Mal de Mer
Took to my chair
Till we got there
Rolling sea swell
All the way
Danny Collins
Saved the day
Captain Ralph!
I know, not a very good limerick but it describes my whole day. I got dizzy and nauseated before we got out of the Atlantic City Channel and stayed that way the whole way to Cape May.
Lots of little boats out fishing outside of Atlantic City.
Wildwood, N.J. rebuilt after 2012 Hurricane Sandy
Taking over the helm when it came time to enter the channel, we threaded our way in, fueled up and settled at a slip in Utsch's Marina. This is a great stop and a very well run marina with helpful caring staff. They even give you a welcome package with a bottle of wine! We stayed here for 4 days on our trip north in 2012 after our Delaware storm event and they remembered us.
Notice......empty bottle!
Beth was able to do the laundry while Danny and I washed the boat. cleaned up the engine room and settled in for a couple of "coldies" when the inverter kicked off and the battery charger quit.
Cursing the event since we had just paid to have the inverter checked out and the batteries upgraded we scratched our heads doing everything we could think of to get the thing working again. We pushed inverter/charger buttons. We clicked breakers off and on. We disconnected and reconnected power cords. In exasperation I called a marine electronics engineer who agreed to come by and take a look the next morning. Relieved that help was on the way we sat down for another "coldie" and calmly perused the Xantrex inverter manual.
"We can try to reboot the processor in the inverter." Danny calmly remarked.
"We already tried to restore it to factory settings." I replied, "What the hell. We have someone coming tomorrow. Let's try it. We've got nothing to lose."
This was a process that involved disconnecting wires from the inverter and shutting down all power to the boat. Restarting the system exactly the way the manual directed.......Voila! It worked!"
We were at peace again with full inverter power......time for another "coldie".
Beth was diligently using the laundry facility at the marina so only got to hear part of the frustration when things screwed up but all of the braggadocios of how we figured it out and corrected the problem. Laughing about it we decided to go out for dinner at the "Lucky Bones" restaurant.
Dodging traffic across the main road into Cape May we entered the restaurant to see a long line up waiting for seating...and no seat at the bar.
"Table for three, please."
The receptionist smiled at me. Looked down at my shirt which had imprinted in small letters "Dalhousie University" and immediately seated us! The food was superb. We started with an appetizer of the biggest mussels I have ever seen. They were drenched in a wine sauce and came with bread rolls for sopping up the sauce after the mussels were finished. Danny then went on to have the baked crab stuffed flounder; Beth the succulent sea scallops;and I the Cuban baked bone in pork chop......HMMMM! We wallowed back across the traffic with a satisfied smile on our faces.
We set out early in the morning with the tide to give us a push up the Delaware Bay. In two to three foot seas, we easily conquered our fear of Delaware Bay and made it across the Chesapeake-Delaware Canal to anchored out at Worton Creek in Handy Cove, on the Chesapeake. A solid fix with the anchor in 7 feet of water allowed us to take the dogs to shore in the dingy and weather a significant lightning thunderstorm.
The Lighthouse in Delaware Bay that we did not see when we came down the Bay in 2012
Lots of Ship traffic on the Delaware (did not see these in the storm on the way down in 2012)
This anchorage had an infestation of small biting black flies, which were too quick for Beth to swat with the electronic fly swatter, so they remained with us until our next anchorage. As we descended the Chesapeake, we took turns swatting flies with everything including towels but a few still remain on the boat.
Exploring the little island we anchored near at Worton Creek....looked like Robinson Crusoe
Returning from a romp on the beach
Chesapeake Bay Bridge
Easy peaceful cruising following the well buoyed channel down the Chesapeake had Danny piloting from the upper bridge. Even though the wind increased in the afternoon the swells were tolerable so we pushed along until Beth spotted another large thunderstorm coming our way. Immediately we pushed the throttles forward and headed to a protected anchorage in the Great Wicomico in Cockrell Creek where we set the hook in 6 feet of water. About 30 minutes later the rain started, the lightning struck and we were rocked by 36 knot winds. Fortunately we just caught the tail end of the storm as it was going out into the bay, so it only lasted 10 minutes. More importantly, we had a good anchor set and the boat remained glued to the bottom.
Anchorage in Cockrell Creek
Beth didn't want to run the generator for the air conditioners and the fan just wasn't cutting it for me so I went up to the upper deck to sleep out in the cool breeze. I easily fell into a deep sleep until about 3 am when I was aroused by a most pungent rancid odor. It was like someone put "smelling salts" under my nose! Yuck! It only lasted a few minutes because the wind changed direction. We had anchored next to a fish plant that made fertilizer and was known to be malodorous in a north wind.
We haven't been able to update the blog because we have been in remote anchorages which do not have accessible internet. This prompted a call from my son to confirm that we were still on top of the water not under it! I reassured him that other than some electrical issues, things were running well and we would be in Norfolk, Va tomorrow.
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