OH, THE PLACES WE’LL GO! 100 Days-Part 1

Technically the ICW Beginning Mile Marker is in Norfolk, VA. We passed through there October 20, 2018.

You're off to Great Places!

Today is your day!

Your mountain (THE ICW)  is waiting,

So... get on your way!

You're on your own. 

And you know what you know. 

And YOU are the one 

who'll decide where to go...

You have brains in your head.

You have feet in your shoes.

You can steer yourself

Any  direction you choose. 

(Dr. Seuss)

It’s been over 100 days that we have been on this journey, but in reality it began many years ago.  It’s hard to actually pin down a date, but we can safely say we have been planning in earnest the past 5 years. 

Obsession has been our home on and off since the day we purchased her in May of 2004.  Here are some pictures of our living quarters. Of course, after 100+ days there is a lot more stuff everywhere. 

We knew then that a trip like this was in our future.  We enjoyed sailing her and visiting familiar and new places these past 15+ years. And when we left Block Island in August and headed west we still didn’t believe it was happening. Each new port, each new body of water, each new state became another “notch” on our trip south. 

We are now in FLORIDA. The last new state on our journey. There is still much to see, explore and enjoy as we continue south.  

As I look back over the past 100+ days I will share some of our most unforgettable moments and include a few insights about our daily life aboard. 

Sunset the last night we were in Port Washington, Long Island. We waited 10 days in Port Washington for a weather window to travel through NYC to Atlantic Highlands/Sandy Hook, NJ. 

Once Hurricane Florence passed inland of us, and the weather cleared we lifted our anchor at 6:30am to catch the favorable tide through Hell Gate and NYC. 

This is a sight I will never forget. 

We toast a lot of occasions on board, but Celebrations with champagne in the teal GLASS champagne glasses are special. 

This was in Atlantic Highlands after our exhilarating and highly anticipated trip through NYC. Also, our first stop in the state I have come to dislike intensely, NEW JERSEY.

Things in New Jersey weren’t THAT bad, after all, a rainbow appeared in the sky at sunset the night before we were preparing to head to Atlantic City.  It’s where we first met Michelle and Dave from Half Baked Catalina 42 owner’s from Cleveland who traveled with us off and on until NC. 

I call Atlantic City the The City with Lights all Night.  

Obsession has lights all night too. We have 2 strings of solar powered  lights strung between the dodger and Bimini. We call it Obsession Constellation. It provides light for us in the cockpit at night, as well as lights for us to look for if we are returning to Obsession by dinghy at night. 

We motor-sailed to Cape May where we anchored for 3 nights riding out high winds and seas,  driving rain and a difficult docking maneuver at Utsch’s. When the weather cleared we ventured around Cape May to Cohansey Cove in Delaware Bay. There were T-storms all around us most of the evening, but our departure was punctuated by this sunrise.   

Our trip has given us the opportunity to meet so many interesting and fun people. Arlene and Kevin Prescott (Frisky Too) guided us to an anchorage in the Chesapeake that we never would have ventured into without their encouragement. The entrance to Fairlee Creek was narrower and more treacherous than entering the Kickinuit River in Bristol. But like The Kick it opened up to a beautiful protected anchorage that would be crowded on any given weekend in the summer. A Tiki Bar on land where you can tie up your dinghy was closed this weekend, but it sure looked like a fun place. 

Annapolis was another highly anticipated destination for us. Not only a sailing destination, but a beautiful colonial and historic city, and the Sailboat Show.  So we spent a week there, on a mooring that gave us front row seats to watch the boat show grow on a daily basis. We bought a new outboard engine for our dinghy (OCD), toured the Naval Academy, walked the historic streets of the city, and I think we really came to realize that our dream was starting to come true. 

We had waited out a Hurricane, mastered Hell Gate, survived an engine failure on Obsession, sailed in the Atlantic Ocean, maneuvered in small tight places, dealt with strong tides and currents, and met other cruisers that we would bump into later in our trip. We had a stretch of beautiful weather, albeit a bit on the warm side, but it helped keep our spirits high. 

We met up with Kevin and Arlene again in Annapolis at the Boat Show Catalina cocktail party along with a few other Catalina 42 Owners.  

As much fun as Annapolis was we love quiet and peaceful nights on anchor in remote places. So, we headed south for a bit of R & R at Rhode River. We were alone for the night, we showered off the stern,  we cooked steak on the grill for dinner, we watched the sun set and were rocked quietly to sleep. Quite a contrast from Annapolis.

 

Some sunset pictures just need to be the sun, the sky and the water.  Rhode Harbor provided that setting. 

So many people told us not to miss Solomons’ in Maryland. “You will love it,” they said. “You’ll never want to leave.” They were right.  We even toured a condo one rainy day. Solomon’s was the first time we got to experience transient dockside amenities too. A pool, a gift shop, a courtesy car, bicycles, laundry facilities, showers,  and a Captain’s lounge. We used it all while we waited out the rain and winds of Hurricane Michael. We took long dinghy rides around the Island and tasted our first soft shell crab, we reunited with Half Baked and met up with long-awaited Purdy Suite, where we gathered for a night full of laughs. 

There were many other places we would have liked to visit in the Maryland area of the Chesapeake, but they will have to wait until our return trip in the Spring. We moved on as soon as we could for Virginia.  

Navigating into Fishing Bay Cove gave us a chance to use our newfound skills with Navionics and tested our nerves with a narrow and twisting entrance. We also experienced our first “grounding”. The scenery was beautiful, the weather was just lovely (although we knew it was windy outside of our safe harbor of refuge.

 

The weather was still beautiful, so we took advantage of it and sailed all the way to Hampton, VA. It was the last time we had both main and job up and moving us at 6-9 knots WITHOUT THE ENGINE! It was a great day to be  on Obsession on the water in the Chesapeake! (Say that with excitement). 

We were greeted by huge Naval Vessels, and a free anchorage in Hampton where we could use the free showers and dinghy dock. We met up with another high school friend, did some shopping and a little sightseeing. 

A short hop across the Bay from Hampton is Portsmouth, VA. The weather turned nasty, but we found space at a free dock for a few nights, and planned our attack as a party of 3 boats heading down the ICW from Mile Marker 1 to Coinjock. 

Bridges to maneuver under and through, a lock to pass through and a docking experience that almost put Payne’s Dock to shame were in our near future. 

It took us about 50 days to get to this point. Many adventures, many experiences, lots of laughs, a few tense and stressful moments but overall a great trip. 

GEORGIA ON MY MIND

I realized that while I’ve been trying to work on a Comprehensive 100 day blog post that I neglected to write about Georgia and northern Florida. Well, really Georgia was nothing special to write home about, other than meeting some new Catalina 42 friends, Michelle and Melvin Bellwood on Belle in Savannah,  an eventful pass through Kings’ Point, and our fun Thanksgiving Weekend in St. Mary’s with them. We also met some new cruising friends there. 

At Thunderbolt Marina in Savannah they deliver warm donuts to your boat in the morning. 

This push tug followed us through a very treacherous stretch called Hell Gate.  We kept saying if we got stuck maybe he’d push us through! But we got through just fine. We did see some shallow areas, but Obsession pushed herself through just fine. We never saw any depths lower than 8 feet. We had called Sea Tow earlier and asked for advice. Sea Tow Jimgave us expert advice. 

The night we anchored in Cattlepen Creek was quiet and peaceful. Just what we like. 

Another difficult passage we followed a C &C skippered by s licalnsailor. Same draft as us, and we both got through only seeing s 5.3 spot near the end. 

We spent another night in s peaceful Creek/Frederica River. 

We finally headed to St. Mary’s. The route takes you along the Cumberland Islands where most ICW sailors rave about the wildlife they see-horses along the beach, porpoises and dolphins playing st the bow of their boat, manatees lazing just below the surface, pelicans diving for fish. You get the idea? Well, we saw none of that-we saw a species not native to the area until very recent times. As we approached Kings’ Bay we saw A SEAWOLF SUBMARINE! and it delayed our arrival in St. Mary’s by an hour. 

St. Mary’s was a fun stop for a few days. We met up with new Catalina 42 friends, Melvin and Michelle on Belle, and met new cruising friends at the Cruisers Thanksgiving Potluck dinner at the Riverview Hotel. 

This was not the most hospitable anchorage, however. We fended off a Catalina 445 meandering around the harbor one afternoon, and, along with other several other boats had to up anchor and move. 

Belle, Melvin and Michelle leaving St. Mary’s at sunrise. 

We then took a short hop over to Fernandina Beach, FL and met up with MHS’69 high school classmates Brian and Diane Nunes.  For only the second time on this trip we had a delicious pizza and enjoyed an evening at the beach with them.

We could only stay one night in Fernandina, as all the docks (including the dinghy dock) were closing down to be demolished and replaced with new ones. This is scheduled to be a long term project. They may not even be open in the spring. We did get a chance to mark the beginning of the Christmas Season however. 

From there we continued south to Jacksonville, 

We had to navigate another shallow, shoaled over area where even the charts weren’t correct. Thanks to Bob423 we followed his tracks and passed through unscathed. Note that our track took us over what should be land according to the chart. 

Next stop-St. Augustine. Nights of Lights and a Cruisers Net night at Anne OMalleys. What a beautiful historical city. 

We will return. 

ThenMarineland, after an unsuccessful attempt to find safe passage to the anchorage in Matanzas Inlet I redeemed myself with perfect a docking against a strong current.  A walk on the beach, and a different sunset view. 

I forget that we are on the ICW-so Daytona is not the Daytona Beach you probably are thinking of. We anchored there, and got an early start to Titusville the next morning. 

We had lots of bridges to navigate and time. 

Titusville.-Finally! BOB423’s temporary home. We took a slip for one night, did laundry, grocery shopped, filled water and fuel tanks, and met a wonderful liveaboard couple. But the bestcwas yet to come-we watched a launch of a SpaceX Rocket delivering the Dragon Payloadvto the space shuttle. My pics aren’t great, but we saw it, we heard it, we felt it from our mooring just outside of Titusville. Earlier that day we watched the Funeral Service for George HWBush. What a way to say goodbye to 41.

Some scenes along the way. 

Our friends north of us near Cumberland Island survived a tornado. We saw lots of lightening, heard thunder, high winds and heavy rain, but escaped Mother Natures’s wrath. 

The trail of the Falcon Rocket as it rocketed into a beautifully clear blue sky. What a thrill for David and me.