Had Will, our 6 year old grandson on Deborah Lee for the first time. And he definitely enjoyed himself. He didn't catch any fish while fishing with Pop. But, did get himself a few crabs.

Took him on a short ride to La Trappe Creek on the Choptank River. A couple of dinghy rides and a trip to the beach was a nice adventure.

We're gonna make sailors out of these kids, yet.

Great Summer

We really have had a great summer. We got caught in several storms. One by the Magothy snapped our main halyard. That was crazy lashing the main down. For another, we were in the Choptank and just dropped the anchor with 100 ft. of chain and rode and just waited it out. Luckily, we were only in 8 ft. of water. It was an interesting hour. And the other was in the Miles River just outside St. Michael's. It surely made our life interesting. It's been an interesting summer weather wise. Other than that we have had the chance to spend some quality time on the Chesapeake Bay.
We had a great time in Annapolis. The Ramshead has a great happy hour and they have live concerts. We were shocked when the manager asked us if we wanted some free tickets for a live concert. There was a no show and someone wanted to just give them away. FREE!!!!!! Our favorite word. Of course we said YES!!!!!!!! How cool was this?
We have been up as far as Whorten Creek and down as far as Hampton, Virginia. The Downtown Hampton Public Pier has a great deal. For Boat US members, $1.25 per foot isn't too bad. But, if you stay 2 nights, you get the third night free. And we had a great stay. Saturday nights during the summer, they close off Queen's Way for a block party with live music. The beer is pricey. But, it's a really great time. Kate and Mike were fantastic and we will definitely go back.
We haven't been able to see all of our cruising friends on the Bay so far this summer. Yet, we had the chance to see Rich and Carole from Killissa at their home in Somonon's. And we have been able to spend time with Fran and John on Chautauqua. As well as, Monica and Doug on Robin.
It's been such a hot summer. And we were glad to not have to spend much of it at the marina, roasting. It's wonderful how you can go out on the Choptank River and feel the most delicious breezes passing over the water.
And we got a new dinghy this year. A Walker Bay. It's awesome. And fast with a bigger motor on it. Zoommmmmm! Unfortunately, this summer was the first time we towed it behind our sailboat. And the portside D-ring ripped through its encasement. When we turned around to look-out, we realized that the whole heavy dinghy was only being held to the sailboat by the tow line and the starboard D-ring. It was amazing how much weight was on that one ring. After speaking to and sending pictures through email, we are waiting for Walker Bay to give us instruction as to the warranty covering the repair. We'll see! Hmmmmmmm.
Summer is not over and we still have time before we have to get back to our land life.
Oh, where can we go next?

Phewy!!!!! It's hot!

Left Thursday, June 24 and sailed up to Dunns Cove behind Tilghman Island. It was a very nice and calm evening. The next morning, Friday, June 25th, we "motored" up t0 Dobbins Island on the Magothy. Didn't make plans to spend any time in these places. Wanted to get north far enough to be able to swim without nettles.
We arrived in Whorten Creek on Saturday, June 26th, around 1:00 pm. We had a great day just jumping in and out of the water to cool off.
We plan to stay here on Whorten Creek today, Sunday, June 27th. We know it's gonna be another hot one. And the new dinghy we bought goes like a bat out of ..... We're having fun with it. BUT, we do have to watch our wake!!!!! So far, this has really been a nice trip! And we have many more miles to go along the Chesapeake.

Some Sailing Time

Got the boat squared away and going to set out into the bay this week for a few weeks. We did some good stuff to the boat this year. Painted the interior, replaced the inside trim of our Lewmar portholes. Bill made the trim by using a vacuum seal machine. Pretty cool! We had new outside cusions made. The canvas was resewn. We're looking pretty spiffy! The water tank began to leak and Bill replaced it. We try to take care of these things when they begin to talk to us. And not wait until the problem is SCREAMING at us. There are places we want to see that we haven't had the chance to. And we want to get down to Hampton Roads for one of their Friday night block parties. Fun to watch the people. And also planning to get up to Middle River in July for the dinghy poker run. We had our 4 year old granddaughter, Olivia, on the boat for a weekend. It turned out to be really nice and she was a natural. We have had two of the three grandchildren on board. The 3rd will be down in August and hopefully will get the chance to come aboard. We're gonna make sailors of these kids yet!

Lewmar Porthole Plastic Trim

For most of us with older boats with Lewmar portholes, the interior plastic trim has become yellowed and quite brittle. This trim is just velcroed on and when you try to remove them, they'll crack for sure. Replace this trim? No way. Lewmar doesn't make these anymore, of course. They want you to replace the whole porthole.

Solution:

Bill ordered a plastic vacuum forming machine with plastic sheets. After painstakingly creating a wood mold that matched the plastic trim, he made his own plastic trim for 11 portholes that match perfectly!!! Of course, this method took place in my kitchen. And he used our vacuum cleaner to create the vacuum. What an awesome job he did. If you can't find the right product, make it yourself.

Cold Winter

This is not the way we would like to spend our winter. But, here we are in Pennsylvania. Along with 49 other states, we have received snow. AND LOTS OF IT. This last storm on Feb10th dropped over 2 feet of this white stuff. And by the looks of it will be laying around for quite awhile. We long for the warm days of summer and the breezes filling our sails. It is something for us to look forward to. Hope all of our cruising friends are doing well down south. And hopefully you have packed a warm jacket. Heard Nassau was experiencing 55 degree "warm breezes".

A Summer of Problem Solving!!!

On the 18th of July, we finally got the problems solved regarding the engine. We had it rebuilt, but, a couple of things still needed to get adjusted.
We took a couple of days to get the boat ready and plan for a great 2 weeks of sailing around the bay.
This is a picture of one of our favorite places. (One of many). Tripp Creek up on the Tred Avon River from the Choptank River. This is a big basin and we have never found many boats up here. Too many jellyfish to swim. We spent the evening with Chautauqua. FUN!

The next morning, Monday, we motored out of the Choptank River and headed north toward the Bay Bridge. Our next destination was the Magothy River and an anchorage behind Dobbins Island. We cannot believe someone purchased this island. It doesn't appear to be habitable. We've walked on it and it's a nice place. It gets crowed every weekend. The power boats love it here and you can get close to the beach. We have seen the Annapolis midshipmen kids zoom up here. It's fun! Sometimes they sing. Beer?
On Tuesday, we headed farther north to Whorten Creek. Only spent one night. But, we did get far enough north to swim (no jellyfish).

We wanted to go places that we have not seen in the bay. We motored again today, Wednesday, since we were dead in the wind. Our destination was North East all of the way up the North East River. This is power boat country. bass boat country. There are sailboats up here along the North East River farther down closer to the beginning of the river.
It is lovely. It was a week day and not many folks around. We took a dinghy ride to check out our
surroundings and found this place quite nice. There are alot of water foul. Several different kinds of duck. We even saw a white duck that had paired up with a black duck.

We were not familiar with our surroundings and did not have a current guide book. We read that it was possible to anchor near a screw pike house. And this is where we ended up. It was nice to stay put for a day or two.
It wasn't the best of days with the clouds overcast. We took the chance and went to the small town of North East. It has several antique stores and restaurants. It didn't take long to go from one end of town to the other. Yet, it was really quaint. If not by boat, a car would bring one to a lovely place to have lunch!
We ended up having lunch instead of dinner out. The Nauty Goose was a great choice. And it was on the water. As we were having lunch we watched it pour down rain. Needless to say, we took our good old time eating our lunch and even had dessert to take advantage of the dry environment. It eventually stopped and we headed back to the dinghy. Bill bailed it out and we zipped back to the Deborah Lee. It poured again after we got on board. And we surrendered to the rain coming down for the rest of the day. Come evening, the clouds parted and we caught a glimpse of a nice sun down. A nice day.
Unfortunately, Bill began to notice that one of our batteries was loosing its charge too quickly. The next morning, Friday, we left very early and headed back to Cambridge. We cut our two weeks shorts about 8 days. We had to go home. The battery situation had to be dealt with and we were more comfortable being in our own marina and having the truck to be able to get anything we may need to get. As it turns out, the battery charger is not working and the generator is malfunctioning. All of it is getting taken care of and we'll be back out there soon!