I’m happy to report that after spending two months in Annapolis, catching up with old friends, getting in some great sails, and feasting on crabs (steamed, soft shell, and crab cakes), we left Annapolis on Thursday, August 27. We are traveling back to FL in “delivery mode”, i.e., putting in 10-12 hours underway each day, with minimal stops for laundry and groceries, in order to get back to Titusville by the end of September. Before departing, Murph captured me enjoying a final meal in Annapolis . . . Steamed crabs, of course!
That does not preclude seeing some beautiful sunsets and sunrises (in fact, we are now getting underway by ~6am each day, so we are seeing sunrises as we leave the anchorage each morning). The first photo shows the view of Greenbury Point from Horn Point Marina as we started our voyage home.
Sunrise at Greenbury Point
That evening, we anchored at Solomons, MD and saw the peaceful sunset and moonrise depicted below. Notice the reflection of the moon in the water.
Sunset and moonrise at Solomons Leaving Solomons early the next morning provided another opportunity to witness a gorgeous sunrise...
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| Sunrise at Solomons |
We anchored that evening in Deltaville, VA. The sunrise the next morning was possibly the best we have seen so far on the trip. The water and sky were filled with striations of pink and blue, so that it was hard to tell where the sky ended and the water began, as shown in the first two photos below. Once the sun rose above the horizon, the colors were striking, as shown in the third photo.
We tied up at a public dock in Norfolk, VA that evening. The next morning we left before dawn and headed for our next anchorage at Buck Island, NC. We knew that it would be an extremely long day, and hoped that we would be able to make the anchorage by sunset. (It can be tricky navigating and dropping anchor in the dark.) After only a couple of hours into our trip, we had to pass through the Great Bridge Lock, which is quickly followed (if going south) by a bridge that opens only at scheduled times. As luck would have it, Murphy’s Law hit us (I blame Murph for that). When we approached the lock and radioed the lock tender for the next opening time, we were told that he was going to open the lock for a northbound barge next, and would open it for us in ~20 minutes. So we dropped the anchor and waited...and waited...and waited. An hour and a half later the lock was finally opened for southbound traffic. Once inside the lock, we had to wait another 30+ minutes in order to coordinate our departure from the lock with the next bridge opening. All in all, we lost 2.5 hours. But the silver lining is that there were gorgeous crape myrtles along each side of the lock, so we had a nice view.
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| Crape myrtles along each side of the Great Bridge Lock |
Later that day, as we traveled the North Carolina cut, headed for Coinjock, we came up behind a huge barge (I would estimate 200’ long) carrying iron shavings. It is risky to pass such a huge vessel in a channel as narrow as the one we were in, but we didn’t want to reduce our speed from a whopping 5 knots to that of the barge for the rest of the day, so Murph decided to pass. We were motoring as fast as we could go, and it still took ~5 minutes to pass it. Later in the day, after we had anchored in a small desolate area of the ICW by Buck Island, NC, the barge passed our anchorage. To get some perspective of the photos below, the barge was in the narrow ICW channel and we were anchored well outside of the channel near land on the other side.
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| 200ft barge carrying iron shavings |
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| 200ft barge carrying iron shavings |
Another beautiful sunrise the next morning...
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| Buck Island Sunrise |
But lest you think that all on the boat is that peaceful, take a look at the photo below. We awoke that morning to thousands, yes, thousands of small flying insects covering the boat outside. They were so thick on the window screens that you could barely see through them. And the cockpit was filled with swarming masses. There were so many that even with the boat closed up (we were inside the cabin), we could hear them swarming. Murph exited the cabin with a can of Raid in hand and sprayed the entire boat. As a result, the boat was covered with their dead bodies and green and brown smears, which turned out to be a real bear to clean up the next day.
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| Insects covering the boat |
Before we left the anchorage, we saw a frog in the cockpit! Now I ask you, we are sitting on a boat, surrounded by the water, so how does a frog get in the boat?? Maybe he was going after a huge, delicious insect breakfast...nevertheless, how the heck did he get there?? I did Google “flying frog” and found a Wikipedia entry, but it said that flying frogs (aka “gliding frogs”) have webbed feet, which this little guy didn’t have, and in any case there were no nearby trees from which it could glide, so who knows...it’s a mystery.
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| Frog in the cockpit |
A couple of days later, as we were traveling near Hobucken, NC, we were approached by two Navy Rigid Inflatable Boats (RIBS). No, they weren’t chasing us, just traveling in the same direction as we were traveling on the ICW.
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| Navy Rigid Inflatable Boat (RIB) |
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| Navy Rigid Inflatable Boats (RIBS) |
Before I close, I just had to include this photo of the smallest vehicle ferry I have ever seen. If Murph and I had thought of using one of these, we wouldn’t have had to walk to the grocery store these past 4 months!
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| Ferry transporting a pickup truck |
As it turns out, lightning struck close to my home and damaged several items, so I had to end my cruise sooner than expected, living and cruising aboard Kelly IV from April 27 through September 5. I spent 18 weeks aboard, instead of 21 weeks, as planned. We rented a car on Sept 5 (Labor Day weekend), Murph and I drove to Titusville, then Murph drove the rental car back to the boat at Wrightsville Beach, NC on Sept 7. As luck would have it, the switch on the boat engine also broke on Sept 4. After returning to the boat, Murph was able to buy a switch on Sept 8 and replace the switch on the boat. He brought the boat back to Titusville alone, and arrived on Sept 21.
WHAT A WONDERFUL ADVENTURE!!!!
For Murph's singlehanded adventure see
ICW Southbound.
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