a cheeky smile. "I swam back out to check on him later that night and I seen that he was still all wet so I swam him back to my island and hung him out to dry."

And in the fading light Mandy could see a shadow of some sort of object hanging under the trees that reach over Waccamaw Creek. Maybe, just maybe, he still hangs there; but only at night.

Doin' the Charleston

We left Myrtle Beach last Thursday and motor-sailed to an anchorage just off the main ICW. This anchorage is a short creek that connects to the open Atlantic Ocean. Beyond the creek, the water was only a few inches deep so the ocean waves tumbled flat before they reached our boat. Fishermen in fast, shallow-draft boat are able to zip out to the ocean at high tide. But we had a spectacular view of the sea without being exposed to it. Friday morning gave us the most beautiful sunrise that we had seen yet. The sun rose in brilliant streaks of orange between the saltmarshes that bordered the outlet of creek to the ocean.

Friday night found us tied to the Charleston City Marina. This marina has the most elegant and expensive yachts in the world. The owner of Land's End brand of stores had his 400 foot, four story megayacht moored here. The Freedom from Newport Rhode Island was here. Freedom's decktop cabins are constructed almost entirely of mahogany. I have never seen finer yacht joinery and brightwork (varnish). Our 32 foot sailboat, in comparison, looked like a pimple on the ass of an elephant in the company of these megayacht.

Despite the luxury bestowed on it's patrons, the marina's much vaunted WiFi didn't work which is why I am only now writing a blog. The rich all have wireless Internet and don't complain about the WiFi. But let the ship's store run out of Perrier and there's hell to pay.

The Freedom yacht hosted a party on the pier Saturday night. The gentlemen attendees wore blue blazers over khaki shorts and wing-tip boat shoes over bare feet. The women wore, or kicked off, their sandals beneath flowing summer dresses. Mandy and I wore our best cutoffs and stained T-shirts. None of the party attendants offered us champagne. So we didn't offer them a Bud Light. Stuck-up creeps!!

We roamed the sunny city over the weekend, trying various restaurant specialties. Our favorite was 'Shrimp in Grits covered with Cheese and Hot Sauce'.

On Monday at noon, we cast off our lines and backed out of our slip into the raging tides of South Carolina. The current often runs half our top speed and the tidal range (from low to high) can be eight feet.

Last night we anchored in a channel that paralleled a bridge. We set out three anchors and hoped that the reversing tide wouldn't break them out. This morning we expected trouble weighing all three but with Mandy at the helm we had no trouble. Her helmsmanship is improving greatly as is her skill at lassoing pilings when docking.

Tonight we are docked in Beaufort, South Carolina. Rainy weather is expected for the next day or two and we will hide here until the sun comes back out to play.

Blogged Down in South Carolina

We're tied to a pier in Myrtle beach, South Carolina. We arrived in the area yesterday after a chilly motor-sail from Southport, just west of Cape Fear.

Southport was a fun little town with funky restaurants named Fishy Fishy and The Provision Company. The homes are cottage types and locals told us that the village is a popular summer destination.

In getting to the Myrtle Beach area, we had to request the opening of a most unusual bridge. It's a pontoon bridge that the tender opens by operating a winch that pulls the floating chunk of highway aside. Another winch floats the pontoon back into place.

I'm using the WiFi provided by the hotel that adjoins the marina. We have discontinued our Verizon wireless service due to the extreme expense--$200 per month for 10Gb--and our inability to find our actual useage. The modem might tell us that we have used 5116 Mb one day then tell us that we have exceeded out 10Gb limit two days later even though we haven't used the computer. My blogging might get a little blogged down for a while because of this.

We have no plans for tomorrow other than to slow down our southbound pace. The weather for these next few days will be sunny with highs in the upper sixties. We're no longer in a hurry to find warmer weather.

The weather is here, wish you were beautiful.

Halloween Boo-bees in my Face

Surf City had no available slips so we made a reservation in Wrightsville Beach--in the Wilmington NC area-- at the Dockside Marina and Restaurant. The trip from Beaufort to Wrightsville was a long 50 mile run with opposing wind and tide so we didn't even get a chance to shut the motor down and sail.

Yesterday was Halloween and we looked forward for some Halloween fun at the restaurant bar. But just before we passed through the last bascule bridge I decided to have a beer. Charlie had left part of a 12-pack of Yingling the other night and one of those beers was calling my name.

I don't usually drink when underway. The rigors of navigating in unfamiliar waters and the concentration required to dock our boat stern-in while fighting the conflicting passions of wind and tide requires a clear mind. But the trip was almost over and I had looked at the marina on-line and would most likely tie up along side a long outer pier. Beginner stuff. So I slowly drank the beer, savoring every drop. I must have drank the beer too slowly because when the beer had warmed to ambient temperature a bee wanted to share my pleasure. Bees don't like cold beer. But they love warm beer.

Just before reaching the bridge I took one last pull on the beer can. This annoyed Mr. Bee who was down inside of the can helping me with my last drop of liquid bread (that's how I think of beer). He retaliated by stinging me inside of my upper lip. For a brief moment I didn't understand why I was experiencing such pain but I reactively spit the mouth full of beer out and Mr. Bee came out along with it. Boo bee!! I must have crunched down on Mr. Bee because he lay on the cockpit seat gasping for life. His tiny wings could barely move. "We're all God's children and we all, man and insect alike, share in his love," I told him. Then in an act of selfless benevolence, I put him out of his misery by slowly pulling his tiny wings off one at a time. I pinched his head between my fingers until his eyes and stinger simultaneously popped out of his body. Then I fed him to the fish that I had been watching pass under the boat on my new chartplotter/fishfinder.

My upper lip began to swell. By the time we docked the boat and headed up to the bar, my Halloween costume was complete. I was going as Homer Simpson. Mandy gave me some drugs which reduced the swelling but also had a soporific effect. By 8:00 pm, I had changed from Homer Simpson to 'dead man walking'. By 8:15, I was asleep. No Halloween partying for Captain Run Aground.

I have stopped posting photos for a while because my computer is so low on disc space that I can't load them from the camera. As soon as I can get some CDs to move pictures out of photo files, I'll post photos again.

Charlie and the Pirate Factory

We managed to back our boat into a slip at the Beaufort City Dock thanks to protection from the screaming south winds by an 80 foot mega yacht tied alongside the outside on the outermost pier. This marina is the only marina in the historic district (all small towns are historic nowadays) and close to the Post Office where we are expecting general delivery mail (thanks to daughter Jacqui).

The trip from Oriental was uneventful. We simply crossed the Neusse River and proceeded down Adams Creek followed by the Adams Creek Canal which brought us to Beaufort.

Charlie called soon after we docked and said that he would come down to the boat at about 6:30 pm. He said he might bring a friend or two. At 6:50 pm --Charlie is notoriously behind-- Charlie and eight boat yard rats showed up with gallons of booze and a bag of chips. We sat on the boat exchanging "Charlie stories" for a while. Mandy and I have hospital stories and his friends have boat yard stories. Later, we all went to the local waterfront pub and had a bite and more libations.

Charlie led us all down a street leading away from the waterfront. We turned behind a few old buildings to a backstreet bar that has been in business for forever, I think. We stepped back in time to the days when local musicians brought their guitars, banjos, mandolins, and fiddles then commenced to have a hullaballoo (or was it a shindig?) just like back in the 60s. Soon after having yet another brewsky, we came back to the boat and crashed.

This morning we cast off lines and took Foxglove out into the harbor to anchor for the night. We would have stayed another night in the marina but at about $80 per night we decided that an anchorage made more sense. We'll hook up with Charlie again tomorrow morning for a while then we will continue south. We plan to go into a marina in Surf City on Saturday and find a Halloween party at a local bar.

Verizon's New Policy

It's been about six days since I have written an entry. That's because I upgraded my Verizon Wireless Program. When I finished the download, a vicious, hate full popup warned me that I had surpassed my 5 gig limit and that I was paying 25 cents per Megabyte for each meg over my 5 gig limit. I had already used 6115 megs. 1024 megs comprise a gig. It's a binary thing. You would think that a thousand megs make a gig but a gig is a power of two (2 to the ninth power of 2 in this case) that is 4,8,16,32,64,128,256,512,1024. At 6115 megs, I was already about 1000 megs over which calculates to $250 in excess fees. When I purchased this packaged, the salesman didn't warn me about any such limit.

As the next few day passed I called Verizon repeatedly and listened to a variety of reports of how my bill had inflated from simple binary math to astronomical differential equations. I received a wide variance of answers from "All is fine, don't worry about it" to "At your current rate of usage, you will owe over $1000 just for this month alone".

So now, we are trying to find marinas that offer free WiFi access. We are now in Oriental North Carolina where the Oriental marina offers free cable and free Internet.

But my last post left us in Whilloby Bay in Norfolk where the high school cheerleaders practice their chant; "We don't smoke, and we don't drink. Nor Folk, Nor Folk, Nor Folk." Nice clean girls here in Norfolk!

We weighed anchor that overcast morning (red skies at morning; sailors' take warning) and powered out towards mile zero of the ICW-- the intracoastal waterway-- just 10 miles south of Whilloby Bay.

We followed the Elizabeth River until we entered the entrance to the Dismal Swamp Canal. It is named by the men who lived in disease and misery to build the canal many years ago.

It was a 28 mile drive that simulated driving through a forest except that I was driving on water instead of a road. Tall trees lined the sides of the narrow canal and deposit their leaves in the canal. The water is so rich in tinin, the ingredient in tea leaves that makes tea black, that the canal water is as black as tea.

At mile 28 all boats stopped to tie up to the North Carolina Visitor's Center. There is room for only three boats so the remaining 10 rafted off of the three moored to the bulkhead. This makes for a large drinking party as boaters climb over each other's boat to meet new arrivals. Many of the boaters knew each other from previous fall travels down the ICW.

The following morning, we broke up the raft at 7:15 am to head for the second of two locks in the Dismal Swamp Canal. The canal passes over ground that is higher than sea level so boats must pass through locks that lift them to a higher level, then after about 32 miles, another set of locks lower them back to near sea level.

The next stop was Elizabeth City where we spent two nights because I needed to plug into shore power to finish some jobs that required power tools. During our stay, the stainless steel wire that secured the dinghy to the back of the boat snapped and the dinghy set out in search of a new home. A dock neighbor snagged it and directed it to the beach where Mandy and I rescued it and hauled it back to our transom where it belonged. I secured new towing rings to it and scolded it for going astray. It cursed back at me. I lost my temper and struck it with a screwdriver. It hit me with an oar. I retaliated with a hammer. It pounded me with the trolling motor. Insults were hurled. Feeling were hurt. The dinghy and I now live within the confines of a pouting truce, eager to find a middleground where we can both live in harmony. Damned dinghy pissed me off!!!

The next day, (I'm lost in the seven day weekend so I don't know which day) we set out under strong north winds southbound down the Pasquatank River to the open ravages of the Albemarle Sound. We received a proper thrashing from the Sound. Wind driven waves hurling down the river collided with waves driven by winds from the open Albemarle Sound created wild and confused seas of six feet and more. We sailed under full main and jib for most of the day then finally turned into the Alligator River anchorage, a place that can only be described as the only lunar anchorage on the East coast. The trees are so damaged by gales and hurricane force winds that they have no leaves and few remaining branches.

The following morning we motored down the Pungo Canal then turned toward Belhaven North Carolina. There, we topped off our fuel and took a walk through the tiny southern town. All restaurants were closed but we found a pool hall where we could get a beer and a bag of chips for dinner. A local patron modeled his Halloween costume for us all; it was a large cardboard box with the number '1' on the back. He wore the box over his body with his head popped out through a hole cut in the top. Above his head was a lamp and on the top of the box next to his head was a TV remote and a paperback novel. "I'm going as a 'one night stand', he said.

Today finds us in Oriental North Carolina. It's a cutesy town where tourists stay in B&Bs and wander the shops in search of nautical curiosities to display in their rec rooms. The tourist season is over now. Most shops and restaurants are closed til spring. We managed to find a blue-cheese-burger in a locals spot and then had a drink at the tiki bar operated by the marina. The locals have no gas station where they can hang out like Mayberry or Lost River so they hang out at the tiki bar.

Tomorrow, we're on to Beaufort to visit Charlie Baldwin and his band of sea-borne desperadoes. Can't wait!!!!!!!

Moving South

Last night we powered into Deltaville Virginia. Deltaville is not like most small Chesapeake villages. Instead of shops, marinas, and restaurants all huddled around the waterfront, Deltaville is built on both sides of route 33 which serves the small side roads that conduct traffic to various parts of the convoluted waterfront. This means that none of the many restaurants and marinas are within walking distance of each other. All transients, that's what we are, must trudge out To 33 and start walking.

But wait. We lowly transients are not only valued in this community of boat builders and boat experts, we are also in the company of southern hospitality. As Mandy and I walked along Rt 33 heading for the nearest eatery/drinkery, we decided to call a few joints to be sure that they were still open for business. Low season is here and many restaurants shorten their hours during the late fall. I talked to Joe at Kokomo's Bar and Grill. His place was closed Sunday through Wednesday but he offered to drop what he was doing to pick us up along the highway and drive us to his competitor's restaurant. We declined his generous offer but promised to return in the spring for a visit to his fine establishment.

I called a place called 'The Galley' to see if someone could drive us back to our marina if we ate there. Of course, no problem!! If the staff was too busy a local would put down his beer and drive us home. Holy crap! Is there a catch?

We walked the two and a half miles to 'The Galley' and had a fine meal at the bar. The barmaid/only waitress/part-time cook, Ellen, assured us that our glasses would never be empty on her watch despite running the lively place alone. When we were ready to leave, I mentioned that someone said that we might be able to get a ride. Within seconds Ellen produced an eager, friendly young man.

I know a little about southern hospitality so I said to the young fellow as he pulled to a stop in our marina, "This money isn't for you. It's for the kids' soccer team or cheerleaders' outfits." I threw a fiver on the dashboard.
"I couldn't accept it," he said as predicted.
"As I said, it's not for you. It's for your church."
"I couldn't......"
"It's for your mother's Christmas fund."
No further response. We said another thank you and he thanked us yet again.

This morning at 7:30 we cast off our lines and motored out of the marina into the Rappahannok River. We ran due east long enough to clear Stingray Point Light before turning south. Four hundred one years ago in 1609, Captain John Smith ran his trusty vessel aground on that very reef. While waiting for the tide to rise and lift him off Captain Smith decided to do some fishing. He caught a most unusual fish. He caught a cow-nosed stingray. Unfamiliar with the species, Captain Smith mishandled the tail of the animal and was stung by the poisonous barb. His hand and arm swelled for the afternoon but the ship's surgeon remedied the painful injury with a mysterious salve and the captain was well enough by suppertime to vengefully eat the beast that caused him such grief. The captain declared that the reef shall forever be named Stingray Point as it is to this day.

Tonight we are anchored in Willoughby Bay in Norfolk Virginia. It's one mile square, large enough to hold hundreds of boats. Tomorrow, we will enter the Dismal Swamp Canal enrout to Elizabeth City North Carolina where we plan to rest for a couple days as a front passes.

About Vera

Vera's White Sands Restaurant sat on a bluff overlooking our John's Creek anchorage last week. I wanted to comment about Vera and her restaurant but I wanted to find a particular photo of her first. In this photo, taken about 8 years ago in her restaurant, Vera is seated in a wicker chair that she probably brought back from some far flung destination in one of her many world wide trips. Behind her is a portrait of her as she posed with her jewels and adornments. For the photo, she dressed down in a saffron gown, riddled with diamonds. She wore only meager number of necklaces and rings. A headband reminds us that she was of Native American descent.

We had the pleasure of meeting Vera a few times at her restaurant. She had been married to an optometrist who worked for the Hollywood crowd. He was know as "the optometrist to the stars". His wealth allowed him to dabble in real estate and in the 50s, he purchased 800 acres of land where Vera decided to open a sandwich shop to pass the time while her husband flew about the country meeting celebrities and making real estate deals.

Vera loved the glamorous life and soon decided to convert her place into a fabulous yacht club. She had the restaurant built with a patio that came to a point at the junction of the two creeks that bordered her property so that patrons would have the feel of dining on a ship. She decorated the interior with a Tiki flare. The bar was covered with a grass roof and bamboo seemed to be a structural part of every corner of the building. She placed Easter Island’ looking carvings and statues everywhere. Then, to bring elegance into the mix, she placed a baby grand piano by the bar where her friends who were patrons and guests of the club would gather to dance and sing the songs from the American songbook.. Some years later, her husband passed away and the membership declined. Vera opened her yacht club to the public.

Mandy loved Vera for her grace and style. I recall an afternoon when Mandy ordered a ‘Vera Martini’ and sat drinking with Vera at the bar. Vera’s signature martini was similar to any gin martini except that her martini was served in a jumbo martini glass. She always had a milk chaser nearby. Sometimes, Vera wore a jeweled crown while she drank. She was affectionately known as the ‘Queen of the Chesapeake’ and therefore needed the crown.

After Vera died a couple years ago, a new owner took over and is slowly changing the demeanor of the club into a party place for the younger patrons. The docks have been rebuilt and elegant motor yachts have been replaced with muscle boats. The beach, where couples once lusted under the moonlight, is now covered with beach volleyball nets. And the bamboo is almost all gone. The baby grand and the stone carvings have been hauled away. But Mandy and I feel lucky to have met Vera and seen her in her element. And even though the years of Sinatra and Martin were long gone by the time we visited the White Sands, we feel lucky to have been swept back in time, listening to a tuxedoed pianist play the songs that Vera loved as she sat by the piano reminiscing.

Five Days of Rain

The photos above are of Mandy at the helm as we finished anchoring the boat in John's Creek, Foxglove at Spring Cove Marina, and a view of the marina.

We motored into John's Creek on Tuesday afternoon under partly sunny skies and 15 mph wind from the NNW. To see where we are anchored, use any map program and type in zip code 20657 or type Lusby, MD then search for Vera's White Sands Beach Club. When you see Vera's on the map, we will be anchored just to the east of the restaurant in a small cove. If you click on "more info" on the Yahoo site, a photo of Vera's will come into view. Our anchorage is beyond Vera's in the background. Vera is gone now. She died last year at about 90 years of age. Mandy loved Vera for her glamor and queenly demeanor. Vera was know as "Queen of the Chesapeake". Mandy now claims that title despite not having a crown on board. More about Vera tomorrow.

It started raining as expected, at 9:00 pm on Tuesday and it hasn't stopped since. Today is Friday. The rain is expected to continue through Sunday for a total of five days of continuous rain. But we're happy here in our little floating home. Mandy makes popcorn and we watch movies and tv shows on HULU on the Internet. We can watch almost every show that we watched at home but a day late and for free. Not bad, eh?

Yesterday, the rain slowed to a drizzle long enough for us to watch five deer wander down to the creek's edge for a drink and to snack on the tall grasses. The osprey that we usually see here have gone. A blue heron is occupying their nest.

Our anchorage feels like being in the center of a small stadium. Tall trees on steep hills are all around us protecting us from the strong north winds. The shoreline is completely wooded except for the yards of a few homes. The trees are starting to turn the colors of fall.

Today, we plan to sail back to Spring Cove Marina on Solomons Island to pick up the mail that Jacqui, Mandy's daughter, forwarded to us. We also hope to see more old friends. We'll spend a couple of nights there then anchor Sunday night nearby. The weather is supposed to clear on Monday and we will continue south to another anchorage south of the mouth of the Potomac River. We hope to be in the ICW at Norfolk by next weekend. We also hope to be in warmer weather within two weeks.

This is contingent on the hurricane status. The Atlantic is quiet for now but a tropical depression that could spawn a hurricane could still develop. But this is an El Nino year and this lessens the probability of tropical storm development. If we get started down the ICW and a hurricane threatens, we'll turn around and run back to Norfolk to have the boat hauled out until the storm passes.

I forgot to mention in a recent blog when I wrote about the boat show, that we observed a younger man and an older man, who were walking opposite directions, accidentally collide because neither was watching where they were going. They both apologized and the younger man said that he had become separated from his wife and was looking for her. The older man said that he also was looking for his wife. "What does your wife look like?" the older man asked. "We can both keep an eye out for her." "Well," the younger man said. "She is blonde and she is wearing a white halter top and she has rather large breasts. She is wearing short white shorts and has long tanned legs. What does your wife look like?" The older man replied, "To hell with my wife, let's look for yours."

A Day at Spring Cove

Today we are still at Spring Cove Marina on Solomons Island in Maryland. We did some cleaning, laundry, topped off the water tanks, and visited with our former dock neighbors. We came in yesterday, late Sunday afternoon, after many sailors had gone home for the weekend. So we were surprised to run into Charlie and Marty who sail to the Bahamas most winters and who gave us some good advice about getting there.

We also saw some of our Scottish friends such as, well, Scotty, whose advice when having our transmission rebuilt was invaluable. Scotty and his wife used to make regular trans-Atlantic trips, under sail, back to Scotland. Perhaps they still do.

We saw John, who used to live alone aboard his boat, now happily married with a new son. John gleams more now than he used to.

Brian, the go-to guy around here, is as pleasant as ever as is the rest of the staff.

We were sad to have missed our great friends, Bruce and Wynne aboard Seahawk. They were great company for Mandy a couple years back when I did some time away to visit family.

We have a few tasks and shopping to do tomorrow before we depart. Tomorrow, the meteorologists say, will bring mostly sun with temps into the 70s but the rest of the week will be rainy. Yesterday I saw sirus clouds, the wispy ice clouds high in the sky, that predict an approaching cold front. Also, the winds had shifted around from the east. Anytime you see clouds in the sky and the wind comes from any easterly direction, rain will likely come soon. We plan to anchor in nearby St. Leonard Creek, a tributary to the Patuxent, and use the rainy days to continue fixing things.

We had an unusual occurrence today. Not long after we arose for the morning, while I checked e-mail and Mandy read her Kindle, I heard noises on the deck. I popped my head through the main companionway to find a rotund Ralph Cramdon and his narrow companion, Norton, casting off all of our lines.

"Oh, somebody is aboard," Cramdon smiled. "Are you Mr. Pearson?"
"No," I replied. "And what are you doing?"
"We're towing your boat to Zanheiser's Marina for repairs."
"This boat is our home. It's not going anywhere."
Ralph studied his notes carefully. "Your boat is in slip C9 and that's the boat that we're supposed to tow out."
"I don't think so," I shot back. "Call your boss.
After a few words were exchanged over the phone a light seemed to illuminate in Ralph's head.
"Oh, it's C9 at Solomons Island Marina not Spring Cove Marina," he repeated to the voice on the phone.
"This is the wrong boat," Ralph shouted to Norton who had already removed both of our bow lines. "The owner is not named Pearson, the boat is made by Pearson."
Cramdon turned to me. "Sorry for any inconvenience. Wrong marina."

We were lucky. If we had decided to go for an early shower we would have returned to find our boat, our clothes, our stash of cash, our passports, our food, and everything we need to sustain life utterly and completely gone. We would have been instant street urchins with little cash and no change of clothes; our only option would have been to call the Coast Guard and report a stolen boat. Our boat, meanwhile would have been towed into Zanheiser's marine travel-lift and hauled ashore to be dropped and blocked in a corner of their massive yard where we might have spent weeks wandering the Solomons Island marinas in hope of finding our missing boat despite the likelihood that it had been stolen and sailed out to sea enroute to a drug runner's lair.

But I find it difficult to hold Ralph and Norton at fault. They are Chesapeake people. Chesapeake people are interesting folk. They are more trustworthy than they should be. It seems to be in their nature. On many of the small islands here, no property deeds exist. A handshake and a smile seals many deals here.

Mandy and I meet many of the descendants of the old Chesapeake Bay culture. We not only see it in their friendly faces but often in their names. A fellow named Meade Breeze is my sailmaker. In Rock Hall, Reverend Nancy Mariner was recently the pastor. Captain Schooner, years ago, pulled my little 21 foot sailboat off of a beach after my motor quit when approaching a harbor. Capt. Schooner was assisted by Captain Johnny Shore. Also, we recently read about the winner of a fishing contest here on the bay. His name is Jimmy Oyster. We meet these people day after day. They are the color that brings life to this area of our country. They are the Chesapeake people.

We're off tomorrow but I hope blog again soon.

Also, I realize that this blog has no contact link. If you wish to contact us, our e-mail is captmaxmiller@gmail.com.