Rock Hall and Fried Chicken

Rogue Harbour to Swan Creek and Rock Hall – 15 nautical miles, 5 kilometres walked

I slept in until the ungodly hour of 8am. I will blame the rum and the midnight bedtime, but in fact I felt pretty good and even had the strength to muscle in the heavy anchor and chain so we could get underway.

 

Our ride was calm and uneventful and we had to motor the entire way as the wind was too light to sail. Chesapeake Bay is full of shallows and reefs and looks quite treacherous for deep draft vessels so we stuck to the deep and well marked commercial channel. To either side of the channel were many crab pot markers, and we know people who have run into these and caused massive damage to their boats, so we stayed clear.

 

Swan Creek is one of the two bays that encircle the village of Rock Hall and we found a cozy anchorage just off the channel entrance. Ben and Kate had arrived earlier and tucked themselves into a spot further into the bay, which was possible with their shorter, shoal-draft keel. Our boat needs at least two feet more of water so they are able to get into places we are not.

Ana and I took the dinghy into shore and tied up at one of the marinas then started walking. It was a sleepy Sunday and the town was very quiet, but beautiful, with its houses on stilts, nautical-themed everything, six marinas, mature trees, and well kept yards. A small bus with the word FREE stamped on the side passed us and I waved him down. The driver opened the door and told us this was a free bus provided by the community and it did a full loop of the town. We jumped aboard and he took us for a ride, along the way telling us his story, all the places he’s lived, and many of his observations about the town and its people. He dropped us off on downtown main street and pointed us towards an ice cream shop, which he heartily recommended.

 

We went into a gift shop sort of place and browsed there for a while then found an incredibly well-stocked fresh food market and picked up some veggies, then wandered down the street, peeking into the shop windows but nearly all the stores were closed. It is a very cute street and I could imagine what the peak season hustle would look like here. We were tempted to stop for a pizza at the one place which was open, but instead decided to grab some HOT TO GO from the grocery store, so with our bag of fried chicken, pot of potato salad, and fresh buns we took the long, slow walk back to the dinghy, had ourselves a nice meal on the boat, then zipped over to Ben and Kate’s boat for a short visit, and were back in time for a most pleasurable 10pm bedtime.

Shotgun Start, C&D Canal, Rogue Harbour, Elk Neck Park, and the Haircutting Plan

Reedy Island to Rogue Harbour – 15 nautical miles, 5 kilometres walked

We awoke to the delightful popping noises of duck hunters blowing away Daffy, Donald, Howard and chums in the marshlands near the anchorage. And by the ferocity and frequency of blasts I’m guessing the ducks didn’t have a chance.

 

We have a device on the boat called a windlass which pulls in the anchor or lets it out at the push of a button. This morning the push of a button returned a barrage of troubling clicking noises instead of pulling in the chain, which I assumed was a failure in the internal workings of the windlass solenoid, something we had experienced this summer but though we had fixed. I got an excellent early morning back, legs, and biceps workout by hauling in 150 feet of thick chain and a 60 pound anchor that was a real beast, especially as it was covered in gooey muck that added another few pounds.

 

We navigated out of the anchorage and into the C&D Canal and it was a lovely ride – calm, peaceful (except for the continuing shotgun blasts), no random floating trees like in the Erie Canal, and just a few other boats. Ana called me down to the cabin because the toaster, which runs off the inverter, was not working and I realized then that the problem with the anchor was the batteries, which seemed to be rapidly deteriorating if they were no longer able to run a toaster. The only thing getting toasted today was batteries.

 

After transiting most of the canal we reached Chesapeake City, pulled the boat into the bay and borrowed a dock at the private marina there as the anchorage was full of boats. We then jumped on the Zoom for our Newport Yacht Club annual general meeting and Ana gave an excellent presentation as Director of Marketing and Volunteers.

As the canal opened up into Chesapeake Bay, the wind was screaming from the north at 15 to 20 knots so we put up the headsail, shut off the motor, and did some peaceful and quiet sailing for a glorious five miles then anchored near our buddy boat in Rogue Harbour. Once we were settled we dropped the dingy, picked up Kate and Ben, headed to shore, and walked the Beaver Marsh Loop in Elk Neck State Park. It took us across a nice beach, through woodlands, up and down some rugged terrain, and around a big marsh. It felt good to get off the boat and stretch out the legs.

 

When we returned to the boat I found the batteries were down to 7.5 volts. “Holy shit!” I hollered. “These batteries are totally messed up. I’m getting out the generator.” So I pulled out the generator and we switched into powerboat mode with the associated smell and pollution, but with a decidedly delicious 14 volts of pure DC power from the inverter. We plugged in every device and fired up the icemaker to make use of the gigglywattts.

 

We all gathered together in the belly of SeaLight and were so happy to hang out with Ben and Kate again as we hadn’t been in the same space for over a week. Ana helped Kate with a travel website she was setting up while I executed my plan to eradicate the rest my cold. The plan was to use alcohol to kill off the remaining germs attacking my body and Ben was more than happy to help, so we polished off most of a bottle of Captain Morgan and felt ourselves getting wiser, funnier, and more handsome with each drink. At one point the conversation turned to retirement planning.

“Ana and I have an amazing plan,” I said as I topped up my cup with fresh spiced rum. “She brought her haircutting gear and is going to fund our travels by doing haircuts. I’ve already got a name for the business. It’s called Dock Cutzzz. This will enable us to travel indefinitely.”

 

“Dock Cutzzz?” Ben asked. “How many z’s?”

 

“Three z’s.”

 

“What about when you’re anchored out?”

 

“Harbour Cutzzz. I’ll make up two signs. She can cut hair of other cheap-assed sailors on the deck of SeaLight.”

 

“What kind of cutzzz do you do,” Kate asked Ana. I was mighty impressed with her perfect pronounciation.

 

“I only do two cutzzz. For men, it’s the OneTwo cut. Number one on the sidezzz, number two on the top,” said Ana as she looked over a Ben, noticing his intense interest, running his hands along the sides of his head.

 

“How about cutzzz for women?” asked Kate. 

 

“I call it the Tropical Lesbian. Similar to the OneTwo, but a bit longer on top for the ladiezzz.”

 

“Amazing! Can you cut my hair right now? I'll take the OneTwo,” said Ben wide eyed.

 

“Sure. You got twenty buckzzz?”

 

“Not on me.”

 

“Come back tomorrow.”

Sailing Delaware Bay and Hot Dog Tossing

Cape May, New Jersey to Reedy Island, Delaware – 54 nautical miles

We pulled up anchor and left at first light. The plan for today was to round Cape May and head north into Delaware Bay which leads to the C&D Canal when in turn joints into the start of Chesapeake Bay. This leg has the potential to be awful as the combination of strong tidal currents, shallows, and opposing winds can create huge standing waves. Ben and I talked it through yesterday, looked at the wind and tide forecasts and decided it was a decent enough day to try it. Ben and Kate’s boat travels at a slower speed than ours so they left at 4am and we followed at 7.

 

There is a large set of shoals just outside Cape Map that we wound through, finding ourselves perilously close to the beach and lighthouse at one point, close enough such that the fisherman who was standing on the beach casting his line could have easily dropped his bait on the deck of our boat. We ran into a patch of standing waves which were manageable and beat us up for a bit but once we got into the bay the waves became larger but more predictable and we were able to make about 5 knots with a 14 knot north-east wind, the headsail up and the motor running.

 

Ben and Kate, on the other hand, were struggling. They had to face a much stronger tidal current and at one point they had their sails up and motor running and were stationary. Plus the boat was getting rocked by the large waves. We were surprised when we caught up with them at 10am, as we expected they would be much further along by then, but at that point the current had eased and they were moving along well.

 

The winds and current calmed right down in the afternoon and it was a nice ride. There is a shipping channel cut through the bay which all the commercial traffic uses, and there is a lot of commercial traffic here as this is one of the busiest shipping routes on the coast. We stayed just outside of the channel and were passed by many boats, including a crude oil tanker called Orpheus, who actually stopped and anchored outside the channel at one point. Turns out the million pound anchors hanging off the front of those monstrous ships are not just for show.

 

At the peak of boredom I remembered the mostly full package of hot dogs in the fridge I’d been meaning to throw out. I bought two packs of these at a grocery store days ago because they were cheap. Well, I got what I paid for. They were the worst hot dogs I’ve ever had. And for me to throw out hot dogs…that tells you something. Our hot dogs in Canada are great – not as fantastic as the ones in Denmark obviously, but still pretty good. But in the US? The great words by one of the nation’s finest laureate poets Dan Aykroyd finally made sense to me. As Roman Craig in The Great Outdoors he said, “You know what they make hot dogs out of Chet? You know? Lips and assholes!” I could taste the lips and assholes in these hot dogs and I didn’t like it one bit.

 

I asked Ana if she’s like to have a hot dog tossing contest but she was feeling worse than ever and wasn’t up for it so I went up the deck alone with my packet of projectiles. I gave the first one a straight overhand throw and it was immensely satisfying watching it wobble through the air like a tubular football and slap onto the water then sink to the depths, hopefully burying itself in the mud so it wouldn’t poison any of the fish. I gave the next one a hearty helicopter spin. I spun it so hard it started gaining elevation and I thought it was going to go straight up and get sucked into a jet engine (likely a Boeing considering their recent fortunes). But it eventually lost spin and flopped down into the water with a gleeful popping noise. I chucked the next one right at the one of the metal shrouds on the boat (these are the thin braided steel lines that attach the mast to the boat at the sides), and it perfectly bifurcated the wiener, creating two mini-sausage projectiles that spun off into the ocean and made me laugh out loud. I made it down to the last wiener and launched that one straight up into the air, wondering if it might land back on the deck and explode and how funny that would be, but my aim was not true and it landed away from the boat and slowly sunk. I just hoped that some nasty ocean catfish or mud crabs would get at them before any of the beautiful dolphins.

 

We made it to the anchorage by about 4pm and anchored behind Reedy Island after passing through a super sketchy entrance that looked to have a foot of water, but I trusted the charts and found it had plenty of depth. Kate and Ben arrived an hour or two later and we were so looking forward to having them over for cockpit drinks, but both of us were still sick and the last thing we wanted to do is infect our friends and ruin their lives for a week.

 

Tomorrow, we plan to conquer the C&D Canal and meet Chesapeake Bay.

A Visit to Cape May and the Power of Excel

Cape May, New Jersey – 2 miles by dinghy, 7 kilometres walked

This morning it drizzled for about 25 minutes. That’s the first rain we’ve seen since in over two weeks and I don’t think there was single two week period this summer when we didn’t get pounded with a rainstorm. The weather we’ve experienced so far has been excellent. Sunny days, cool nights, and when the winds have been strong, they have usually been in our favour. I have always been a strictly summer guy but I will admit the quality of the fall season has been rising in my estimation.

 

Despite both of us still feeing rotten, and despite there being a 20 knot wind blowing us toward a lee shore (which means the wind is blowing you towards land) with our trusty Rocna anchor holding us steady, we decided to take the dinghy into South Jersey Marina then walk into town. We passed by commercial docks and saw a large fleet of massive fishing vessels, the ones with ten miles length of nets all wound up on giant rollers. I had quick look online and this is one of the largest fishing ports on the east coast and their primary catch is scallops, squid, mackerel, lobster, and butterfish. The government website also read that in 2013 their overall catch was 20 million pounds with an estimated value of $35 million. So at a buck-fifty per pound to the fishermen, the massive amount of margin must be going to the middlemen and retailers. There was also a large number of big sportfishing charter boats in the marina. Sometimes I wonder how there can be any fish at all left in the ocean.

 

It was a nice, long walk into town and what we found there was a cute tourist town, centered around the Washington Street Mall pedestrian area. It was lined up with specialty boutiques, coffee shops, restaurants, and had great street furniture for all the old men to sit on while the wives burnt up their social security cheques in the stores.

 

From here we walked towards the ocean and found an incredibly huge and luscious beach with white sand, lifeguard stations, beachside cafes, and washroom/changerooms. As it was the end of the season, the beach was deserted but I could imagine the hoards of tourists here in July.

I was really not feeling so well, and also nervously looking at the anchor app (which mirrors from my own phone left at the boat to track its movements and screeches out an alarm if the boat moves outside of its anchor range…meaning the anchor has let loose and you are in big trouble) every few minutes, so we returned to the marina, dinghy’d back, and found the boat exactly as we left it, except the wind was even stronger now.

 

The rest of the day was spent route planning for the following day, which was going to be a big one as we had to get up the Delaware Canal, and it was not known by others to be the most enjoyable part of the journey. Ben and Kate wanted to come by for a visit but that would involve bleaching every surface and fumigating the entire contents of the boat, then we’d have to leave before they got here so as not to infect them, so they considered it then decided against that plan.

 

In the evening we had a quick call with my brother Curtis. Ana noticed on Facebook that they are selling their lovely cabin in Manitou beach in Saskatchewan and we were very surprised as they haven’t had it for long and absolutely love it.

“You guys moving somewhere?” I asked him.

 

“No, why?” Curtis replied.

 

“You’re selling the cabin. What’s up with that?”

 

“Time to move onto other opportunities.”

 

“Did you do a spreadsheet for that analysis?”

 

“Of course so! How do you think we made it to that decision?”

 

“You know, some people say you can’t put a value on fun. I say those people just haven’t learned how to use Excel properly.”

How Did We Become Sailors?

Cape May, New Jersey – 0 nautical miles, 247 Kleenex tissues consumed

Since both Ana and I are now sick, and our activities yesterday were limited to sleeping, resetting the anchor a couple times, a paddleboard ride and beach walk for me, eating some cookies that Kate and Ben kindly bought for us in town, and watching a couple of movies, I will instead today write about how we became sailors.

 

I am from Saskatchewan, a place known more for farming than seafaring. But as my buddy David Leng has mentioned to me on multiple occasions, sailing is in my blood as I have deep Scandinavian roots – Icelandic on my Dad’s side and Swedish on my Mom’s. And those Vikings certainly were seafarers, and not too bad at farming either, plus they were tops at raping and pillaging (but I haven't tried this yet). So me getting into sailing makes a certain amount of sense, if you consider historical origins.

 

My first glimpse of sailing happened when I was a little kid and my dad got a line on this sailboat some farmer was restoring but ran out of either patience or money and needed to liquidate. He thought it would be a good backyard project, although I have no idea how we would have gotten it into our suburban Saskatoon backyard through that little gate. My dad has always been a dreamer, but a mostly practical one, and he envisioned himself fixing up this boat and I guess launching it in the South Saskatchewan River and sailing it to the Atlantic then around the world? Anyway, his hopes were dashed when we all went to this weekend psychic festival at the Holiday Inn in Saskatoon and a batty old heavily eyeshadowed psychic wearing a carpet for a shawl told him there was something wrong with the boat and he shouldn’t buy it. Which just exposes the fraudulent nature of psychics – there’s something wrong with EVERY boat. Duh.

 

Anyway, that project fell apart, but it wasn’t long before Brian Ford (a.k.a. The Legend of Fishing Lake) picked up a windsurfer somewhere and started teaching all the kids how to use it. I loved it so much that my parents bought us a Bic 250 windsurfer and let me tell you, I spent every hour I could on that thing and loved it. I learned how the wind works and how to adjust the sail to get maximum speed. I learned about centreboards and how they were needed to turn the sideways wind power into forward velocity. I also thought I looked pretty cool ripping around on the lake with my black shades and my hat turned backwards and thought it might translate into some success with the ladyfolk out there but that never happened – they were more impressed with practical farm skills like baling and combining, and I had none of those. So I’d have to find my life partner elsewhere.

 

My next experience with sailing came about ten years later when I was living and working in the Bahamas and four of us landlubbing consultants on the project (I prefer “International Men of Mystery”) pooled our funds and bought a 1979 Hunter 30’ sailboat called The Lost Shaker which I still believe is the greatest boat name ever as it comes from a Jimmy Buffet song. It came with a marina slip in Nassau and one of our boat neighbours Dan gave us sailing lessons, which only helped a bit, as we brutalized that boat and really roughed her up, smashing into coral reefs, banging the keel into rocks, breaking the prop, losing the engine off the dinghy, and having to get rescued by BASRA (Bahamas Air and Sea Rescue Association) so many times we were on a first name basis with the officers. But we had a lot of fun sailing her and it did result in some luck with the ladies (or at least one) – that’s where Ana and I met, and she was very impressed with our yacht and that’s where we first sailed together. I knew right away she was the one for me, as she too was from a seafaring nation - Portugal - and we were destined to sail the world together in the future. But not on that boat as it got sort of wrecked in a hurricane.

 

Spin forward another ten years. After living and working overseas for quite a while, we moved back to Canada in 2003, had our kids in Calgary, then moved to Paris, Ontario in 2006 which is positioned perfectly between the Great Lakes of Lake Erie, Lake Huron, and Lake Ontario. It was time to get back into sailing. It also happened that Ana’s job with WestJet wrapped up around this time so any low cost traveling we were to do in the future was going to have to be land or water based. And we’re not much for camping or motorhomes so in 2010 we bought a boat – a 2005 Hunter 33’ called Bella Blue, which was a perfect boat for us at that point in our lives. We docked it in Port Dover on Lake Erie and spent ten years covering nearly every inch of that lake, plus another season in Sarnia on Lake Huron, and two extended trips into the North Channel and Georgian Bay. The kids grew up on that boat and we really learned how to sail.

 

With rapidly growing kids we realized in 2020 that Bella Blue was getting too small for us. So we made the difficult decision to let her go at the end of summer and were boatless…but not for long. The following spring Ana found us a boat – a magnificent 2005 43’ Beneteau Cyclades called SeaLight, and we’ve spent four seasons cruising the width and breadth of Lake Ontario with our kids, our extended family, and our friends. She is now taking us to the Bahamas and is currently where we call home.

 

Where will our sailing career take us from here? This trip is a big test for us. By the end of it we are sure to know our tolerance for spending long periods of time on a boat. I don’t think we would ever permanently move onto a boat, but I can foresee some longer trips and progressively more challenging ones in our future. I would love to sail across the Atlantic to the Azores, then onwards to the Mediterranean. I’d also like to sail further into the Caribbean and maybe to South America or Mexico or Panama. And who knows, maybe cross the Pacific one day. But we’re not at the right stage of life or skill level now.

For now, we are doing what we love and gaining new sailing skills every day through making mistakes, learning from them, and getting to know every square inch of this boat.

Overnight Ocean Sail

New York City to Cape May, New Jersey – 150 nautical miles

By 8am we had left the mooring, filled up SeaLight’s tanks with fresh water from the marina dock, returned everything to the anchor hold, cleaned the muck and grime from the anchor chain off the boat deck, said goodbye to Magnus and send him off to the subway, and were on our way heading south at 9 knots on an ebbing tide, ready for the next stage of our adventure.

 

We stopped at a fancy marina called Liberty Landing just across from the south end of Manhattan and filled up with fuel, bought a few things from their fantastic chandlery, and spoke to their staff about finding suitable replacement batteries, which didn’t work out but they sure tried their best. From there we continued south a mile or so and what do you know, Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. We took the mandatory brag shots then navigated our way out of New York harbour which was easier and less stressful than I had feared. It was actually very easy, and I was prepared for it to be tricky, but the bay is just so massive that there’s room for everybody. I quite enjoyed the buoys as they were outfitted with huge bells that produced loud gonging noises as they were rocked by boat wake. 

 

Soon, we were out of New York and on the mighty Atlantic Ocean and it was precisely not what I expected. Total glass. No waves. Calm as Lake Ontario on a windless day. I was prepared for The Perfect Storm, but what I got instead was Tranquility Bay. We eased out into the ocean and began the long haul to Cape May, which we hoped to reach by early morning after our first overnight ocean run. Before losing cell signal, Ana contacted a yacht club in Annapolis that was willing to accept a package for us (in exchange for docking there for a night) and we put in an order for new Victron lithium batteries, which were scheduled to be shipped within a week.

 

With that bit of work done we kicked back and enjoyed the ride. Well, at least I did – And had picked up a rotten cold (or something) and she felt progressively worse and worse as the day went on. The wind started picking up and it was right on our nose, but even ten knots of wind didn’t seem to build much for waves so the ride remained quite smooth.

As midnight neared, and the spooky orange slice of a moon rose higher into the dark sky, we passed Atlantic City and cheered on the gamblers, who were completely unaware of us.

New York City – Aircraft Carriers, Pasta in Times Square, Advice from Dads

New York City – 11 kilometers walked

By 6:30am our batteries were showing 10.5 volts, not enough to run any of the 12 volt systems on the boat so I fired up our portable generator to get some fresh jigglywatts back into the system. I also turned on the diesel heater to take the bite off the morning chill, and just to make sure we were making our best effort to destroy the Earth, I also fired up the diesel engine to warm up the water so we could have showers. Thankfully there were no overnight sailors anywhere close to us to see this travesty of greenhouse gas emissions. The only thing worse would have been if I had been screening Talladega Nights on the mainsail from our kerosene-powered projector.

 

We had a big breakfast of eggs and sausages then I got to work on the batteries. Whenever I’m contemplating an electrical project with the potential for massive injury (which is most of them) I give my dad a call as he’s got solid electrical skills. I ran the plan by him via FaceTime, we talked it through, then I executed without electrocution or explosion. Magnus said, “I guess you’re never too old to call your dad for advice, hey Dad?”

 

“That’s absolutely right. Dads know a lot. I hope you can call me for electrical advice someday,” I said, then looked at him expectantly.

 

“I’ll probably just call if I need help with Excel or some computer thing.”

 

That was good enough for me.

 

After the battery project I turned my attention to the leak in the anchor hold. It hadn’t dried much overnight as the crazy currents and wake splashed high on the boat and kept forcing water into the space through the anchor vent clamshells. I had to ask Ana to spot for me as it was a long way down there and I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to push myself back out without shitting my pants or blowing a vein in my brain, so she was at the ready to start heaving on my legs. I went headfirst into the hold with some blue shop towels and a tube of sealant clamped between my teeth like some sort of maintenance pirate. Well, the sealant must have been old or something because it came out a strange colour and was more jellied than advertised. I should have stopped right there and got a different sealant but since I was upside down with the blood rapidly flooding my brain messing up the wiring, I went ahead and did the shoddy repair and hoped for the best.

 

By noon we were ready to go so we jumped back on our favourite subway and headed to the city. Ana got off a couple stops before me to go shopping at Columbus Circle and I met up with Magnus near Penn Station, but it took a few texts back and forth to find each other. It went something like this:

 

Me: MEET ME AT 7^TH AVENUE AND 29^th STREET

Magnus: OK, I’M THERE, WHICH CORNER ARE YOU ON?

Me: THE ONE WITH THE HOT DOG STAND

Magnus: THERE’S HOT DOG STANDS ON THREE OF THE CORNERS

Me: AH, RIGHT. I’LL BE THE GUY WAVING HIS HANDS AND JUMPING UP AND DOWN

Magnus: QUIT JUMPING UP AND DOWN, I SEE YOU. JEEZ.

 

I was quite thrilled when Magnus said he’d like to join me at the Intrepid museum, which is a giant aircraft carrier and nuclear submarine anchored right in the Hudson River. I remember my buddy Tony telling me about it years before, and how he’d spent the better part of a day there. Well, I can see why – it was excellent. We spent a lot of time looking through the many displays, walked the ship from end to end on the various levels, then spent quite a while checking out the airplanes and helicopters on the flight deck of Intrepid. We were both surprised to see the Enterprise space shuttle also there, in its full glory, in a massive covered hangar on the deck of Intrepid. Something else I didn’t expect was a British Airways Concorde jet on the jetty beside the ships, within the same complex. After exploring all this we decided to give the sub a miss as there was a lengthy queue and we felt like we’d had our fill of war machines for the day.

 

We met Ana in Times Square, had a nice dinner at the Olive Garden restaurant, then walked around enjoying the frenzy of tourists taking selfies, street performers working hard to draw a crowd, Furries hustling tourists to part with some cash for a photo, scantily clad women with their camera crews creating social media content in the form of plunging necklines, bulging bosoms, and runway pose-offs, and the thousands upon thousands of video screens advertising the best and worst of America, and robbing the night of its darkness.

 

We walked north to find the next A train station, along the way visiting, yes, an M&M’s store – wall of chocolate, full sized M&M mannequins, clothing and giftware for each of the M&M colours, and a bunch of other ridiculous stuff. But it was packed full of tourists, and most of them were buying.

We subway’d back to home base, stopped at the wine store to pick up a fresh box of plonk, then took our final dinghy ride back to SeaLight.

 

Tomorrow Magnus goes home and we head south.