Voyage 2011-2012: Chapter 5

1 Jun 2012, Spending some time in Reedville, 37 50.31 N/ 076 16.83 W

Left the anchorage at 0545 (it's a long way to Reedville) and got a great boast out of Norfolk/Hampton with a 2 knot current. Sadly, once we were in the Bay, it was against us much of the way to Reedville. Winds were around 10 kts out of the SW in the morning but faded to under 5 in the afternoon. Sigh! There were almost no crab pots to Reedville which was nice. Again weather was predicted to go foul so we signed up for three days dockage at the Crazy Crab. We arrived at CC around 1730 with just enough room for us to fit on the face dock.

We stayed for three days in the little town of Reedville due to weather. We got ice cream at the local parlor, walked 2.5 sm (each way) to the closest market, ate at the Crazy Crab and Tommy's, watched a bit of TV, and chatted with the other boaters stranded in Reedville. All good things come to an end and today we leave here for Solomons. As we left, we passed the 'stack', a resurrected chimney from a long ago menhaden factory. The town spent a bunch of money to fix it and light it. Very nice. We even bought a couple of tee shirts commemorating the project "Save the Stack"

6 Jun 2012, The End Game, 38 46.626 N/ 076 33.888 W

What is with the weather. Several days ago, we had a weather window to go from Reedville to Solomons. Winds were SE@15-20 so we sailed most of the way to Solomon's Boy that is unusual. As usual, we anchored in Mill Creek where we were almost alone. As predicted, the weather turned ugly so we stayed an extra day to wait out the weather. Today, we left the anchorage at 0945 where we were met with W@15kt winds and modest seas. Once we entered the Bay, we had all sails up and motor off. Not bad.

At midday, NOAA issued a severe weather watch over most of the Bay. We saw the clouds turn a little ugly and the radar quickly lit up with squalls. As we approached Herring Bay, the wind spiked and Bob donned his life jacket to drop the mainsail. We arrived at Herrington Harbour North (HHN) at 1635 and were tied up and happy at 1700. We were victorious! Carolina Beach to HHN in over 6 weeks!

We cleaned the boat and prepared her for the haul which happens today. She will be brought near Phipps Boat Works as we will be having some carpentry work done during the summer. We cleaned the topsides and the waterline again so Jule III would not be embarrassed with a dirty bottom. Today we said goodbye until August when Bob will start his next season projects. BTW, next season starts in early September. Big plans for the next season.