[Changed log file format; most recent entry is at end.] [Previous log file is http://www.geocities.com/bill_dietrich/Magnolia/MagnoliaLogEarly2002.txt ] [This log file covers my trip from Florida to Chesapeake in 2002] 5/14/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Boot Key Harbor at Marathon FL. Cell-phone liberation day ! My one-year cell-phone contract is over, and I'm terminating that sucker. What a money-drain. Trying to get out of the harbor today, and start my cruise up the east coast. Took a huge dinghy-load of garbage and old engine-oil ashore. Some guy at the dumpster pointed out a great plastic folding storage crate someone had thrown away; probably $50 at West Marine; I grabbed it. Lots of last-minute errands to do. Lots of straightening up and stowing to do aboard. Plan to anchor just outside the harbor and scrape the bottom of the boat. Very hot and still day; should be relatively easy to raise the three (!) anchors. Dinghied ashore again, and bought gasoline ($15), 50:1 oil ($8), genset sound shield screws ($3), more food. Dumpster at gas station had a big pile of plastic Coke and milk crates being thrown out; I grabbed 4 Coke crates and 4 milk crates. Looked for place to leave car, and there are no free options left. The marinas are all cracking down on their parking. Saw Don at Dockside and said hello. Picked up my mail for the last time and found a cancellation notice for my auto insurance; must have forgotten last bill under my pile of papers. Back to boat, and realized I was so anxious to get going today that I forgot to eat breakfast. Ate some lunch, then dinghied ashore and took car to storage lot ($35/month). Mailed check to renew auto insurance, and called them to tell them it's in storage; they want a letter. Said good-bye to a bunch of people. Back to boat, although the instant the dinghy cleared the marina and I was thinking "cruise starts now", the outboard quit. Tried to start it several times, then noticed fuel hose was kinked closed. Getting three anchors up in this heat took about an hour and a fair amount of dinghy work. The anchor with longest scope was firmly dug in, and brought up a lot of primordial ooze with it. The foredeck is a mess; heaps of rope and chain, three anchors, ooze everywhere. Magnolia is cruising again ! We're in motion ! Out through Boot Key Bridge, west entrance of harbor, then under 7 Mile Bridge. Fierce current opposing me, and Magnolia is slow, because the prop probably is covered with barnacles. Made 2 knots over ground going through. Saw dolphins near Pigeon Key. Good omen, what ? Anchored near Rebecca Shoal, at lat 24.43.604 long 81.06.487. Engine hour 1754.7 Put one anchor out with 100 feet of chain and 100 feet of rope, in 7 feet of water with no wind, just to wash it all off. Dumped other anchor and chain and rope straight under the bow to wash them off. Washed deck with soap and lots of saltwater. Jumped over side and snorkeled and scraped the hull. Lots of crud all over, from a month at anchor in the harbor. Propeller was completely covered with barnacles about 1/4 inch deep. Scraped prop and starboard upper side of hull. Was snorkeling until almost 8:30. Calm, hot evening. Salad and grilled sausages for dinner. 5/15/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor near Rebecca Shoals, near Marathon FL. Measured fuel level 8.75 inches. Wired backlight connection on Link 2000. Raised anchors and cleaned foredeck. Took about an hour, because winding the rope rodes onto the big reels is really a two-person job. Had to keep going back and forth between foredeck and V-berth. And current was making boat lay at angles to anchors. But now everything is stowed properly and the foredeck is clean again. Did a bucket of laundry. Straightened up aft cabin. Motored through calm, sunny, hot day in morning, then wind grew in afternoon. Put sail repair tape on jib and stitched it; a slow job. Almost had a close encounter with marker "80"; did one stitch too many before dashing back to helm. Heard a Mayday; first one I've ever heard. Someone was reporting a man in the water and probably drowning. Anchored in Cowpen's Anchorage at lat 24.58.725 long 80.35.002 Terrible holding, but anchor plus 100' of chain works. Engine hour 1762.4 Too tired to snorkel under the boat, and there's a bit of wind and swell anyway. Salad and corn on the cob and soup for dinner. 5/16/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in Cowpens Anchorage, near Islamorada FL. Measured fuel level 8.0 inches. Did a bucket of laundry. Motored up to Tarpon Basin (Key Largo) and anchored. Sharp rain at one point. Dinghied ashore to do email and groceries. Raised anchor and motored up to Jewfish Creek bridge. Through there and under Card Sound bridge and on to anchor at Pumpkin Key, at lat 25.19.647 long 80.17.409 Engine hour 1769.1 Now I remember why my girlfriend liked it here so much; spacious, calm, quiet and a beautiful red/orange sunset. Salad and grilled sausages and saffrron rice for dinner. 5/17/2002 (Friday) At anchor near Pumpkin Key, near Key Largo FL. Measured fuel level at 6.75 - 7.0 inches. Cleaned genset and engine water strainers. Bled fuel filters for first time in a long time; a little black guck at the bottom of each, but not bad, and no water. Raised anchor late and motored up through Biscayne Bay. Scrubbed all of the plastic crates I scrounged a few days ago. Whole aft cabin-top is covered with crates. Struggled to control the paperwork (bills, receipts, notes, lists, etc) that has grown to cover my main table and fill my "briefcase". Paid another year of boat insurance ($868). Anchored in Biscayne Bay at NW end of Key Biscayne, at lat 25.43.416 long 80.09.955 We anchored here once before, just off a channel but surprisingly peaceful and beautiful. Nice view of the colorful nighttime Miami skyline. Engine hour 1775.1 Snorkeled under the boat for about 1.5 hours, scraping the starboard side (sheets of barnacles) and rudder. Lots of little shrimp things stuck on the Velcro of my dive gloves. Dinner is salad and spaghetti. Ran genset for 1 hour. I'm in the land of broadcast TV again (the Keys have none) ! I like TV. 5/18/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Biscayne Bay at NW end of Key Biscayne FL. Measured fuel level at 6.25 inches. Raised anchor and motored into Crandon Park Marina, to the fuel dock. Loaded 150 gallons of diesel into the tank and 4 gallons into a jug ($188). Measured fuel level at 17.0 inches. Disposed of garbage and old diesel, mailed letters, got water. Left marina, and decided to go out Cape Florida instead of Government Cut. It was more scenic, and I've never been out that way, but going into the teeth of flood current and SE wind was slow. Probably would have been an hour quicker to go the other way. Very rolly in the ocean; I'm heading NE and the wind has been blowing from the SE, so the swells are on the beam. Passed entrance to Government Cut at Miami. Three medium-sized container ships to watch; one crossed ahead of me and another did circles behind me. They're more maneuverable than I expected. A thrill: put away my Florida Keys chartkit and started using the Miami-to-Jacksonville chartkit ! Heard a vessel "Magnolia" in Miami Beach Marina call the dockmaster to ask for 6 bags of ice to be delivered. Got out far enough to find the Gulf Stream / Florida Current: speed over ground jumped from 6 knots to 9+ knots. I was welcomed into sunny Ft Lauderdale by a sustained rainstorm with thunder. Lots of traffic, and then sailboats doing circles waiting for the 17th street bridge to open. Using binocs and asking the bridge tender, I saw and verified that it had 57 feet clearance, so I took my 53-foot mast under it. No problems. Motored around the bend, with lots of traffic passing each other with abandon. Saw a couple of girls in bikinis dancing on a small powerboat, and one of them flashed me ! Turned into Lake Sylvia, which has room for about 12-15 boats. Not bad at all. Still raining fairly hard as I anchored at lat 26.06.260 long 80.06.693 Engine hour 1782.3 After a little while, it started REALLY pouring, and kept going for an hour or two. Some pretty good lightning, too, within half a mile of the boat. I started swinging too close to the catamaran "Y2" near me, so I started the engine, and when the rain stopped I raised anchor and moved slightly, to lat 26.06.296 long 80.06.729 Engine hour 1783.0 Dinghied ashore to Lauderdale Marina and called my cousin's husband, who will come to see the boat tomorrow. Back to the boat. Did some stitching on the jib. Now that the rain has stopped, there's no wind and everything is hot and humid and steamy. Salad and tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. 5/19/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in Lake Sylvia in Ft Lauderdale FL. Very cloudy and threatening rain again. Saw a bolt of red-orange lightning about 2 miles away. Tidied and cleaned boat inside and out, since my cousin's husband was supposed to come over. He never showed up (was supposed to hail me on VHF), but now I have a fairly neat and clean boat. Started raining early and kept raining just about all day; a few half-hour periods of no rain. Rained buckets from noon to 1:30 or so and again from 6 PM to 7; lots of just hard rain too. Went for dinghy ride at 5:30 to investigate municipal mooring field, and barely got back to boat in time. Still have deck leaks on port side of main cabin, under settee and above opening port. People in next boat over came rowing back to their boat at 7, totally soaked to the skin in pounding rain. Weather forecast now is for N wind all week ! Makes my hope of going "outside" (offshore) impossible; the Gulf Stream is going to have 10-foot square waves. Either I have to wait here all week in the rain, or go "inside" (the "ditch", the ICW). If it's not raining too badly tomorrow morning, I'm doing the ICW. Good thing: no one official has come around to hassle me about anchoring in Lake Sylvia. Maybe I could stay here all week if necessary. Alternatives are scarce: motoring up ICW, trying to get a city mooring (they're all full) for $20/night, or going into a marina (not!). Not for the first time, I'm glad I got a big boat with lots of space and amenities. Sitting in the rain in a small boat with no pilothouse and no genset and such would be a lot less comfortable. Dinner is salad and sweet potato and chili. Ran genset for 2 hours. 5/20/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Lake Sylvia in Ft Lauderdale FL. Got started about 8 AM; raised anchor and started motoring up the ICW. Clouds burned off and it turned into a nice, sunny day. Saw 2 dolphins just south of the Las Olas bridge. Another boat, Moonshadow, went through bridge ahead of me, turned around with an engine problem and went back through the bridge, then came through northward again 10 minutes later; I heard the bridge tender asking them to make up their mind about which side of the bridge they wanted to be on. Lots of nice houses and boats to see; it's an interesting trip. Not as narrow and tricky as I expected. Didn't have to wait more than about 10 minutes at any bridge. Very little traffic, I guess since it's a weekday. Some idiot roaring back and forth in a go-fast boat in the channel just south of the Camino Real bridge. Made about 17 miles in 3+ hours, through 8 bridges (Las Olas, Sunrise, Oakland Park, Commercial, Atlantic, NE 14th St, Deerfield, Camino Real), before an oil leak forced me to anchor in Lake Boca Raton at lat 26.20.764 long 80.04.446 The Marine-Tex patch on my oil cooler is leaking; it lasted 3 months. Guess I should have replaced the oil cooler while I was in Marathon. Loafed for a couple of hours to let the engine cool down, then located the oil leak (coming from under the old Marine-Tex patch), scraped and cleaned and then applied more Marine-Tex. Put a few more stitches in the jib. Did some wiring fastening in the engine compartment. Dinner is chili and green beans. Ran genset for 1 hour. 5/21/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Lake Boca Raton. Got started before 8 AM; started engine and patch on oil cooler is working. Raised anchor and started motoring up the ICW. Fighting current and headwind. Headwind of N 15-20 with gusts to 25 kept going all day, and is supposed to keep going all week. Motored through 18 bridges: Palmetto Park, Spanish River Boulevard, Linton Blvd, Atlantic Ave, George Bush, 15th Ave, Ocean Ave, Lantana, Lake Ave, Southern Blvd, Royal Park, Flagler Memorial, Parker, PGA, Donald Ross, Indiantown Road, Jupiter Federal, 707. Stiff chop with whitecaps in Lake Worth and south of Hobe Sound. Had to deal with barges going my direction a few times. Did about 47 statute miles in 8.5 hours. Lots of interesting houses and boats and places to see, but surprisingly few boats and people in motion, I guess because the weather is bad and also people have left for the summer. Some gorgeous big sailboats docked at Rybovich Spencer in West Palm Beach. Tried to anchor in loop to east of Indiantown Road bridge, but it was too small and the mouth was full of anchored boats. Actually dropped the anchor near the channel with thoughts of dinghying into the anchorage, but gave up and raised anchor while wind was whipping the bow back and forth and boats in the channel were waking me. Anchored just south of Hobe Sound, west of G 49 at lat 26.59.314 long 80.05.513 Protected from swells coming from north, plenty of room, but not far from the channel. Engine hour 1796.3 Tired and a nasty headache from motoring about 8.5 hours. Not looking forward to another N days of this. Napped and then had rice-and-soup for dinner. Ran genset for 1 hour; it ran rough under load at first. Don't see anything funny in the exhaust. Maybe it got air in the fuel today ? 5/22/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor just south of Hobe Sound (Jupiter FL). Cool, grey, cloudy morning. Got started about 10 AM. Fighting strong N 20-25 headwind all day. Some interesting scenery through Hobe Sound and to Peck Lake, but then when I got to St Lucie Inlet and Indian River, ir was all just hard slogging into strong wind and lots of whitecaps, with nothing much to look at. Went through 3 bridges: Hobe Sound, Indian River and Jensen Beach. Not many other boats out today, just a few powerboats. Did about 35 statute miles in 7 hours. Removed old AC stereo from main cabin; going to install a car stereo instead. Anchored south of Causeway Island in Ft Pierce, at lat 27.27.364 long 80.18.362 Engine hour 1803.5 Wind still gusting up to 25 suddenly. "Moonshadow" is in the anchorage; I was following them up from Ft Lauderdale a couple of days ago. Put a patch and lots of stitches in the jib. Intended to make spaghetti for dinner, but genset ran so roughly (even with no load) that I shut it down. Have to investigate the fuel filters tomorrow. Salad and sausage-and-onion sandwiches for dinner. 5/23/2002 (Thursday) At anchor south of Causeway Island in Ft Pierce. Very windy and rough in the morning. Weather forecast is for NE 15-20 forever. Investigated genset fuel system; manual pump and strainer seem fine. Primary filter looks okay. Secondary filter (which I've never been able to get off) has stains on outside. Ran the genset, and everything looks okay, but governor goes crazy trying to keep it at right RPM. Guess I'll try to change the filters tomorrow. Battery shelf is really sagging; removed two batteries and shifted a third, and cut wood to make a support in the middle of the shelf. Put batteries back in. Raised anchor (not easy in the wind and swell) about 10 AM, and motored out just in time to have to circle for 20 minutes as a tow came under the Ft Pierce south bridge very slowly. Several other boats circling with me. Really nasty long tow of rusty pipes, with a towboat at each end. Motored up through Ft Pierce; nice area north of there, then back into exposed part of Indian River near Sebastian Inlet. Only one opening bridge today: Fort Pierce North bridge. Drilled and painted wood for shelf support, and opened up new car stereo, while underway. But too rough and congested to get much done while traveling. Listened to a lot of classical music and NPR news on the radio. Saw many dolphins near Sebastian Inlet. Anchored in very shallow water just W of Grant Farm Island, at lat 27.55.361 long 80.31.014 Engine hour 1810.4 Perfect shelter from the wind and swell, and pretty, but very shallow and very close to channel. Not an anchorage listed in the guides. Did about 36 statute miles in 7 hours today. Put more stitches in the jib; looks like most of the leech needs to be restitched. 5/24/2002 (Friday) At anchor W of Grant Farm Island. Slightly aground; not entirely unexpected. Up early and moved batteries and installed new support for battery shelf. Looks good. Couldn't power off, even with wakes from passing boats, so moved water jugs to bow, dinghied out and moved anchor, and was able to power off with jugs and dinghy not weighing down stern. Still a bit tricky to keep off while raising dinghy and then anchor, with lots of passing boats wondering what the heck I was doing. Stern of boat was almost in channel while I was raising anchor. Motored up through nice day. Cleaned stuff off the deck, put many stitches in the jib, listened to radio. Anchored near Cocoa FL, SW of the causeway bridge at lat 28.21.305 long 80.43.205 Wind blowing me straight towards a nasty rocky lee shore. Dinghied ashore. Got rid of all of my garbage, had a nice internet session, and then failed to get most of the items on my hardware list (bought batteries for $5) and got nothing from my grocery list. It's all boutiques here. Odd feeling to be here, since I drove through here once looking at boats. Didn't think I'd be boating through here later. Different point of view when you boat/dinghy/walk through a place. Raised anchor and motored up for another 2 hours or so, to anchor in the middle of lots of empty water, SW of NASA, more or less. Near a couple of power plants, but nice and open. Would be a little more protected if wind was from E as it's supposed to be, but it's from SE instead. At lat 28.29.146 long 80.45.168 Engine hour 1818.4 Did no opening bridges today. Did about 42 statute miles in about 7.5 hours. Looks like I passed the 300-mile mark on this trip today; I celebrated with a rum-and-coke and cheese-and-crackers. Lots of noise on the hull of the boat, might be those "popping shrimp" I've heard of. Sounds like it's raining. Noise stopped by 9 or so. Got experimental with dinner: curry with sweet potato, onion, raisins. Edible, but marginal. Needed meat, and the rise was a little undercooked. Propane acting funny; maybe big tank is getting low. 5/25/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Indian River near NASA. Realized that the big building I was seeing to the east is the NASA Vehicle Assembly Building. Took primary fuel filter off genset, but couldn't get secondary to budge. It's buried under a maze of tubes and brackets, and I think I need a new tool to loosen the bolt that holds it on. Raised anchor and motored north. Right away, the alternator fan belt started squealing over a certain RPM, and there was a smell of hot rubber. Then the smoke alarm went off; at least now I'm sure it works. Fan belt settled down quickly, and I have 2 spares, but I'll keep an eye on it. I think alternator was producing about 60 amps briefly, and that was a bit much for a 3/8" belt that may be slightly too loose. Through a swing bridge at Titusville; first for me. Kept looking over at NASA launch pads, trying to see the space shuttle, which is supposed to launch in a week or two, but couldn't see it. Maybe it's too small to see from this distance, or covered with scaffolding, or not visible from this direction. Lots of people out on boats, pulled up to tiny islands and fishing and sunning and barbecuing. Lots of dolphins at entrance to Haulover Canal. Under way, put stitches in the jib. Had to stop because sun got too strong. Seemed to have a favorable current, and did have a tailwind, up Mosquito Lagoon (definitely not named by the Chamber of Commerce) and north of there. Lots of "fish camps" on this stretch: trailer parks with boat ramps and docks to fish from. Anchored NE of New Smyrna Beach bridge, at lat 29.01.679 long 80.54.895 Engine hour 1825.5 Did about 41 statute miles in about 7 hours. Napped, showered, and then dinghied ashore to a Food Lion supermarket. Score ! Felt like a kid in a candy store. Bought meat, salad, snacks, fruit, etc. Grilled sausages and salad for dinner. 5/26/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at New Smyrna Beach FL. Finally got secondary fuel filter off genset; had to remove oil pressure gauge and move fuel pump priming lever to get enough room (in 3 places) to swing a wrench. We'll see tomorrow if new filters fixes the problem. Motored up through Sunday-of-Memorial-Day-weekend activities: lots of little motorboats and jet-skis roaring around, lots of people having fun. It was fun to watch. Some pretty areas, especially near Flagler Beach. Did some jib-stitching, lubricated the windlass, and did a bucket of laundry while under way. Ended up in a no-man's-land at the end of the day; the places I hoped to anchor turned out to be almost mud flats. Settled for a wide space not far from the channel, about 3 miles south of Matanzas Inlet, at lat 29.39.604 long 81.13.037 Two anchors to try to avoid drifting closer to shore. Engine hour 1834.1 Did about 47 statute miles in about 8.5 hours. Had a nice current in my favor the last 3 hours or so. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Huge wake from two speeding powerboats (they looked like cubes with slight points on the front). Had to lift up pots when other wakes cames, to avoid losing dinner. 5/27/2002 (Monday, Memorial Day) At anchor in ICW a few miles south of Matanzas Inlet. Just realized that I should change the oil and filters about twice during this trip north (changed at start, and will have to change at end); I have filters for only one change and oil for about two. Hard to measure fuel level exactly; 12.5 to 13 inches. Installed new fuel filters on genset, and it still has the problem, plus now a big fuel leak on top of secondary fuel filter. Raise anchors and motored north. Against current to Matanzas Inlet, then with current to St Augustine. Almost had a close encounter with Bridge of Lions bridge in St Augustine; I knew the current was pushing me towards the bridge, but several things were happening (boat under sail coming through bridge, radio traffic, etc), and then I did a waiting-circle and put the gearshift in neutral. All of a sudden then current turned my circle into an ellipse, the bridge starting getting very close. Full power, turn to starboard (wrong; boat turns better to port, and wind was from starboard). All of a sudden I see a little motorboat raising anchor in front of me, after fishing under the bridge. Missed them by about 50 feet; missed the bridge by about 100 feet. Not smart. Against strong current north of St Augustine (Tolomato River). Bumped ground near marker 79. Put some more stitiches in the jib, and read genset manuals. Stopped a bit early because I was making only 3.9 knots, and to avoid ending in another no-man's-land without anchorages. Anchored at Pine Island, about halfway between St Augustine and St John's River, at lat 30.03.056 long 81.21.931 Engine hour 1840.7 Did about 30 statute miles in about 6.5 hours. Dribs and drabs for dinner: salad, then tuna-salad sandwiches, later cheese and crackers. Blew E 25+ and poured buckets of rain at midnight, for more than an hour. 5/28/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Pine Island, just off ICW between St Augustine and Jacksonville Beach. Replaced engine heat-exchanger zinc; mostly gone. Started to work on genset, but lost heart when I realized that putting a soft rubber washer in my diesel fuel line probably wasn't a good idea. Raised anchor and started motoring. Making good speed now. Wind got stronger and stronger as day went by. Crossed St John's river; smaller than expected and calmer than the ICW ! I was expecting some huge, nasty river with lots of ocean traffic, bad currents, etc. Stiff opposing current on other side; almost stopped for the day at one place. But speed picked up, I kept going, crossed Nassau Sound (fairly rough), and started looking for a place to anchor. But it's all very exposed marshes. Tried one place but couldn't find shallow water where I wanted. Kept going to Fernandina Beach. Huge sawmill (or something that smells of sawdust), several other big factories in sight. Anchored once, pulled it up in strong current, anchored again in a shallower, better spot. Strong winds and currents and not much shelter in this area, but the holding seems to be very good. At lat 30.40.301 long 81.28.190 Engine hour 1850.3 Did about 48 statute miles in about 9.5 hours. I'm pretty tired, but I'm almost out of Florida ! Dinner is salad and beer-bratwurst sandwiches (delicious), and fruit cup and chocolate for dessert. Feeling fine after that. 5/29/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Fernandina Beach FL. Cleaned bilge a bit. Worked on genset: made a fuel-tolerant washer from gasket material and put it on secondary fuel filter. Seems to have stopped leak, but genset still is misfiring. Clogged injector ? Dinghied ashore to Fernandina Beach, but all I accomplished was to get rid of my garbage. It's all boutiques, and the library disables access to web-based email sites (no wonder all of the machines are idle!). Raised anchor, in a nasty current which kept pulling chain hard enough to make the windlass brake slip. Motored across and up Cumberland Sound, which was big and rough and messy, but the current seemed to be with me. Turned against me north of there. Crossed into Georgia, and changed chartbooks. Big swells on the nose going down Cumberland River, salt spray all over the front half of the boat and the pilothouse, but current was with me. Crossed St Andrew Sound in boisterous conditions, but no problems. Glad to get into shelter of Jekyll Island GA. Not much anchoring room, but sheltered from NE and E. Anchored between mudbank and channel, at lat 31.03.223 long 81.25.377 Engine hour 1856.5 Did about 33 statute miles in about 6 hours. 5/30/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Jekyll Island GA. Measured fuel level 10.5 inches. Worked on genset. While I was there, put a wrench on the frozen bolt on top of the water tank, and with one good turn it snapped right off ! No big loss. Anyway, started to work on the misfiring problem, and found that heavy air-intake pipe to engine block was loose. It has a glow-plug and some kind of rebreather loop on it, so maybe that's important. Anyway, tightened it, and now the genset seems to run fine ! Ran genset for 0.5 hour to test it. Noticed that when charging batteries, even with switch in "all" position, battery bank 1 accepts more current than bank 2. The switch has been in the "all" position for days, so I wonder if bank 1 is self-discharging more, or has some problem ? Or maybe bank 2 is the bad one ? Confusing. Raised anchor and motored up through winding channels among marshy, grassy islands. Not much to see, and not much other traffic. Increasing numbers of birds and visible fish. Irritated by some horseflies; they don't attack me, but they get into the pilothouse and can't figure their way out, and sometimes bang into my head. Did about 37 statute miles in about 6.5 hours. Anchored in New Teakettle Creek (in the middle of nowhere), at lat 31.27.221 long 81.18.288 Engine hour 1863.2 Salad and hot chili for dinner. Very still evening; wind is going to be "variable" for a day or so, and it is very low right now. Saw lots of spectacular cloud lightning off to the west at 9 PM or so; supposed to be some nasty storms S or SW of here. 5/31/2002 (Friday) At anchor at New Teakettle Creek in GA. Cool, damp, foggy morning. Fog dissipated by 10 AM, so raised anchor and motored on. Across Sapelo Sound and St Catherine's Sound, both big, wide bodies of water. Not much other traffic today, but several big fishing boats in Sapelo Sound. A bunch of jellyfish in the water. Wind stronger than forecast. Anchored in Redbird Creek, at lat 31.50.610 long 81.09.354 Opposition of wind and current making boat lay strangely. Engine hour 1870.5 Did about 40 statute miles in about 7 hours. Was going to start genset and make pigs-in-a-blanket, but the radio had such lovely show-tune music and then an Artie Shaw retrospective, that I couldn't bear to spoil the quiet. So I reheated chili over propane. Later, after two spicy chili dinners in two nights, I could have refilled the propane tank with methane, if you know what I mean. 6/1/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Redbird Creek in GA. Just another day of motoring up the ICW, stitching the jib, doing dishes, etc. Although civilization did reappear, and I crossed into South Carolina. Anchored at Jarvis Creek in Hilton Head SC, at lat 32.12.503 long 80.46.516 Engine hour 1878.7 Did about 48 statute miles in about 8 hours. Prairie Home Companion on radio; heard some Car Talk earlier. NPR has been a wonderful diversion on this trip. Dolphin fishing nearby. Salad and pigs-in-a-blanket for dinner. Ran genset for 1 hour. Amazing sunset: the sun was a neon-red ball against a grey background, slowly sinking into the horizon. Stunning. 6/2/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Jarvis Creek in Hilton Head SC. It's my birthday ! I'm 44 years old today. But I started a new life when I began sailing / cruising / living aboard, so maybe I'm only 1 or 2 years old. Measured fuel level 8.0 inches. Raised anchors (tough; they were twisted) and motored through Hilton Head, across Port Royal sound, and up to Beaufort SC. Finished stitching jib, and raised it on it's halyard; won't get to test it yet. Bad anchorage south of bridge: full of moorings, deep, and lots of current. Anchored at lat 32.25.774 long 80.40.700 Engine hour 1883.1 Did about 23 statute miles in about 4 hours. Very hot afternoon. Started to dinghy ashore, but stopped to say hello to a guy who had watched me circle through the mooring field / anchorage a few times. He turned out to be called "Capt Seaweed", on "Issinara", who has been sailing for 34 years. He turned 80 a couple of weeks ago, so we wished each other Happy Birthday. A skiff running at night hit his boat a few weeks ago, destroying a shroud and leaving propeller marks halfway up the starboard side of the hull. They're claiming he didn't have a proper anchor light. He says he's done no work on his boat for 18 years (and it looks it), but he's going to fix it up this summer and then sail it for another 18 years. He said the supermarket on this side was pretty far out of town, so instead I dinghied under the bridge and over to Lady's Island. Landed at a marina, tried to walk to supermarket, but gave up in the heat. At least I got rid of my garbage. Got back to marina and attendant offered to drive me there since he was going out for an ice cream anyway. So he dropped me at the supermarket, I did a quick 5-minute shopping session, and he picked me up. Turned out I had given up about 1/4 mile short of the supermarket, so it is walkable, but just barely in this heat. Got back to boat and laid around feeling hot. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. A bit cooler in the evening, but still hot inside. Wind died completely late at night, leaving the water flat as glass, and leaving me sweltering in my berth. Ran a fan a few times, but hard to sleep. 6/3/2002 (Monday) At anchor at Beaufort SC. Dinghied ashore and did email, but no useful stores within walking distance. Raised anchor and motored on. Went for about 1.5 hours, then found myself fighting a 2-knot current in the Coosaw river, so I anchored and ate lunch and took a nap. The radio said it was 97 in Beaufort (and everywhere else within 100 miles). Bad sleeping last night and hot weather today has me feeling blah. When I got going again, the current was just as strong, and as I went further down the Coosaw river, the headwinds grew from 10-15 to 15-20+, and the boat was plunging through swells. One of the roughest segments I've done yet. Speed over ground down to 3 knots at one point; probably a 2.5-knot current. Almost went across a shoal at the end; I was looking at a big red marker, but should have been looking at a small red buoy. Saw it in time and veered off around it. Kept blowing and getting greyer all afternoon and evening. Anchored near Alligator Creek in the South Edisto River, at lat 32.34.545 long 80.23.241 River is nice and wide here. Engine hour 1889.4 Did about 28 statute miles in about 6 hours. Evening is grey and humid and windy. Trying to get my laundry to dry on the lifelines. Don't feel like cooking: salad and tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. Lots of fish jumping at dusk. Still and warm in the middle of the night, but not as bad as last night. Lots of insects at dusk and dawn. 6/4/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in the South Edisto River in SC. Lots of annoying insects when I opened the screens this morning. Someone threw a switch at 8:30 AM and just like that it went from no-wind to 5-10 knots of wind. Motored up north some more. Hot day again. Heard a Mayday call from someone on a boat fishing out on the continental shelf drop-off, whose captain had just had a severe heart attack. He didn't know where they were, was reading off Loran numbers to the Coast Guard. Didn't hear how it turned out. Managed to unfurl the jib and motor-sail for 10 minutes. Missed a bridge schedule by about 2 minutes and had to wait a half hour. Engine surging a little at the end of the day. Anchored in the Wappoo Creek just west of Charleston SC, at lat 32.45.941 long 79.58.740 Engine hour 1896.0 Did about 36 statute miles in about 7 hours. Nice chat with Jack and Chris on "Canadian Sunset". Dinghied ashore to the supermarket. Turns out I was anchored about 100 yards from it as the crow flies, but can't go that way because of houses. Had to dinghy up the river, under the bridge, dock at the boat ramp, climb steps to bridge, walk across bridge (narrow sidewalks), down street (no sidewalks), through traffic light, to supermarket. Then back, with a hand-cart precariously draped with groceries. In the heat. At least I got lots of good stuff. Onion and bratwurst grilled for dinner. 4 or 5 dolphins traveling up the river, one blowing very loudly. It happened again tonight: late at night the wind died totally, the water was smooth as glass, and the heat made sleeping very difficult. Insects biting me too. What a pain ! 6/5/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in the Wappoo Creek just west of Charleston SC. Couldn't sleep at 4 AM, got up until 7 or so, went back to bed. Headache. Added about 1/2 quart of oil to genset, about 3/4 quart to engine. Added water to batteries. Raised two anchors in a current, trying to time it so I could get through the bridge at next opening. Sweaty and exhausted by the time I was going. Not the best mood to enjoy the sights of Charleston sliding by, but I did enjoy them. I remembered when my brother lived here, and my brothers and I went along the waterfront seeing everything. Seeing it from a boat was cool. Lots of interesting houses, Fort Sumter, an aircraft carrier / museum (Lexington ?). USCG RIB was doing donuts in the harbor, probably practicing maneuvers. After stowing the anchor chain, I was tired again, and managed to bash 2 or 3 toes into the companionway corner. Iced them right away. I think the toe next to the little toe on my right foot is broken: several hours later it's all purple around the knuckle, and hurts when I touch it. Went around a fishing boat; dolphins leaving the scene, one slapping the water with his tail several times. Saw a big military plane (maybe C5) circling the harbor several times. Went through a bridge, then raised mainsail and motor-sailed through canals for several hours. Took sail down when not helping any more, and motored on. Flies pestering me in pilothouse all day. Caught up to ugly multi-part dredge moving slowly, and decided to anchor in a wide spot. After anchoring, I was swinging all the way out into the ICW, so I raised anchor and moved a mile or so to a wider wide spot. Anchored in ICW a few miles north of Mclellanville SC and just south of South Santee River, at lat 33.07.948 long 79.19.914 Engine hour 1904.8 Did about 49 statute miles in about 8.5 hours. Dinner was salad and then cheese-and-crackers and then chili. The flies in the pilothouse really started bothering me, so I slaughtered them. Many sleep with the fishes. 6/6/2002 (Thursday) At anchor between Mclellanville and Georgetown SC. Measured fuel level 4.25 inches. Started motor-sailing. Saw my first alligator, on this trip. Nasty day: have a splitting headache, opposing current, wind just strong enough to blow all of the exhaust into the pilothouse. Got through canal section and immediately anchored, to try to medicate and sleep off my headache while the tide changed. Got going again and had a nice radio conversation with "Spirit". Got into Georgetown SC, where the anchorage is tight and has strong currents. Engine hour 1909.5 ? Did about 19 statute miles in about 4.5 hours. Dinghied ashore. Seems like a pretty town. Did internet and some groceries; a lot of walking. Back to boat, salad and spaghetti for dinner. 6/7/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Georgetown SC. Couldn't sleep very well with this headache, so up early. Want to leave at high tide to catch fair current, too. Measured fuel level 3.5 inches. Started engine in glass-flat calm, can see that I'm losing some oil through the exhaust. Tons of gooey mud on chain and anchor. Moving shortly after 7 AM. Looks like a nice current of 0.7 knots or so. But wind is right on the nose: no motor-sailing. And nice current went away quickly, replaced by opposing current. After 2 hours, my head was splitting and the current was slowing me to 4 knots, so I pulled over and anchored. Tried to sleep, ate a bit, felt like cutting my head off. Felt a little better by noon, but current not slowing. Got ready to move at 1, but skies opened up and it poured rain and lightning came down. Sat in cockpit waiting for a strike to hit the boat; there were multiple strikes within a mile, and a couple about 1/4 mile away. A few hairs were standing up on my arms and legs and neck, and when the lightning was very close I huddled in the cockpit with my fingers in my ears and my eyes closed. I figured if the boat got hit, that might save my eardrums and my eyes. No strikes. Poured for about 45 minutes, filling all of my buckets with rainwater for showering. Got moving at 2, and it started raining fairly hard again. Visibility went to 1/2 mile at one point. Turned on running lights. Opposing current is worse than ever; I'm doing only 3.5 knots over ground when I should be doing about 5.5 knots. Just what I need when my fuel is running low: lower fuel mileage ! "Spirit" caught up and passed me, and we had a long conversation. They thought the opposing current was only 0.5 knot; I thought it was more like 2 knots. When we matched speeds side-by-side, their GPS read spead-over-ground 0.5 knot faster than mine, which makes no sense. When I increased RPMs, I still didn't get over 4.5 knots. As I went further up-river over the next few hours, my speed-over-ground increased to 5 knots without touching the throttle. So, I wonder if something is wrong with my prop, and I can't explain the GPS discrepancy. My tachometer being screwy doesn't help; maybe it's screwy at different levels on different days ? I'm totally confused. Passed by a marina selling diesel, even though I'm getting low. Was kicking myself for a while afterward. But there's a big marina with fuel just after my intended anchoring spot tonight. And I really should have 20-30 gallons left in the tank, enough for a couple days. But I've never run it so low; maybe the last 10 gallons are inaccessible ? Anchored in loop off ICW just north of Bucksport SC, at lat 33.39.948 long 79.04.231 Not very good holding, but I'm here. Engine hour 1916.1 Did about 27.5 statute miles in about 6.5 hours ! Saffron rice with fava beans and onion added, for dinner. 6/8/2002 (Saturday) At anchor just north of Bucksport SC. Turned nice and cool in the middle of the night. Headache almost completely gone. Measured fuel level 2.25 inches. Got started late. Pulled in to Osprey Marina for fuel. Tighter than I expected; fortunately no one else at the fuel dock. Loaded 104 gallons ($114 at 1.16/gallon) into the fuel tank, 5 gallons into the jug. Got water too. Measured fuel level 12.5 inches. Going again by noon. Close call getting out of marina: the wind blowing right down their entrance channel made it hard to get the bow around, and I came within 6 inches of a tall post with a no-wake sign on it. I was going very slowly, and helped the post past by shoving it a little, but it was too close for comfort. Hard to see how I could have done it better; there wasn't much room. Made next bridge only because it was late opening. Turned into a tough day. Lots of tight channels with nasty rocks on all sides and underneath, nowhere to stop or anchor, lots of traffic, opposing current much of the day. This stretch of ICW is 3 miles in from all of the nice beaches, but you can't get there from here. Some interesting things to see: backyards of houses, marinas, golf courses, etc. Saw a live elephant in someone's backyard; several people were standing around it, and it was backing up, but it didn't look like they had rented it for a party or anything. Saw a golf course that had a cable-car system (like a ski lift) from one side of the ICW to the other. Looked at the dock at Barefoot Landing, but it was full with a couple of boats circling waiting for a spot, and docking singlehanded on that low dock with boats ahead and behind was not appealing. Something boomed off the hull, in the middle of the channel, and I looked in my wake to see a loose dock piling floating, with maybe 1 inch visible above surface at one end. Don't think it did any damage. I could have been keeping a better watch, but I'm not sure I would have seen it anyway. My headache came back. No bathroom break for 6 hours. Was fighting a huge opposing current the last hour or two. Nowhere good to anchor where I ended up, in the Little River (north of Myrtle Beach), near the Little River Inlet, just south of the SC/NC border. Anchored just off the channel, with lots of boats and jet-skis still going by, at lat 33.52.414 long 78.35.181 My best calculation is that I might be gently aground in the mud at 1 AM, shy about 0-3 inches of depth. 8.5 depth now, at high tide, and a 5-5.5 tidal range. So I'll have 3-3.5 at low tide and need 3.5. Too tired and headachy to go further, and there is no better place for 10 miles. And I don't want to poke into somewhere and run aground now, almost at high tide. Engine hour 1922.8 Did about 33 statute miles in about 6.5 hours. Salad and tuna-fish sandwiches for dinner. A bunch of casino/cruise boats went out at 8 PM and came back in at midnight. Didn't run aground at low tide. 6/9/2002 (Sunday) At anchor near Little River Inlet, just south of SC/NC border. Measured fuel level 11.5 inches. Added 1.75 quarts of oil to engine; it's definitely losing it. Got going fairly early. Went through a pontoon bridge (a first for me). Saw wild goats on island. Lots of activity on the water and beaches, and lots of houses to see. All the traffic made it pretty stressful; hard for me to find chances to dash below to use the head or do anything else. Wanted to stop at Southport NC, and go ashore to call my relatives, but like many of the places around here, there was nowhere good to anchor. All narrow channels surrounded by very shallow water, strong current, tons of boat traffic, and lots of marinas. Just kept going past Southport and up the Cape Fear River, to anchor just north of R36 near Snow's Cut, at lat 34.02.429 long 77.56.315 Anchored at max flood, and was barely able to snub end of chain around cleat in time to catch the weight of the boat on it, and I saw the deck flex under the cleat. Definitely need to add backing plates to the bow cleats at least. Did about 45 statute miles in about 8.5 hours. Engine hour 1931.5 Salad and spaghetti for dinner. A freighter went by every hour or two, but most of their wakes weren't too bad. A couple of powerboats went by the next morning and their wakes were worse. 6/10/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Cape Fear River NC. Measured fuel level 10.5-11 inches. Motored up through bridges (a couple with very restrictive schedules) and tight channels surrounded by shallow water. Lots of dolphins at S entrance to Snow's Cut. Huge following current through Snow's Cut and afterward, but that just gave me a solid 30 minutes to wait before Wrightsville Beach bridge. Opposing current later in the day, but not too bad. Did some motor-sailing, but I don't think the mainsail gave me more than a tenth of a knot. Everywhere I looked, there was nowhere to anchor, if I had wanted to. Everything is channel, marina, docks, shallows. More traffic on the radio from an aircraft carrier offshore somewhere. Anchored at Sloop Point, the only anchorage within 15 miles in each direction. Anchored more or less in the middle of a side channel; hope it doesn't have much traffic. Seems like a nice place. Lat 34.24.334 long 77.35.551 Engine hour 1938.2 Did about 34 statute miles in about 6.5 hours. After a while it dawned on me that the "thumps" I'd been hearing probably are artillery noises from the Camp LeJeune firing range, about 25 miles away. Salad and hamburgers for dinner. 6/11/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Sloop Point in NC. Measured fuel level 9.75 inches. Motored for a while, then got fuel (110 gallons for $94, $.85/gallon) and engine oil (3 gallons for $21) at New River Marina. Engine hour 1941.1, afterwards measured fuel level 17-17.25 inches; forgot to measure fuel level before. Up into Camp LeJeune, through a very slow swing bridge with a very strong current pushing me towards it, then up through the firing range. Saw a plane off to the north apparently dropping bombs; occasionally I could hear thumps and see big clouds of smoke, but I never could see a bomb in midair. Lots of motoring through nondescript channels with nowhere to anchor. Went through Swansboro, which looked kind of nice. The anchorage there looked big enough (even with a huge set of barges anchored in there), but inlet current runs through it, and it's right next to a busy highway bridge. Finally anchored several miles north of Swansboro, practically in the channel, at lat 34.40.873 long 77.01.551 Engine hour 1945.5 Did about 40 statute miles in about 7 hours. I'll be glad to get to somewhere that has decent anchorages at frequent intervals. A few days ago, I thought I bruised muscles in my left upper chest, when I leaned hard on the bow pulpit as I pulled up the second (bigger) anchor. Now I wonder if I cracked a rib in there; it still hurts, and hurts a lot when I use it or press on it. But the good news is that my headache is gone and my broken toe feels fine. Salad and chili for dinner. 6/12/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor north of Swansboro NC. Measured fuel level 16.0 inches. Engine zinc a little furry but quite intact. Engine oil very low; must be leaking into exhaust water. Added 2 quarts ! Definitely can see it in exhaust water after starting the engine. Ate last 2 quarts or so in about 24 engine hours. Raised anchor and motored on. Raised jib but it didn't do much; took it down. I think some guy in a boat going the other way gave me the finger because I was wandering around in the channel as I furled the jib. Ten minutes later, nice beam wind came up and I raised the main and got a few tenths of a knot out of it. Then huge following current took over; did 7 knots past Morehead City, then had to fight the current from the inlet into Beaufort. Anchorage is crowded, as expected. Anchored somewhat into the channel, at lat 34.42.921 long 76.39.959 Engine hour 1949.5 Did about 20 statute miles in about 4 hours. Will let engine cool, then disassemble exhaust system. Hope I just need a new gasket somewhere. Dinghied ashore, did internet, connected with my relatives in the area, and they wanted to come over right away to see the boat ! Dashed back to boat and straightened up and cleaned frantically, then dinghied ashore and met them and ferried them out to the boat. They were impressed, but once my aunt had seen the whole interior, she said something like "well, now I know I could never live on a boat". We went to Clawson's for a nice dinner (although they had run out of ribs, which apparently they get from Denmark!). I strolled the docks a bit afterward. There's a marlin-fishing tournament going on, so the docks are full of expensive fishing boats. A lot of nice-looking women along with those boats, too. Someone anchored very close to me, with one anchor while I have two, and I wouldn't use their anchor rode to secure my dinghy. They were swinging very close to me at one point. Restaurant played music until 12:30, and then I couldn't get to sleep, so I didn't get much sleep. 6/13/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Started taking engine exhaust system apart a bit. Found a bunch of oil on outside of aft end of exhaust manifold. Took exhaust elbow off and cleaned it, partly because I always wanted to see if it was clear, and partly to get at the rest of the exhaust system. Looks fine. Several fish nibbling hard at the hull of the boat all morning; eating the barnacles ? Suddenly occurred to me that exhaust manifold has no oil running through it, so can't be source of problem. Maybe raw water pump shaft seal is bad ? Took impeller out of raw water pump; didn't find any oil there. Maybe so little is leaking that it's hard to tell. Or maybe leak is inside oil cooler, which is known to have other problems. Dinghied ashore and was picked up by my relatives and taken to their house in Indian Beach. Had a very nice visit, including some beach time and a swim in the ocean (actually, Onslow Bay). Great home-cooked dinner. Back to the boat, to find that a big catamaran had anchored right off my bow. Ran genset for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Tried to remove raw water pump from engine, to inspect it. Hoses are fighting me. 6/14/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Finished removing raw-water pump from engine, but then realized that it can't leak oil into raw water, because it is driven by an auxiliary shaft and has no oil feed. Replaced impeller, because I never have before. Face-plate is a bit pitted; probably should get a new one. More importantly, the pump shaft bearings don't turn freely; needs grease or a rebuild. That requires a press. Put raw-water pump back onto engine. Started taking oil-cooler off. Ran out of energy when I got to the messy part: removing the oil and transmission oil lines. Will do it tomorrow. More cruising boats arriving, and some anchoring way out in the middle of the channel. Hope the police don't come and tell all of us to leave. Saw a boat "Katinka" that I think we saw in Georgetown Exumas. Dinghied ashore and did errands. Looks like I might be able to get a replacement oil cooler right in town. Spaghetti for dinner. Ran genset for 1.5 hours. Good thing I didn't take oil-cooler off completely: had a very scary experience at midnight. A sharp thunderstorm came through the harbor, high winds and lots of rain, and like an idiot I laid in bed for 5 minutes thinking "wow, it's getting strong". Then I hear people yelling, I go up into the cockpit, and a sailboat ("Rejoice") is dragging right past me with a woman screaming on board. I dive down into the engine compartment and reconnect the seawater hoses to the oil cooler. Up into the cockpit and start the engine. Down again to look for any problems with the exhaust system, raw water pump, or oil cooler, all of which I've messed with in the last two days. Up again to motor away from the boat that dragged, which is now whipping back and forth next to me. I might have dragged 20 feet or so myself, but not more than that. Up to bow to check on things there, back to cockpit, down to engine compartment. Anchor rode snarled in chain locker; freed up a little of that. Back topside. I'm wearing only underpants, I'm totally soaked, my glasses are soaked and fogged. Tried my snorkel mask but it soon fogged up. Kept motoring to keep my boat as far from the other as I could. Finally the storm passed and eventually I talked to the other boat on the radio. They're going to stay where they are (too close for my comfort). We'll see what things look like in the morning. 6/15/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Woke up at 5 AM to check on things, and found "Rejoice" sitting 5 feet off my bow and swinging back and forth. If they didn't have a reverse transom, we would have collided. I tried to trim an anchor rode to move farther away, but it looks like my primary rode is fouled on the propeller or rudder. I was afraid that would happen; I had to slacken the rode last night to try to motor further away from "Rejoice" as they swung back and forth. Checked out propeller shaft and stuffing box to see if anything was damaged; looks okay. Decide I can't do anything, the boats probably won't collide, and go back to bed. Up at 7 AM, and snorkeling under the boat by 7:30. At least the water is fairly warm. The rode did go into the propeller, which chopped it off. Fortunately it was the rope part of the rode, not the chain. Takes a lot of effort to free the rode (and cut off some smaller cord I must have hit somewhere on the ICW). Zinc is starting to get seriously diminished. Some foot-long fish close to me as I work on the propeller; I guess they can't see very well in this murky water. I notice that a 25-foot non-cruising sailboat has ended up high and dry on the beach. Now I have to recover my CQR anchor and 100 feet of chain, which are lying on the bottom. They're probably somewhere under "Rejoice", so I have to wait for them to wake up and emerge. I loosen the fittings on the oil cooler (no easy task) while waiting. I want to take it off, take it ashore, and get a replacement this morning; the marine store supposedly closes at 12. Finally "Rejoice" moves, and first I try dragging the dinghy anchor around to try to snag my lost chain. No luck, so I snorkel. Very hard; the water is 12-14 feet deep, more than I'm comfortable free-diving in. I go to the bottom 5 or 6 times, but it's so murky that I don't have much of a chance. I give up, decide to go buy a grappeling hook ashore, start to haul up the dinghy anchor, and it's snagged on anchor chain ! Try to raise it, but it's very heavy and I'm not healthy; my rib/muscle injury hurts like the devil when I haul on it. Snorkel and put another line on the chain; now I can see indeed it is the lost chain. Back onto the boat, try to haul on the lines, very painful. Finally see the problem: the propeller has twisted the rode into a huge tangle, so I'm trying to raise 150+ lbs of rode in one lump. Also, sometimes the wind swings the boat away from the anchor and pulls the chain out of my hands. I snorkel again to find the end with the rope on it, and it too is twisted into a huge ball. Propeller twisted 30+ feet of rope into size of a basketball. Back aboard, more hauling. My cussing at the pain brings an offer of help from Forest on "Rejoice", which I gladly accept. We sweat and haul and untwist chain for an hour or more, finally getting it all straightened out and back at the bow. He says he saw 46 knots on the wind indicator last night, and someone else reported 50 ! By now, it's too late to remove the oil cooler and get to the store by 12, so it'll have to wait until Monday. I'm exhausted; time for a shower and lunch and nap. Went ashore, bought a zinc ($2) and did internet. Back to boat, reattached oil cooler hoses a little better, started splicing anchor rode, straightened up a bit. Then ashore for dinner with Chuck and Carol, who I've met through email. We happened to see a towboat pulling the beached sailboat back into the water; they pulled it off quite fast, and didn't wait for high tide to do it. Had quite a nice conversation with Chuck and Carol over dinner. Took them out to Magnolia and gave them the tour; they were delighted when we saw dolphins in the harbor. Had a very nice time with them. Ran genset for 1 hour to charge batteries. Exercised air conditioners briefly. 6/16/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Loafed all day (except for doing a splice of the anchor rope to the anchor chain); trying to let my chest muscles heal. Bending or twisting or using my arms much causes pain. Just read books in the cockpit and watched the harbor and shore traffic. Reheated chili for dinner. Ran genset for 2.5 hours to charge batteries. The wildlife in this harbor is pretty impressive. There are dolphins just about every day, schools of fish that somehow hit the surface of the water (from underneath) with a sharp slapping noise, fish that are eating gunk off my hull, and wild horses on the island across the harbor from town. And the usual gulls and pelicans. 6/17/2002 (Monday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Removed oil cooler from engine. Getting the right-angle fittings off the body of the cooler required major grunting and swearing and the big pipe wrench. Took it into town and found that the guys who know how to order stuff at both of the marine stores aren't in today; try tomorrow. Dropped off propane tank to be refilled; forgot to pick it up again later. Went to maritime museum; very nice. Saw whaling equipment, especially appropriate since I just finished rereading Moby Dick for the Nth time; it's one of my favorite books. Bit of a mess back at the dinghy dock; I usually lock it to something with a cable lock, and today I couldn't find a good piece of dock to run the cable through, so I just looped it around a tall piling that the dock was floating up and down over. So I get back, and the loop of cable with lock has slid 8 feet down the piling to the bottom of the water and gotten stuck. Spent some time sticking my arm down into the water before I realized how deep it was. Fortunately I had a telescoping oar / boat-hook on board. Even with that, it seemed unlikely that I'd succeed, but eventually I managed to loosen the loop, draw it up and unlock it. Phew ! Back ashore to do internet, and realized I'd been approaching the oil-cooler ordering the wrong way. Using the Perkins number instead of the Sen-Dure equivalent I'd looked up, several out-of-town places have it. Now have to get it into town. Rained, and all the little buggies are out and in my cockpit. Spaghetti for dinner. Ran genset for 3 hours. No sooner had my head hit the pillow, than the wind started to build and gust. I laid there for 5 minutes thinking "am I going to make the same mistake I made 3 days ago, and have a disassembled engine when an emergency occurs ?" So I got up and reattached the oil cooler to the engine. The wind never got to more than 15+ knots, but it was gusty and swirly. 6/18/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Ordered new oil cooler ($320). Finally dawned on me that the marine stores in town were no help, and in fact probably would just mark up and add sales tax to something I could order as easily myself. So I ordered it from a place in Texas and it will be delivered to the dockmaster here. Borrowed a "courtesy car" from the maritime museum and went to Napa Auto (oil filters, $24) and a supermarket. Rained hard, but mostly while I was driving or inside the supermarket. Picked up my refilled propane tank ($12 for 20 pounds). Pushed boat in circles with dinghy to unwind anchor chains a bit. Dinner was a saffron rice / beans / corn / onion thing; not too bad. Ran genset for 2 hours. 6/19/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Rained for several hours starting at dawn. Didn't do much of anything; wasted the day. Sausage sandwiches and baked beans for dinner. Ran genset for 2 hours. 6/20/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. More wind and rain at night, rain at dawn, wind and rain in afternoon. Of course it's making me drag a little right toward a small boat moored behind me; I'm within 10 feet but don't want to run engine and raise anchors with dicey engine and 2 anchors and such close quarters. New oil cooler arrived right on time and fits; put it in and everything seems fine. Won't know if oil leak is gone until I've run engine for several days. Started engine oil and filter change; still don't have the hang of using the Tempo Oil Boy oil extractor. Doesn't help that the instructions on the box and those on the pump body are completely contradictory. Plan to test engine tonight and leave Beaufort tomorrow morning if everything is good. Whoops; got too confident. Finished oil change, fired up engine, and looked in engine compartment to find oil pouring out of the filter housing. Ran up to cockpit and shut engine off. What a mess in the engine compartment ! Found that filter gasket had fallen inside housing as I wrestled to bolt it on. Put it on again, started engine again, oil pouring out again ! Decided old gasket was still in there, took out new gasket, tried again, still pouring out ! Pried out old gasket, put new gasket in, still gushing. By now I'm pulling my hair out; I'm wondering if I cracked the housing when I took it off to get at the oil cooler. Tried rotating the filter housing a little and retightened, and finally it worked. Now to mop up a couple of gallons (!) of spilled oil. I hate oil changes. Maybe I need to buy a different filter housing. And I still need to figure out that stupid Tempo pump. One fitting on oil cooler leaks a little; I'll have to repack it tomorrow, and clean the bilge, and dispose of a ton of used oil and oily paper towels. Guess I'll be in Beaufort one more day. Salad and leftovers for dinner, peaches for dessert. Ran genset for 2 hours. 6/21/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. More wind and rain at night and in the morning. Repacked fitting on oil cooler, topped up transmission fluid, ran engine for half hour, no leaks. Bailed oil out of the bilge for a while, using a plastic cup. It's grim down there. Dinghied ashore and disposed of many jugs of oil and many bags of oily paper towels. Did various errands, then back to boat. Raised anchors, which took about an hour. Strong wind and curent running, fortunately in favorable direction (not toward immediate neighbor boats). The second anchor (Danforth) was in like concrete; even getting the rode tightened up vertical and running the boat forward and reverse a bit, it took 10 minutes before it decided to come up. And the two rodes being twisted around once didn't help either. Rained at one point, and I was constantly ducking into the engine compartment to look for oil leaks. All in all, a pretty stressful exercise. Got going, up through Beaufort bridge, then fighting strong current up channels and canals. Heard radio transmissions about a plane that crashed right in the ICW channel in North River, closing the ICW. I might be in that vicinity in 3 or 4 days. Pulled over after an hour and a half to anchor and check engine and transmission oil levels; no problems. Got going again, heading for Oriental NC. But as I got within 5 miles, I realized it looked tiny on the chart, and if I couldn't anchor inside, there was nowhere else to go. I'd end up totally exposed in the Neuse River, with NE or E 15-20 wind blowing on me through a 20-mile fetch, with a bottom marked "hard" on the chart. So I pulled into Cedar Creek at the last second. Turns out to be quite a nice anchorage, sheltered from most directions, good depth. Anchored at lat 34.55.976 long 76.38.700 Engine hour 1956.1 Did about 17 statute miles in about 5 hours. Can see smoke of a large wildfire off in the direction of Oriental. I'm pretty tired from worrying all day about whether the engine would drop all its oil and seize or something. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Terrific red sunset spread all across the western sky. Wind died almost completely at 8 PM. 6/22/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Cedar Creek, 5 miles east of Oriental NC. Wind was very light all night, instead of the E 15-20 that was forecast. An hour or two of rain. Measured fuel level at about 16 inches. Was lazy in the morning, got a late start, and nature made me pay for it by starting to rain just as I started to raise anchor. Had to stop a couple of times to wait while it rained hard. Motored out into increasingly bad conditions: hard rain and fog. Visibility down to 1/2 mile at various times, but I was in a wide channel and then the very wide Neuse river, so it never stopped me. Brief thought of going into Oriental to see how it looked, but pouring rain and fog dissuaded me. Rained most of the day, hard at times, and was dark and grey all day. I just closed everything up, stood in the parts of the pilothouse that the rain wasn't blowing into, and kept going. Not much wind most of the day. Heard them announce ICW at Coinjock is open again after that plane crash; was closed a whole day ! Anchored in Campbell Creek, off the ICW in Goose Creek. Sun came out and day turned beautiful afterward. Lots of spectacular clouds on horizon in every direction, but I'm in a clear spot. Lat 35.17.105 long 76.37.162 Engine hour 1961.8 Did about 33 statute miles in about 5.5 hours. Salad and pigs-in-a-blanket for dinner, with baked brandied peaches for dessert. Should have baked and broiled the peaches longer, but they tasted fine. Ran genset for 1.5 hours. 6/23/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in Campbell Creek. Raised anchor and joined a procession of sailboats going up the ICW. Motored across Pamlico River, which is very wide. Then everyone raised sail, joining a bunch of smaller local boats, some of which raised spinnakers, and sailed (locals, mostly) or motor-sailed (cruisers) up the Pungo River toward Belhaven. I was sailing, and everyone left me in the dust, even though I had all sails and plenty of laundry up. I did 3.5 to 4 knots for an hour or so, enjoying the quiet. Then started motor-sailing, then suddenly everything was happening at once. Was being passed by a motor yacht, big rainstorm approaching, take laundry down, get sails down, close all hatches and ports. Lots of dashing around, but got it done. Fortunately, everyone went past Belhaven; I went in. So plenty of anchoring space. But heavy rain arrived just as I did, so I took it slow through the harbor and waited until the rain slowed a bit before going to the foredeck to anchor. Anchored in Belhaven NC harbor, at lat 35.32.438 long 76.37.983 Engine hour 1965.0 Did about 19 statute miles in about 4 hours. A little green frog suddenly appeared in the cockpit. He must have swum by and climbed up the side of the boat somehow, I guess. We haven't docked in more than a week, and the dinghy hasn't docked in several days. I watched for a while as he explored the cockpit. His body is about 2 inches long, and he's a pretty bright shade of green. He left as suddenly as he came; don't know where he went. Salad and big batch of (homemade) french onion soup for dinner. 6/24/2002 (Monday) At anchor at Belhaven NC. Dinghied ashore; town seems nice. Two great hardware stores, nice library, but supermarket is far away. Bought various tools and transmission oil ($21). Raised anchor and got going. Nice motor-sail up Pungo River, but then the Alligator River - Pungo River was 20 miles of tedium. Narrow, lots of stumps in the water on both sides, no other traffic, no houses, fluky wind, hot. Anchored at south end of Alligator River, in nice, wide-open area, at lat 35.39.981 long 76.02.179 Half-dozen other boats here. Stupid flies still present, even though I'm 1/4 to 1/2 mile from land in all directions. Engine hour 1971.3 Did about 34 statute miles in about 6 hours. Installed a car stereo CD player. What a quality-of-life improvement ! Now I can play my CD's without firing up the genset or running the inverter. Doesn't take much juice, either. One CD I played was Bizet's Carmen, but my head is full of Bart Simpson's lyrics to Toreador: Toreador, don't spit on the floor, use the cuspidor, that's what it's for ! Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Just after the sun went down, the full moon rose on the opposite side, and it was a pastel pageant. Started out a delicate salmon pink, then turned canteloupe orange, then a pale yellow. Beautiful. Military jets maneuvering overhead tonight. 6/25/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at south end of Alligator River in NC. Poked my head up at 0830 and everyone else was gone or just leaving. So I cooked a quick oatmeal breakfast and sailed off anchor. Sailed for about an hour, but got tired of doing 3 knots, and started the engine. Motored up the Alligator River, rockin' to the Beatles: Revolver, then Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, then Yellow Submarine. Long hot slog across Albemarle Sound, which is wide and featureless. Uncomfortable beam seas, too. North River also uninteresting. Anchored at Buck Island, at lat 36.16.005 long 75.57.465 Engine hour 1977.8 Did about 45 statute miles in about 8.5 hours. Salad and chili for dinner. Lots of flies; they drove me out of the cockpit. 6/26/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at north end of North River in NC. Lots of tedious motoring today, mostly through canals with shallow water right at the edge, so I can't relax. Saw the airplane that crashed in the ICW a few days ago; it was hauled out and sitting on the ground at USCG Coinjock. Pretty intact, but bent. A small, maybe 2-person craft. Nice strong SW wind as I'm going north, so I'm motor-sailing and making good time. Heard a report of a bridge-jumper at Hampton bridge, some kid with orange hair. Someone else came on and said "if he jumps, he'll get stuck in the mud". First anchorage I tried was 4 feet deep instead of the charted 7 feet; backtracked and the previous one was 7 feet deep instead of the charted 11-16. Anchored north of Pungo Ferry NC, at lat 36.38.662 long 76.03.619 Engine hour 1983.7 Did about 30 statute miles in about 5.5 hours. Cleaned the bilge a bit. Salad and leftover chili for dinner. Didn't sleep well at all; hot and muggy and had a headache. 6/27/2002 (Thursday) At anchor north of Pungo Ferry NC. Started early, but had to waste lots of time waiting for various bridges. Didn't quite time the chain of them right. Went through a lock, a first for me. Fairly stressful, especially since while I was waiting for it to open, keeping position with difficulty, some idiot cut in front of me and stopped close off my bow. And he wasn't listening to the radio. But then when we got into the lock, he screwed up and ended up swinging around and tying off facing backwards. I was looking, but I couldn't tell if the water level went up or down; must not have been much of a change. The lock was about 600 feet long by 72 wide; 6 or 8 boats were in it at the same time; the water wasn't pumped, it just pours in when the gates are opened. Interesting motoring up through the beginning of Norfolk harbor; lots of big ships and Navy ships being worked on. Saw a couple of aircraft carriers. Saw an Aegis destroyer with armed guards on the foredeck, watching out for terrorists, I'm sure. There were a few restricted zones cordoned off by buoys, but not as much as I expected. Several railroad bridges with identical names, and it took a while to get one of them to respond to radio. In fact, I don't think the tender ever did respond, but he opened the bridge. Anchored south of Hospital Point in Portsmouth VA, across the channel from Norfolk VA, right at statute mile 0 of the ICW, at lat 36.50.651 long 76.17.981 Engine hour 1989.8 Did about 26 statute miles in about 6 hours, despite having a headache all day. About 1200 miles down, about 250 miles to go ! Dinghied ashore at Nauticus museum in Norfolk. Seems like a nice town, but as usual the grocery store is about 1.5 miles away. So is the world-class art museum. Lots of boutiques and cafes near the waterfront. No supermarket near shore on the Portsmouth side either. Salad and tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. Severe thunderstorm warning until 10 PM tonight. Sure enough, I laid my head on the pillow at 9:15 and a squall came in at 9:20. Started blowing 30 knots or more, lots of rain, kept going for at least a half hour. One or two flashes of lightning, but far away. Glad I had two anchors down. Wind went away but rain continued until well after midnight. 6/28/2002 (Friday) At anchor between Portsmouth and Norfolk VA, at ICW mile 0. Did grocery shopping: got on free NET bus which would take me halfway, but a guy named Rick heard me talking to the driver, and offered to drive me to the supermarket; I took him up on it. He works for the city development agency, bringing in new business. He dropped me off, I did my shopping, then carted my stuff about half a mile to the NET stop. It took me within a few blocks of the dinghy dock. Went to the Nauticus museum and went on board the USS Wisconsin, an Iowa-class battleship. Very disappointing: all you can do is stroll the decks, you can't go inside and see engines, etc. The museum is okay. Got to pet a shark in a petting pool. Learned a few things: the sharks can see us up through the surface of the water, the Lexington and Saratoga started construction as battleships and were changed mid-construction to aircraft carriers, the bow of the Kentucky was cut off and welded onto the front of the Wisconsin. Museum was barely worth $10 admission. Met up with Stacy, a guy who contacted me through my web site. Showed him Magnolia, then he treated me to dinner and we had a nice conversation about boats, general news, etc. Had a nice time. He knows my log file better than I do. He asked why I document dinners but not breakfast or lunch; for the record, breakfast usually is a cup of granola, lunch usually is peanut butter crackers or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I document dinners to try to shame myself into doing something respectable for dinner. I checked out free music at Nauticus afterward; they had a really good band playing. Ran genset for 1 hour to charge batteries. 6/29/2002 (Saturday) At anchor between Portsmouth and Norfolk VA, at ICW mile 0. Wasn't sure whether to stay another day and see art museum, or leave. Decided to leave; got going early, raised anchors. Very calm, fun to motor past all of the huge docks and ships in Norfolk Harbor, then past lots of Navy ships NE of Norfolk. Saw two submarines at dock and a third in dry-dock. Saw a large warship moving out into the ocean about a mile ahead of me. Motored up into 10 knots headwind and big swells; not what I expected. The wind is supposed to veer and stall and go variable today and tonight. But now I've changed plans a little; instead of heading for east side of the Bay to anchor sheltered from predicted east wind, I'm going up the west side, to anchor sheltered from north swells. Several other sailboats slogging up north with me. Read a book, listened to Peter Gabriel. Boats really plunging up and down in the swells at times. Heard an amusing boat name on the radio: Yada Yada. So someone called them: "Yada Yada, Yada Yada, Yada Yada, this is ". Anchored in the mouth of the Rappahannock River, just south of Windmill Point, at lat 37.36.733 long 76.17.823 Engine hour 1999.8 Did about 47 statute miles in about 9.5 hours. Cleaned the bilge a bit. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. A fair bit of rolling every now and then. 6/30/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in the mouth of the Rappahannock River. After 50 engine hours, I haven't lost any engine oil, so I guess replacing the oil cooler did the trick ! Got going late; foggy morning turning into a hazy day. Visibility a mile or two in the morning; fine later. Little wind, very calm seas. Heard another funny boat name on the radio: Ooh Baby Baby. Someone calling them: "Ooh Baby Baby, Ooh Baby Baby, Ooh Baby Baby, this is ". Suddenly saw lots of transparent little jellyfish in the water at the mouth of the Potomac; these must be the "sea nettles" everyone talks about. Pretty boring day, just motoring up through wide bay, not much other traffic, land fairly far away. Kept going across mouth of the Potomac, up past Point No Point, and anchored near west shore a few miles south of the Patuxent River, at lat 38.14.299 long 76.23.343 Engine hour 2008.1 Bad holding, but conditions are calm and going to get calmer overnight. Did about 45 statute miles in about 8 hours. I've crossed from VA to MD. Spinach and sausage and cheese omelet for dinner, mostly to clear some old things out of the freezer. Well, this anchorage turned into a disaster. Right about 10 PM as I'm going to bed, an ugly swell came up out of the ESE, and the boat started rocking horribly. Tried raising mizzen as a riding sail, tried hanging a milk crate over the side as a roll-stopper, tried hanging a Danforth 35 over the side (just touching the bottom) to reduce rolling. The anchor seemed to help a bit. But the rolling continued, and I got little sleep all night. 7/1/2002 (Monday) At anchor a few miles south of the Patuxent River. The fiasco continues: the rolling continued until about 7 AM when it started to lessen, and it was mostly gone by 9 AM (when it was time to get up and go). Figures. Worse, when I went to retrieve the Danforth 35, I found only a shackle without pin on the end of the line. I guess the pin wasn't wired, and I didn't notice that as I was dropping it in the middle of the night. Anchor could be anywhere in an arc about 50 yards long and 10 yards wide. Launched the dinghy and tried trolling with the dinghy anchor, but the bottom is too rough; the dinghy anchor keeps snagging on bottom. Went snorkeling, but visibility is about 2 feet, water is 10 feet deep, and when I get to the bottom I have to feel along with my hands. Saw a sea nettle or two, which didn't improve my mood. Gave up (maybe a little too quickly). As I finished hoisting the dinghy, was startled by a couple of small stingrays zipping along the surface, making a racket, coming right toward the boat. So, if anyone finds a Danforth 35 anchor in the Chesapeake, it's mine ! Bought it used for $90. Bummer. The west shore south of the Patuxent River is covered with Navy stuff: RADAR domes, satellite dishes, a naval air station, hangars. Saw a jet doing touch-and-go landings at the airfield. There's a target range out in the middle of the bay. Crossed the mouth of the Patuxent, then tried to gauge when to cross to the east shore, relative to a freighter also going north. Screwed it up the first time: got 1/4 of the way across and found myself getting into a race to get across his bow, so I veered back to the west and waited until I could cross his stern. Went up the Choptank River, up Broad Creek, and up San Domingo Creek to the "back door" of St. Michaels MD. Anchored with about 10 other boats, in middle of creek about half a mile from town, at lat 38.46.371 long 76.13.815 Engine hour 2015.3 Did about 38 miles in about 7 hours. Got the usual "oh, no, he's anchoring near us, is he too close, does he know what he's doing, there goes the neighborhood" looks from people on the next boat as I was anchoring. Hot afternoon, and it's going to be even hotter the next couple of days. Salad and sausage-and-onion-sandwiches and rice-and-corn for dinner. 7/2/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor on south side of St Michaels MD. Dinghied ashore, got rid of garbage, checked out town, went to maritime museum (very nice; lots of boats, explanations of the history of the bay, how fishing is done, waterfowl, crabs and crab traps, lighthouse, etc). Did library and groceries. Back to boat, and it's hot today. Someone said later it's 95; I thought it was supposed to go to 90. Tomorrow was supposed to be hotter than today. Ashore again, wandering around, more library and groceries. Needed to run genset, so cooked pigs in a blanket for dinner, also baked some oatmeal/apricot cookies (not quite right; needed more butter and less egg, I think). Had corn on the cob, too. Ran genset for 2 hours. 7/3/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor on south side of St Michaels MD. Hot already at 7 AM. Spent morning straightening up, then went ashore and met my aunt, who drove over from DC to see Magnolia and me. The dinghy dock here isn't easy, so getting her in and out of the dinghy required care. But she was very impressed by Magnolia, not expecting her to be so big. Then we drove to Tilghman Island for a very nice lunch. Had a lovely visit with her. Spent the afternoon enjoying the air-conditioning in the library, then got groceries and back to boat. Very hot and still. Salad and corn on the cob for dinner. Decided to try sleeping on deck, so I put the longest cockpit cushion up on the fore-cabin-top, put a sheet and pillows on it, and slept there from 9 PM to 2 AM. The cushion is a bit too firm and narrow, and there was some noise from other boats for the first hour, but other than that it was fine. Nice breeze, only an occasional nibble from an insect. Got a bit moist by 2 AM, and the firmness was bothering me, so I moved below. Still very hot and stuffy in the aft cabin. 7/4/2002 (Thursday) At anchor on south side of St Michaels MD. Got going early: up at 6 AM, anchor up by 7 AM (chain was covered with muck). Measured fuel level 11.25 inches. Hot already at 7 AM. Lots of fishing boats out at this hour. Went through Knapps Narrows, through the bridge next to the restaurant we ate in yesterday. Get out into the main bay, and the wind is right on the nose. I'm cruising along, and all of a sudden the fan belt starts squealing. I look at the battery monitor, and the alternator suddenly has decided to put out 40 amps at 15.3 volts instead of the 5-7 amps at 14.4 volts it was doing. I do a brief check for dangling wires, but there's really only one wire, for both charging and battery voltage sensing. I slow down to idle, speed back up, and everything's fine. Hope the alternator regulator's not dying. Troubles come in multiples: suddenly the aft water tank is empty. I switch to the forward tank. Very rolly in main bay near Lane bridges. Hot and hazy too. Boat flying spinnaker crossed ahead of me, then almost immediately jibed and came at me. Fortunately, he'd snagged and wrapped stuff doing the jibe, so he came to a halt and I last saw him far behind me. Saw procession of six small Navy vessels, all designated "YPsomething". A long, hot day with no breeze over the boat most of the time. Couldn't raise Baltimore harbormaster on the radio to ask some questions about anchoring. Didn't want to go all the way in to Inner Harbor. Finally dropped anchor right next to Fort McHenry, figuring if the police tell me to move, I'll move. Fireworks are supposed to be launched from the fort, but I don't see a barge or anything. Kind of rolly here; maybe I'll move. Anchored at lat 39.15.543 long 76.34.990 Engine hour 2025.2 Did about 45 miles in about 9 hours. After a couple of hours, I did move across the channel, into what I thought was a dead area. But after cooking dinner, I took two bites of my spaghetti and looked up to see a tug with barge full of sand coming right by me. I contacted him, and he said he was coming back in 30 minutes to put barges on the mooring right next to me. So I had to move again. Fortunately, I'm not in the part of the harbor where the fireworks and all of the marinas and attractions are. The radio traffic from there sounds like it's a mess; everyone jockeying for position, complaining about each others wakes, etc. The fireworks are nice; I'm a mile or two away, a little further than I hoped to be. But in 6 directions around the harbor I can see smaller displays from other municipalities, as well as the main Baltimore fireworks. Pretty nice. Then it's a minor zoo near me, and a major zoo in the main harbor, as everyone leaves after the fireworks. I sleep from 10 to 1 on deck; there's a nice breeze. Go below, and it's still fairly hot there. A nice breeze develops around 5 AM. 7/5/2002 (Friday) At anchor in Baltimore harbor. Raised anchor, motored up into the Inner Harbor just to see what it's like, and found an open space in the teeny anchorage there. Room for about 6 boats, surrounded by skyscrapers, between the USS Constellation and the submarine USS Torsk. I can't believe I'm right here, in the middle of the city ! Pretty cool. Anchored at lat 39.17.100 long 76.36.611 Engine hour 2027.3 Every 5 minutes or so, a recording from the Torsk plays "Dive! Dive! Dive!" or "Surface!". I'm sure that will get old. Went ashore and took long walk to library. Came back to find a very entertaining scene: the anchorage also serves as the pond for the paddle-boat concession, and Magnolia is surrounded by families and kids paddling away. Half of the boats are plain, but half are cute green or purple dragon (or maybe Nessie) boats. Fun to watch them and be watched while I ate lunch in the cockpit. Some of them try to escape out into the harbor, and attendants on skiffs zip out and chastise them. Ashore again, overheard someone say there's a 4-hour wait to get into the Aquarium. Orioles are out of town. Went to Maryland Science Center. Not really worth the $12 admission price. They had lots of unimpressive stuff about the manned space program; they're still searching for a justification for it. Walked up the hill to Federal Hill Park, which has a really amazing view of the harbor and city. Then to Cross Street food market, which was fun to wander through. On the way, I passed a lot of row houses which looked a lot like the one my grandmother lived in, in Trenton NJ, complete with walk-through brick tunnels into the backyards. We used to play in that tunnel when we were kids; it was dark and cool and fun to throw a rubber ball in. Bought pork chops and watermelon and bananas. Back to boat to refrigerate it. The paddle-boats are still going strong. Salad and grilled pork chops for dinner, watermelon for dessert. Delicious ! No shower tonight; I'm too shy to shower on deck with 5000 people watching, some of them from 20 feet away on paddle boats. Ashore again, to wander around with thousands of other people strolling after dark. Back to boat, and the paddle boats kept going until 10. 7/6/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Baltimore's Inner Harbor. Turned cool overnight; feels wonderful after days of 90's and high humidity. Up at 6 AM to take advantage of fair tide. Raised two anchors, with lots of muck on the chains. Moving by 6:45, with tidal current and wind in my favor. The harbor is quiet at this time of day. Still got rocked by various passing powerboats; they seem to have no manners here. Nice run down the Patapsco River to the bay, then a long segment motor-sailing close-hauled up the bay to the Sassafras River. Tons of traffic everywhere, and lots of powerboats will no regard for their wakes. Tried to sail up the Sassafras, but got tired of doing 3.5-4 knots. Wound my way up the river, seeing tons of people in the water, in boats, etc. Got to town, where things were really dense, and almost ran aground. Someone warned me off, and just as I started to turn, the keel plowed through soft mud for a few feet. But it went right through, and I realized I hadn't been paying attention and there was one more set of markers I should have been aiming for. Amazing density of boats here, and several very big marinas. Lots of boats anchored; I'll bet a lot of them are ones we saw in the Bahamas. Made a U-turn at the end of town (where there's a bridge), came back out, and anchored (but still in the no-wake zone). Anchored at lat 39.21.817 long 75.54.217 Engine hour 2036.3 Did about 40 miles in about 8.5 hours. Had a swim around the boat. Can't remember the last time I swam in fresh water, and the reduced buoyancy made me work hard. Wanted to scrape the hull and check things out, but visibility was terrible. About 6 inches and very murky even then. But the water temperature was perfect. Did a couple of laps. Did my good deed for the day: heard someone calling to a friend on another boat, asking if they had a grease gun. They didn't so, I zipped over in the dinghy and lent them my grease gun. Didn't have the energy to go into town; all indications are that there isn't much there anyway. Salad, and potatoes au gratin with canned ham added, for dinner. 7/7/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Georgetown MD in the Sassafras River. Slept in, woke up to foggy day, got going late. Motored down the Sassafras River, up the bay and Elk River, and anchored in Veazey Cove in the Bohemia River, near the west entrance to the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal. Anchored at lat 39.28.471 long 75.55.304 Engine hour 2040.0 Did about 15 miles in about 3.5 hours. My calculations show the best time to enter the canal is early (0500) tomorrow morning. Max flood in canal, which should be in my favor, is 0630 tomorrow. Then I get into the Delaware about 0800 and turn north, and should have a flood tide current in my favor, going toward Philadelphia, which has a high tide at 1305. 7/8/2002 (Monday) At anchor in the Bohemia River. Up at 0430, still pretty dark, had fun rinsing muck off the anchor chain as I raised it. Moving by 0500, into the canal proper by 0520. Lovely fair current, 2 to 2.5 knots. Plenty of light, but very foggy. Heard radio say that some of it was smoke coming down from Canada, but I also saw fog rising right out of the water. Visibility usually 1/2 to 1 mile, but just east of Chesapeake City it went down to 100 yards a couple of times. I was nervous that a freighter would suddenly appear, but I saw no other traffic for the entire length of the canal ! Plenty of freighter traffic out on the Delaware River. A 1.5 knot fair current here. Tried to stay out of shipping channel, but I got forced into the channel at a "pinch point", and of course there was a freighter overtaking. I checked out his name ("Nandu") in case he hailed me, and then of course he gave some lame hail like "sailboat at the Pea Patch, come back" (not saying his name). I didn't know that was the name of the island I was next to; it was marked on one of my chart pages but not the other. And I'd been hearing traffic from as far away as Baltimore and Kent Narrows and Philadelphia. So I didn't respond, and then he blew a long whistle. I hailed him, he gave me a gruff warning to stay out of the channel, and he went by with plenty of room to spare. I was hugging the rocky shoreline as closely as I dared, and I wasn't on his side of the channel, but I definitely was in the channel (the channel marker on my side was on dry land). Guess I could have stopped dead short of the "pinch point", and waited for him to pass. Several other freighters after that, but no problems. Plenty of room to stay out of the channel. Then I got to Philadelpia, and the same freighter "Nandu" started jawing at me to stay out of his way as he was docking, even though I was 2 miles south of him. I had some trouble understanding which side of the river he was going to dock on, and he started getting insulting, saying "do you know which side 'port' is, skipper ?". I said "you said stay on the NJ side, right ?". He said "yes". I said "which way am I heading ?". He said "you're doing good". I said "so why are you yelling at me ?". And some other freighter or tugboat captain came on, laughing, and said "because he's a dick, that's why !" North of Philly, I sailed off the edge of my charts. I knew this was going to happen, I should have found and bought a chart for the final 20 miles, but I didn't. Came to an opening bridge I couldn't tell the name of, then saw a sign on the main span saying "61 feet at high tide". I went under with my 53-foot mast, and at the last second I was sure the sign was wrong and the mast would hit. But we went under fine; big sigh of relief. A few more bridges to negotiate, and got held up for 5 minutes by a couple of tugs delivering coal to the Duck Island power plant, but then: Trenton, the Magnolia has landed ! Motored up far enough to see the cemetery near where my grandmother used to live, then turned back 100 yards because water was getting shallower. Anchored near the County launching ramp, where we used to launch our little motorboat 25 years ago. Anchored at lat 40.11.209 long 74.45.370 Engine hour 2053.1 Did about 90 miles (?) in about 13 hours. Dinghied ashore and called my Mom. Back to boat, polished stanchions and straightened up and had spaghetti dinner. Back to shore to pick up Mom and take her to the boat. First time I'd seen her in about 18 months (can that be right ? Christmas of 2000 ?). I'm a bad son. 7/9/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River. A boat brokerage nearby kindly agreed to let me leave my dinghy at their dock for free. Did so, left Magnolia anchored in the river, and spent the night at Mom's house. A real bed, real shower ! Cable TV ! Air-conditioning ! Rained hard in the middle of the night. 7/10/2002 (Wednesday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm still at Mom's house. Drove down to look at Magnolia from shore, just to make sure she was okay. Spent night at Mom's house. 7/11/2002 (Thursday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Bailed out the dinghy, dinghied out to Magnolia to do chores. Measured fuel level 7.5 inches. Shook fire extinguishers. Stowed stuff (mostly groceries) that were strewn all over the V-berth, so I could then remove headliner in V-berth, so I could then remove anchor windlass from deck. Also removed forward port bow cleat. Ran genset for 4 hours to charge batteries. Took cleat and windlass to a machine shop, to have backing plates made, and to have them make a platform to raise the windlass 1.5" so chain doesn't jam so easily. Went to Trenton Thunder minor league baseball game; perfect night, and we could see Magnolia from our seats (through a tree), since it's a waterfront stadium. 7/12/2002 (Friday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Visited my sister's house in Pennsylvania; she has 3 dogs, 10+ cats, 4 sheep, several chickens, 3 ducks, and now a horse. Also a paddleboat on her pond. 7/13/2002 (Saturday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Found that someone stole the carabiner off my dinghy painter as it was tied to the (guarded) dock. Did a mini-cruise up and down the Delaware, with my mom, Aunt Nancy, brothers Dan and Chris, sister Carol and brother-in-law Marc on board. A lovely time was had by all. 7/14/2002 (Sunday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Out to boat, and: - cleaned out refrigerator. - tried to remove fuel vent line to fit a bigger line, but its mounting onto the fuel tank is impossible to get to: the fill line is right aft of it, a bulkhead is right forward of it, the freezer dryer above it, thick bundles of wires running over it. Gave up. - removed raw water pump from engine, to see if I can get its bearing replaced. - removed water intake hoses from engine, to see if I can get the Y-valve replaced. - removed water filter from under galley sink; need to replace filter or entire unit. 7/15/2002 (Monday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Dropped off anchor windlass and bow cleat at machine shop. 7/16/2002 (Tuesday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Dropped off water pump and water intake piping at marine service center. 7/17/2002 (Wednesday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. It's an "excessive heat alert" day. 7/18/2002 (Thursday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Picked up anchor windlass plates and cleat backing plates at machine shop ($200). New windlass bolts ($5). Out to boat. Reinstalled anchor windlass, with lots of sweating but only a little hammering and cussing. Looks good. Ran genset for 2.75 hours. 7/19/2002 (Friday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Picked up new bolts for bow cleats ($16 !). Picked up rebuilt raw water pump ($220 !) and intake plumbing ($50) and bought some intake hose that turned out to be the wrong size ($10). Out to boat, put engine raw water system back together, and everything seems to be fine. Ran engine for 0.5 hour to test it. Still some oil out the exhaust, but maybe not much. Incredibly hot, muggy, sweaty work, especially because it's raining just enough to keep me from opening the hatches to get air through. 7/20/2002 (Saturday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. 7/21/2002 (Sunday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Out to boat, found 2-foot water snake basking on swim platform. Put port bow cleat on with new backing plate. Ran engine for 1 hour to test it and charge batteries. 7/22/2002 (Monday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Out to boat, did my least favorite chore: changed engine oil and filter. Went well this time: pumping was a long, sweaty job, but the filter came off and on without major oil spill, and then no leaks when I started the engine. Got 8 quarts out, out of 10 max. Used my last jug of oil. Ordered decal to put boat name on swim platform ($25). 7/23/2002 (Tuesday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Bought 8 gallons of engine oil ($50), two filters ($17). 7/24/2002 (Wednesday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Out to boat, put 5 gallons of diesel in tank, ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries, added more water to tanks. Tried to reassemble drinking water filter, but it kept leaking, and finally I found the plastic threads were totally mangled. 7/25/2002 (Thursday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Bought jug of diesel ($6) and jugs of gasoline ($10). Added more water to tanks. Did 3-hour cruise down the Delaware with my sister and my nephews and Mom on board. Weather was absolutely perfect; had a wonderful time. Delicious Trenton pizzas from Nino's for dinner. 7/26/2002 (Friday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Bought new drinking water filter and housing ($30). Picked up boat name decal; it wasn't right, and they ran off a new one in 10 minutes. So why couldn't they have done the first one in 10 minutes, instead of making me wait 4 days ? Added more water to tanks. Put boat name decal on bottom of swim platform; looks good. Led chain into chain locker and tested windlass; works fine; I think raising it 1.5" will prevent jams. Ran genset for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Installed new water filter housing and filter, with some cussing and a few leaks. 7/27/2002 (Saturday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River; I'm staying at Mom's house. Measured fuel level 6.75 inches. Did cruise with cousins Tim and Patrick and their families (Maryann, Robin, Patrick and Erin). It was great; their kids are at a perfect age (about 6 and 8), running all over the place, having a ball steering, etc. Erin kept wanting us to go faster. Little Patrick swung dangerously from companionway to drop onto settee until we told him to stop. 7/28/2002 (Sunday) Magnolia at anchor at Trenton NJ in the Delaware River. Raised anchor at 0930 and headed south. Scrubbed deck for a while; some bird or insect left nasty green specks on it. Great timing: left Mom's air-conditioned house just in time to run into "excessive heat" days forecast for the rest of the week. Opposing 2-knot current as I arrived in Philly. Anchored about 1430 at lat 39.57.858 long 75.07.032, in the Delaware in north Philadelphia, just north of the Benjamin Franklin bridge. Nice view of downtown. Fairly rolly from all of the pleasure-boats. Engine hour 2070.0 Removed starboard bow cleat and installed new backing plate. Very glad I did it: one of the aft bolts was rusty and sheared off, and one of the forward bolts was rusty too. That's my usual anchoring cleat, and it was in bad shape ! Now has new nuts and lock-washers and bolts, and a backing plate. Nice evening: lots of breeze, not too hot, Philadelphia skyline and Ben Franklin bridge and clock tower in Camden all lit prettily. Turkey sandwich and salad for dinner. 7/29/2002 (Monday) At anchor in the Delaware River in north Philadelphia. Anchor up at 0700, motored south. Very little traffic, but most of the traffic appeared at the trickiest parts (intersection with Schulykill river, intersection with Christina river, pinch point at Pea Patch Island). Anchored at 1230 just south of Pea Patch Island, at lat 39.34.596 long 75.33.605 to wait for favorable current to go through C+D Canal. Started to put V-berth wood back together. Tried to take a nap, but too hot. Short rainshower, then hot again. Raised anchor at 1600 and motored through the canal; had about 1 knot favorable current. Anchored at 1915 in Bohemia river, at lat 39.28.556 long 75.55.227 Engine hour 2079.3 Salad and sausage sandwiches for dinner. Hot, still night. 7/30/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in the Bohemia River. Slept late. Put some more of V-berth back together. Got going at 1100, motor-sailed down Elk River and up to Havre de Grace, at the mouth of the Susquehanna River, which provides about 1/2 of the water flowing into the Chesapeake. Very breezy day. Anchored at 1400 at lat 39.32.535 long 76.04.946 There's a busy passenger train bridge over the river, at the north end of town. I'm fascinated by it for some reason: when a train goes across, it looks just like bridges I've seen on model railroads. A very odd sensation. I guess my distance from it and the look of the harbor and bridge and train must all match models I've seen. Dinghied ashore at 1730 and walked through town. Lots of interesting old houses. Several waterfront parks. Best park is just south of where I'm anchored, near the old lighthouse. Spaghetti for dinner. Another hot night. 7/31/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Havre de Grace MD. A little cooler and less humid today; not bad. Finished putting V-berth wood back together. Cleaned bilge a bit. Messed with jib whisker pole, trying to get fitting off. Cleaned knotmeter sensor. Measured fuel level 3.75 inches (lower than expected). Dinghied ashore to do library. Tested alignment of fan belt. Seems to be aligned okay, so all of the dust must be coming from pure overloading/slippage. I think it's tight enough; the alternator just puts on too much load for a single 3/8 belt. Tuna salad sandwiches for dinner. Dinghied ashore to sit in park and read book, and was met by Dick, who saw from my log file update this afternoon that I was in Havre de Grace, and came over and found Magnolia and waited for me to come ashore ! Took him out to the boat and showed it to him; had a nice conversation. Back ashore and read for a little while. Back to boat, tested 1st and 2nd bilge pumps, then ran genset for 2 hours to charge batteries. 8/1/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Havre de Grace MD. Patched a couple of chips in the gelcoat. Removed fitting from end of jib whisker pole; it was a struggle. Dinghied ashore to library and grocery store. Lots of small sailboats frolicking in the evening. A bunch of J-24's and several Stars, plus other types. Very pretty; some spinnakers too. Salad and cheeseburgers for dinner. Ran genset for 2 hours to charge batteries. 8/2/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Havre de Grace MD. Hot day again. Tightened bow cleat bolts. Cut trim wood on port side of pilothouse. Several window-rattling booms from Aberdeen Proving Ground. Went to fuel dock and loaded 150 gallons of diesel ($175.34 at $1.17/gallon) and some water. Measured fuel level 15.5 inches. Engine hour 2083.3 Dinghied ashore, meeting a nice cruising couple from "Sea Flat" on the way. They have been fitting out a trawler with twin Ford Lehmans, Onan 12 kw genset, 4 fuel tanks, 24 through-hulls, etc. They spent 8 months on the hard. Brutally hot in the afternoon. Took shelter in the library for a couple of hours, then in supermarket, but still miserably hot on boat when I got back. Very light breeze, and sun is striking boat from side so there's no shade in the pilothouse or on deck. Didn't cool off until 8 or so. Heard free music in the park, but too hot to go there (and would have interfered with dinner). Grilled chicken, and salad, for dinner. Black cloud with nasty lightning coming my direction at 9 PM, but seemed to pass west of me. Ran genset for 2 hours to charge batteries. 8/3/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Havre de Grace MD. Lots of excitement at midnight; suddenly the wind and swell grew, until a 30-35 knot E wind was blowing. Worst possible direction for me; this put a lee shore less than 100 yards away. So I got up, started the engine in case the anchor dragged, and sat in the cockpit for a couple of hours. I watched a bit of lightning, but it all passed well to the west. I shut down the engine after an hour or so, when the wind slowly shifted from E to SSE, a safer direction. The catamaran "Journey", which had been anchored near me with no one on board, dragged and ended up against a marina wall. At the time, I wasn't sure I'd seen it in it's usual place when I first came on deck, so I wasn't sure it had dragged. But in the morning I saw it up against the marina. Didn't look like it was damaged. Some rain at 5 AM or so. Raised anchor about 0715 and got going; wanted to sleep in, but leaving early took advantage of tide. Bit of a pain within a half hour: the alternator started putting out 15.3 volts instead of 14.3 volts. It's done this before, but this time I had to stop and restart the engine twice before it would behave again. Warm day by 0900. Made good speed down the Bay, helped by fair current. Motor-sailed, but wind was from unhelpful direction much of the time. Long trip down the Bay, and then down and up the mouth of the Chester River (it makes a U-turn). Turned up the Corsica River and anchored at 1515 just inside Town Pt, at lat 39.04.688 long 76.08.068 Engine hour 2092.7 8 solid hours of travel today, after short sleep last night: I'm tired. Took a quick dip in the river to cool off, despite seeing some nasty jellyfish in the Chester River. The water was warm and looked unappetizing, so I stayed in for only a minute. But when I climbed back aboard and stood wet in the breeze, the cooling was lovely. Tightened the bolts on the davits. Took another dip; saw some jellyfish after I got out. Salad and chili for dinner. 8/4/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in the Corsica River on the Eastern Shore. Slept late. Rebedded some teak trim on starboard side, to see if I can stop a deck leak. Hot but breezy. Raised anchor about 2 PM and motor-sailed up the Corsica River a little, then back down the Corsica and up the Chester to Chestertown. Someone had told me that there were lots of nice houses to see on the Corsica, but I found the Chester more interesting and scenic. Nice mix of woods, and fields and farms. Did some more teak trim rebedding as I traveled. Hot trip, since it was mostly downwind at the same speed as the wind. Anchored about 5:15 in river just south of Chestertown bridge, at lat 39.12.226 long 76.03.679 Nice shallow water: 5 to 6 feet. Only 3 other boats anchored. Strange interaction of wind and current; we're swinging in different directions sometimes. Engine hour 2096.1 8/5/2002 (Monday) At anchor in the Chester River at Chestertown MD. Windy morning. Dinghied ashore to park at south end of town, and was welcomed to town by two guys (Bill and Kenny) who were having a fair amount of beer with their early lunch. Walked down waterfront and then up high street, and this looks like the nicest town I've been to yet. Beautiful old houses, lots of shade trees, a college, nice library, fair amount of nice-looking women. Did my email and checked out a few marine shops. Dinghied ashore again later, and wandered around town a bit at dinner time. Got very windy while I was back on the boat later, and got nice and cool. Salad and chili, and potatoes au gratin (from a box), and brownies (baked from a mix) for dinner. Ran genset for 2.25 hours. Tested 3rd and 4th bilge pumps: manual pump works fine, AC pump doesn't work. 8/6/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in the Chester River at Chestertown MD. Rained several times last night. Very windy day; steady 20 gusting to 30. In fact, it's blowing the water out from under the boat; it's down to about 4 feet at low tide, when it was 5 yesterday. A big heap of dirty dishes to do from last night's dinner. The other two boats in the anchorage left this morning; I have it to myself now. Did dishes. Made dent in my pile of credit-card receipts. Dinghied ashore, did some errands, then walked out to Washington University to check it out. Nice place; very scenic, and fun to wander through some of the buildings. More beautiful old houses on the road past the college, too. This town is loaded with neat old houses. Salad and tuna salad sandwiches and saffron rice for dinner. Ran genset for 2 hours. 8/7/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in the Chester River at Chestertown MD. A bit less windy than yesterday, but windier than forecast. Nice cool weather, great for sleeping. Dinghied ashore and walked across the bridge over the river, to see what was on the other side. Nice countryside, some houses and a store. Nice houses north of bridge on town side. Enjoyed the walk. Went to library, then walked around a section of town I hadn't been through. Back to boat for lunch. Scraped inside of pilothouse a bit. Then dinghied ashore again. Had conversation with a guy sitting on a bench at the dinghy dock, who turned out to be the bridge tender. He was so bored staying in the bridge tender's house all day with nothing to do that he was hanging out at the dinghy dock, keeping an eye out in the unlikely case that a boat approached the bridge. He works 2 days a week, and says he's had to open the bridge only 2 or 4 times since April. The tender's house is air-conditioned and has a TV, he reads a lot, the traffic is noisy, and the job is boring. He's a retiree. Back to boat, and sanded the interior of the pilothouse. It's going to need more scraping and a couple more sanding passes, then new wood around the inside of each window. But at least I've gotten started on it. Ran genset for 2.25 hours. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. 8/8/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in the Chester River at Chestertown MD. Dinghied ashore to do email, then back to boat. Raised anchor about noon, and headed down the river. Wanted to build my character and test my patience, so I did everything under sail. Wind was fluky, changing direction and speed. Many times left me drifting with the river current, at about 1 knot. Probably averaged about 2.5 to 3 knots. Sailed all the way down to the junction with Grays Inn Creek. Did a bucket of laundry along the way. Had to start the engine once, to avoid hitting a marker buoy (I got too close to it, started my turn too early, and then the wind shifted and died and gusted until the current carried me right toward the marker). Started engine and dropped sails at the creek entrance, because it is narrow and shallow and straight upwind. Anchored about 1700 in Grays Inn Creek, at lat 39.05.722 long 76.12.364 Ran engine a while to charge batteries. Engine hour 2098.5 So the sail down the Chester took about 5 hours, instead of about 2 hours if I had motored. But I needed the practice sailing, I needed to cultivate some patience, and it was a gorgeous day and I was in no hurry. So it was worth doing. Dinner wasa hodge-podge: salad, cheese and crackers, mushroom soup with rice in it. 8/9/2002 (Friday) At anchor in Grays Inn Creek off the Chester River. Got going at the crack of 0930. Motor-sailed, and had fair current most of the way. Got to Annapolis, went into Back Creek to check it out. Almost ran aground at the entrance (mostly my stupidity). Very congested inside; 8-10 boats anchored in the middle of everything, but I'm not comfortable doing that. Very confusing coming out of the creek, too; lots of little school sailboats doing unexpected things. Went up an anchored north of the first bridge; moderately far from town, some wakes, right near a cable area and a ruins area. But there is no other better choice. Anchored about 1430 at lat 38.59.709 long 76.29.462 Engine hour 2103.6 Main topping lift came apart when I furled the main; I guess that circular clip I found on deck the other day came from its clevis pin. No harm done. Dinghied ashore; about a 10-minute ride down the river, around the corner of the Naval Academy, then into town. Free dinghy docks in lots of places. But there's lots of traffic, the library is 3 miles from the waterfront (I started to walk it before I realized how far it would be), and no supermarket nearby. Lots of nice buildings, though. Bought clevis pins (didn't fit; took them back the next day) and water intake hose ($6). Back to boat. Salad and sausage sandwiches for dinner. 8/10/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Severn River just upstream of Annapolis. Slept horribly last night; wakes and swells kept me up and I finally got up for several hours in the middle of the night. Tried to fix the main topping lift, but the clevis pins I bought are too big. Smaller size unavailable. Messed with gear oil in outboard motor, but didn't accomplish much. Dinghied ashore and took tour of Naval Academy. Tour was a bit slow but gave a lot of interesting info, and the Academy grounds are beautiful. Lots of good-looking women too; tourists and relatives of Plebes. It's Plebes Parent's Day, so traffic is abysmal and the Academy is busy. I'm turned off by the rah-rah patriotism of the place, but you can't deny the history and the setting and the competence of the Academy. It's interesting that you have to flash a driver's license to get into the Academy (and the State House); don't they know that most of the Sept 11 terrorists had US driver's licenses ? I guess they want to appear to be doing something to prevent terrorists. Had McDonald's for lunch; had a hankering for fries and a milkshake. Went into the State House; very nice. Thought of touring the Paca house, but they wanted $8 ! Bought hose clamps ($24). Back to boat, then right out in dinghy again, this time going north and up Weems Creek, to supermarket. Success, but I'm all wrung out and headachy from no sleep and a busy day in the hot sun. And the river and my anchorage are rougher than ever; I have to move. So I raised anchor at 1600 and motored up the river, ending up in the mouth of Maynadier Creek, just west of Little Round Bay, at lat 39.02.092 long 76.34.176 Popular spot; lots of people partying; morons on jet-skis zooming around. Ran engine extra to charge batteries. Engine hour 2105.1 Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Collapsed into bed at sundown. 8/11/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in Severn River several miles upstream of Annapolis. Got a lot of good sleep last night, but still tired and headachy today. Listened to radio and read a bit this morning, then had a nap at noon. Warm but fairly quiet. Lunch and then another nap. Fixed the main topping lift, using a cotter pin instead of a clevis pin; couldn't get a small enough clevis pin. Had some excitement in the mid-afternoon. A guy was driving his inflatable dinghy nearby, towing his son around on one of those inflatable-donut things at high speed. The guy leaned over the motor to do something (maybe adjust the rope), and fell out of the dinghy. The dinghy kept on going (he wasn't using the deadman lanyard), and started making circles. He yelled at his son to pull his way up the rope to the motor, but his son wasn't strong enough, and soon fell off anyway. So now the dinghy is making big circles, and both of them are in the water trying to stay out of its way. He yells to his wife on the big boat to come get them. The dinghy almost runs over his son once. Soon it misses my boat by about 2 feet, going just about under my dinghy hanging from davits on the stern. The wind is making its loops move toward another boat, then shore. The big boat comes by and picks them up out of the water, and we all see the dinghy eventually miss another boat, then slam into an empty dock. It bounces off a few times, does a few loops over the line to the thing it was pulling, then gets stuck. Probably the best possible outcome: no one hurt, maybe some propeller damage to the dinghy, nothing else. Added some oil to the genset (I knew it was a little low), then checked the coolant and found it was VERY low. I've been diligent about checking oil, but not very good about checking coolant or watching the temperature gauge. Added water and hope no damage is done. Ran genset for 2 hours to charge batteries. Salad and saffron-rice-with-corn for dinner. 8/12/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Severn River several miles upstream of Annapolis. Feeling good this morning: well rested, and headache is gone. Good news: the coolant level on the genset is okay. Will keep watching it. Probably should flush and replace coolant on engine and genset. Raised anchor at 0930 and motored down the Severn River; as calm as I've seen it. Lots of Navy sailboats just outside the Academy docks. Was thinking of pulling into Selby Bay, which is just around the corner, but the segment down the Severn was so short that I decided to press on to Oxford. Scraped and cut out decaying wood trim inside pilothouse. Alternator regulator acted up again, about noon. Suddenly went up to 15.5 volts, putting out about 30 amps. Stopped and started engine several times to no avail. Stopped, waited 10 minutes, started again. Stopped, started, ran with alternator not excited. Did it again, finally it got back to running at 14.4 or so. More scraping and cutting out wood trim inside pilothouse. Hot afternoon: upper 90's, and supposed to be the same for the next few days. Uneventful trip. Did see a container ship. Tons of jellyfish in the Tred Avon river. Anchored at Oxford at lat 38.41.824 long 76.10.327 Engine hour 2113.0 Salad and chili for dinner. Propane camp stove is leaking a bit. Oxford has a ferry that seems to be in constant motion; kind of fun to watch. 8 or so other boats in the anchorage with me. 8/13/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Tred Avon River at Oxford MD. Was a hot, still night; hard to sleep. Moved onto deck about 4 AM and slept there for an hour; it was nicely cool, but too moist. Put some form-a-gasket sealant on the camp stove to try to fix the propane leak. Dinghied ashore to check out Oxford. A very small town. Library is tiny and no internet or newspapers. Most stores were closed at 11 AM on a weekday ! Had a very nice chat with the librarian, who has lived in the area for a while and knows everything that's going on. In the heat of the afternoon, I decided to replace some of the raw water intake hoses on the engine. A little more work than expected, since I didn't notice that the water pump shifted in its mounting when I yanked out the old hose, so I couldn't understand why the new one just wouldn't fit. Finally figured that out, got everything together, ran engine for 1.5 hours to test it, charge batteries, move further into anchorage and away from traffic. Four girls in bikinis came into the anchorage in a 24-foot sailboat. They're having a grand time. Salad and grilled sausage sandwiches for dinner. Slept in the cockpit all night. Nice temperature, but cushions a bit narrow and too firm for good sleeping. 8/14/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in Tred Avon River at Oxford MD. Another "heat advisory day"; it'll be in the upper 90's, and humid. The girls in bikinis are swimming off their boat. Dinghied ashore to see more of the town. Bought a switch ($4) to put in the Radio circuit. Had a long conversation with another librarian; she used to sail and half-owned a sailboat, and sailed once off Scotland. A very nice lady. Back to boat, lunch, then raised anchor under sail and sailed a mile or two up the river. Tricky because the wind was from aft, and kept shifting and causing accidental jibes. Finally started the motor when the river got very narrow. Had intended to go up to Easton, but changed my mind and ended up anchoring in Peachblossom Creek off the Tred Avon river. Lots of big, expensive houses here. Very hot afternoon. Installed switch in the Radio circuit. Salad and sausage-and-noodles for dinner. Ran genset for 1 hour to charge batteries. 8/15/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in Peachblossom Creek off the Tred Avon River. Started about 9 AM and motored down to Cambridge. Would have been a simple trip except that my alternator suddenly started putting out 30 amps at 15.5 volts again, after properly charging up to about 14.4. I stopped and restarted the engine, to no avail. At one point the alternator was putting out 16 volts ! Then suddenly it went back to proper operation, putting out 14.4 again. Strange. Anchored in the middle of Cambridge, in the recommended anchorage, which happens to be very tiny. I'm swinging within 40 feet of a public concrete dock with a couple of boats tied to it, and the occupant of a powerboat is not too happy. I'm a bit nervous, although it's a very protected harbor and I've put out two anchors and the wind is supposed to blow from SW (blowing me away from the dock). Can't anchor much further out, since the guidebook says they take barges through here. Lat 38.34.331 long 76.04.428 Engine hour 2120.1 Boat immediately surrounded by ducks and some swans. They swim quite close, looking to be fed. Paddled the dinghy about 30 feet to the dock (lots of cockroachs all over the lower part of the seawall!) and went ashore. Had a nice conversation with the couple on St Ignatius, then saw a bit of the town, called the guys in Florida who sold me the alternator (they say I need a new regulator; now the question is how to accomplish that), did internet at the library. Back to the dock, another boat had arrived, and I met all of the other cruisers. Told them I was nervous about being in such a small anchorage, and that the guidebook said barges come through so you can't anchor in the middle of the creek. One couple who had been there a lot said barges never come through, but later another couple said a crane barge had come through early that morning ! Had a nice long conversation with the couple on St Ignatius, comparing notes on places we'd been, and comparing alternator problems. They were complaining about insects, and I was remarking that I hadn't been bothered by insects since leaving North Carolina. Back onto Magnolia, finally decided to get out of the anchorage and anchor out in the river. Of course it was nasty raising anchors: I had two down, and the boat managed to spin 3 times while I was gone ! Raising the Danforth 43 by hand is never easy, but now I was doing it in close quarters, twisted around the other chain, with a dose of black mud making the chain slippery at times, with my fellow cruisers sneaking a peek at what I was doing. Finally got the anchors up without injuring myself or any boats, and got out of there. Anchored just outside the entrance to Cambridge Creek, just west of the entrance. I'll get hit by some wakes, but I feel very secure here; no worries if any thunderstorms come through. Took a while to wash most of the black gook off the boat with buckets of river-water. I think I'm going to try taking my spare (old) alternator apart and cleaning it. If that goes well, I'll try putting the new regulator on the main (new) alternator myself. About time I learned how to field-strip an alternator ! Gave my hair a bit of a trim. Salad and chili-with-rice for dinner. Slept in the cockpit most of the night. 8/16/2002 (Friday) At anchor in the Choptank River at Cambridge MD. Dinghied ashore, gave my boat cards to the other cruisers, walked around town a bit. Called the alternator guys in FL again, and the head guy strongly recommends sending it to them (says it requires special tools). So now I have to switch alternators and haul the new one to a shipping place. Switched alternators. Took about 1.5 hours. The wiring of the old alternator is fairly complicated, and I had trouble getting the belt back on. Also added water to batteries. Seems to work okay; ran engine for 0.5 hour to test. Dinghied ashore, stopping to say hello at a boat (St Ignatius) that has moved from the free dock to anchor as I have. UPS'd the new alternator off to Florida; had a choice of paying $56 or so to get it there Monday, $28 for Tuesday, or $9 for Wednesday. Chose Wednesday. With luck, I might have it back Monday the 26th ? Not sure if I want to wait in Cambridge for it, or go to Solomons and have it sent there. Beastly hot this afternoon; probably 98+. Long session in the cool of the library, reading newspapers and magazines and doing email. Headed back to the dinghy, but had the good timing to go by the South African boat as people were gathering for Happy Hour, and they invited me aboard. Spent a lovely couple of hours munching chips and drinking soda and talking. Lor (?) and Thelma on the South African boat have sailed for three separate years (76, 86, 02), and sailed across from SA to Trinidad and up to here this year. They built their boat themselves, and it's very nice. George and Jackie on the other boat have done the Florida to Chesapeake roundtrip each of the last three years. We talked about all kinds of things; lots of fun. Ran genset for 1 hour to charge batteries, watch a videotape, cook dinner, heat shower water. Dinner was salad and reheated chili and egg-salad sandwich. Genset definitely is losing coolant, onto engine compartment floor. Guess that's tomorrow's project. 8/17/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in the Choptank River at Cambridge MD. Took genset sound shield off, found lots of brown residue from coolant boiling out from the filler cap. The whole area is disintegrating; when I tried to reposition the overflow hose, the metal fitting it was attached to snapped right off the filler neck. Refilled the tank, ran the genset. Within 5 minutes, water was spitting out the overflow hole. After 20 minutes, there was a pool of water up there, boiling off. When I stopped the genset, steam started pouring out the hole, spattering the engine compartment wall, filling the compartment with steam. I wonder if this is just a bad filler cap; I'll try that. What could cause actual overpressure ? A blockage somewhere ? I'm sure the engine isn't very hot yet. They're having log-canoe races in the river today; very pretty. Six twin-masted boats with lots of sails and about 6-8 crew on each. They put down one of the course markers about 100 feet from me, so I have a great view of that turn. One boat put a rail under the water after jibing, taking on water, and they were yelling "hike out, hike out !". They each have two long hiking planks, and people sit out on them. Dinghied up under the river bridge and up "Shoal Creek", which turned out to be pretty shoal (surprise!). Found a sandbar I could anchor at and walk to a road without crossing private property, and walked to Acme supermarket. Still, a half-mile walk in this high-90's heat was no fun. And I forgot to ask for double-bags, so on the way back a bag split and a 99-cent jar of spaghetti sauce crashed onto the road. They were having another heat of the races when I got back. Did some more work on the genset, and found that the coolant still is boiling hot, so it's overheating (and the temperature gauge is kaput; suspected that). Started investigating the raw-water path, and found the impeller had 3 of 6 vanes sheared off. Can't find one of the vanes; looked in the end of the heat exchanger. Guess I'll hope for the best. I did check the exhaust water flow most times I started the genset, but I guess the last few times it was "spitting" more than a steady stream, and I didn't react to that. Have one spare impeller; I'll put it in tomorrow. Dinghied to library. On the way back, had nice little conversation with the two couples at the free dock, then said hello to the couple anchored out and found they're leaving tomorrow morn. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Wish I had my good alternator. Salad and chicken for dinner. Used a recipe sent to me by Michelle, who got tired of seeing "spaghetti, chili, spaghetti, chili, ..." in the log. Her recipe: boneless thin-sliced chicken, bell pepper, lemon seasoning, Italian salad dressing, wrap up in aluminum foil and put on grill. Do corn on cob on the side. I substituted bony thick chicken, onion for peppers, lemon juice for lemon seasoning, balsamic vinegar instead of salad dressing. Didn't have any corn. Otherwise, I followed her recipe ! Delicious. Rained a bit in the night. Still hot and humid. 8/18/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in the Choptank River at Cambridge MD. Forecast to be cooler today, but it isn't. Put new raw-water impeller in genset, fired it up, and saw wisps of steam from near the filler cap after 10 minutes. Bummer. Shut it down. Very hot and humid afternoon, and I'm feeling down. Mainly the weather (it's really back today), but I'm bored and lonely and worried about the genset. Whenever I get some energy, I clean up the boat; my aunt and uncle will be visiting me tomorrow. Do the dishes, scrub the decks, start putting stuff away. Did 2 buckets of laundry. In the early evening, I check the genset and the coolant is fine, so I run it for 30 minutes, and it steams a little but seems okay. Hard to tell because the temperature gauge definitely is not working, and I can't even find the sender in the parts and maintenance manuals. I'll have to follow wires back from the gauge to find the sender. Will check coolant again tomorrow morning. Start feeling a bit better as it cools off in the evening, although some big powerboat wakes me severely, dumping all the stuff off the bookshelves. Dinghy ashore and fetch 3 loads of water, mostly in the dark with no lights on the dinghy. Ran into a fishing line from the pier at one point; I flicked it over my head before I realized what it was. One guy was fishing from the side, everyone else was on the riverfront, and I wasn't being careful. Hoisted the dinghy and washed it out. Ran the engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. Salad and tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. 8/19/2002 (Monday) At anchor in the Choptank River at Cambridge MD. Did a lot of cleaning this morning, then went ashore and found out my uncle was sick, so he couldn't come, and my aunt has seen Magnolia already. So she came and took me to lunch at Snapper's, and we had a great time, but we didn't go out to the boat. Oh, well, it was good to clean up anyway. We went for a scenic drive through the west end of town; some nice houses. Felt tired and headachy in the afternoon. Ran genset for 2.5 hours to charge batteries; seems to be running okay. Ran cleaner through outboard motor to get rid of carbon. Salad and various little munchies for dinner. 8/20/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in the Choptank River at Cambridge MD. Some rain in the early AM (drove me in from sleeping in the cockpit), and now blowing 15-20 knots. Guess the front is starting to come through, which is supposed to reduce the heat and humidity. Thought I had fixed the genset temperature gauges: Traced the wiring, opened up the genset control box, and found that the wires were strained and the vibration had snapped them off at the crimp connectors. Crimped on new connectors. But found later that the gauges still don't work. Dinghied ashore, did library, walked over to Visitor's Center near the river bridge. Cooler today, but still around 90. Suddenly decided to leave for the Patuxent tomorrow morning. Bought 15 magazines and 5 paperbacks at the library for $2. Loaded another 20 gallons of water. Salad and chili for dinner. Ran genset for 2 hours to charge batteries. 8/21/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in the Choptank River at Cambridge MD. Got going at 0630, motor-sailed down the Choptank, down the Bay, up the Patuxent a little to Solomons Island MD. Easy trip, with current in my favor, wind favorable part of the way, not much other traffic. Anchored about 1230 in Back Creek near the maritime museum, at lat 38.19.844 long 76.27.590 Engine hour 2130.2 Dinghied ashore. Tried the maritime museum, but you have to pay admission to use the dinghy dock. Docked at Holiday Inn and had to pay $1; the first place I've had to pay for any dockage since leaving Marathon ! The horror, the horror. Another inconvenient town: the dinghy dock is far from the interesting river-walk area, the library is out of range. A decent upscale supermarket is right next to the Holiday Inn. Bought some groceries. Noodles-and-soup muck for dinner. Filling. Nice cool night, very quiet in the harbor. 8/22/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in Back Creek at Solomon's Island MD. Dinghied ashore, walked around, went along the river-walk, went through J. Lore oyster-house museum, had nice conversation with attendant there, went to UM biological research station visitor's center and had a nice conversation there, then went through Calvert Marine Museum. Nice fossils, some nice fish and otters, nice place. Back to Magnolia, half-intending to leave harbor and go up-river. Found another boat anchored too close for comfort, so did raise anchor about 2:30 and motored up-river to St Leonard Creek. Very windy on the river, very calm in the creek. Went up the creek and anchored at lat 38.25.526 long 76.29.351 Engine hour 2132.6 Very pretty area; some nice houses. Salad and reheated chili for dinner. Finished reading Gore Vidal's "Lincoln"; very good. Enjoyed relating some of the places in it to places I've passed on this trip. 8/23/2002 (Friday) At anchor in St Leonard Creek off the Patuxent River. Woke from sleeping in the cockpit to find a couple of swans circling the boat, wanting handouts. They went away hungry. Came back later, went hungry again. Disconnected genset temp gauge on binnacle, to see if it is preventing the one belowdecks from working. The wiring is very strange. Patched some cracks on deck. Sailed most of the way down the creek, at 1-2 knots, then motored out and up-river to Battle Creek. Anchored. Polished some stanchion bases. Salad and spaghetti and a beer for dinner. Ran genset for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Belowdecks temp gauge shows about 150 degrees. Rain and lots of thunder and lightning at 11 PM; the storm passed right overhead. Then some wind and lots of rain at 0130, and I still have some serious deck leaks. They show up only in very heavy rains. 8/24/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Battle Creek off the Patuxent River. Very grey, foggy, damp, still morning. Raised anchor about 1100 and motored up the river to Benedict. Anchored in the river in front of the town. It's hot and humid and the town doesn't look too interesting and I don't see an obvious place to land. So I just stay on the boat, reading and trying to remove some trim from the side of the pilothouse. Rained a bit at 5 PM, which cooled things off. Salad and pigs-in-a-blanket for dinner. Ran genset for 2 hours to charge batteries. Ran air conditioners to exercise them. 8/25/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Benedict in the Patuxent River. Raised anchor about 1130 and sailed down the river in very fluky wind. Did 1-2 knots, then wind switched about 120 degrees. Tacked back and forth for a while, getting almost nowhere, then gave up and motored down to St Leonard Creek and anchored. Baked beans, and saffron rice, for dinner. 8/26/2002 (Monday) At anchor in St Leonard Creek off the Patuxent River. Grey, damp, still morning. Raised anchor and motored down to Solomons Island. Pretty crowded in the anchorage; couldn't anchor near the museum, had to go further back. Opened binnacle and looked at genset temp gauge wiring; looks fine, but the genset is putting voltage on most of the wires while it's off ! Must be wired incorrectly in the genset control box. Opened up and cleaned grill, and, as expected, found that burner is totally eroded and must be replaced. After looking it up in the West Marine catalog, started thumbing through and looking at all of the other things I should buy, and got discouraged. Scraped caulk off port outside of pilothouse. Measured fuel level 12.0 inches. Salad and chicken and potatoes au gratin for dinner. Ran genset for 1 hour to charge batteries. Genset is running very roughly, even under small/no load. Fuel problem ? It seemed to be misfiring, then recovering after 30 seconds or so. Finally it got so bad that the genset stopped. I started it, it ran for 20 seconds or so, then stopped itself. Checked oil, looked for obvious problems, started it again, and it stopped after 5 seconds. Maybe high-temperature cutoff ? Left it off. Fortunately, it lasted long enough to cook dinner. 8/27/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Solomons Island MD. Water pump is leaking; I'm starting to feel like the whole boat is breaking down around me ! Looked at genset, saw bad-looking gasket peeking out of fuel lift pump, so I removed the pump and partly disassembled it. Insides looked okay, so put it back together and reinstalled it. Genset ran for 30 seconds or so, misfiring as usual, then shut itself down. At least I didn't make it any worse. Guess I'll take the injectors out tomorrow. Alternator still hasn't arrrived from Florida; that's what's keeping me here. Dinghied ashore. Had to pay $1 for dockage and $1 for garbage. Went to West Marine, bought spare impeller ($28) for main engine, but they didn't have barbecue burner I need. Saw signs for hardware store and another marine store, but they both turned out to be vacant (out-of-business) stores. Bought groceries. Suddenly remembered I had forgotten to pay my credit card (which I do via internet) a couple of days ago. Called up, was charged $10 for paying it via phone, and was informed that someone had been "found to be in possession of my credit card number" (probably a computer somewhere got hacked), so they were canceling my card and issuing a new number. So now I have no credit card for 2 weeks and I'll have to get another batch of mail from Florida. Dinghied over to a nearby boat and invited them over to Magnolia for drinks later. John and Tina from Catalina 30 "October" came over for drinks, bringing a bottle of champagne they gave to me, and were amazed by how huge my boat is. We had a couple of rum-and-Cokes, then they invited me to their boat for dinner. I stopped by to talk to a boat from Marathon on the way over. Went to "October" and met Michael, a doctor and lawyer who is thinking of buying a boat to live aboard while working. Had great conversation and very nice dinner with the three of them. John has lived many places, done lots of racing and boat deliveries, has lots of great stories to tell. His grandfather owned the big old house on the corner of 12th street in Barnegat Light NJ, right across the street from the house my parents owned on 12th street. Their boat was hit by someone a year a two ago, damaging pulpit and stanchions and lifelines and deck, and the insurance money almost added up to the price they paid for the boat ! And I had trouble seeing the damage, most of which is unrepaired. Ran engine three times today, 30 minutes each, to charge batteries. Wish my good alternator was here, or genset was working. 8/28/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Solomons Island MD. Cool, totally grey, constant light drizzle all day. Not heavy rain here, but NC/VA border is getting deluged. Headache from the one measly rum-and-Coke I drank last night; I guess I just can't tolerate alcohol at all any more. Felt poorly all day; didn't work on genset. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Looks like "October" moved into the nearby marina; I guess they got tired of being cooped up on the boat. Good alternator finally arrived from Florida. Put it back on and it seems to work as well as before. Only cost $9 to send it, they charged $47 to put a new pulley on and send it back, they found nothing wrong with it, and I was stuck here for a week waiting for it. And the new dual pulley looks like it has different spacing than the dual pulley on the crankshaft; nuts ! But at least I have it back and working. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Salad and eggsalad sandwiches for dinner. I'm planning to head out to St Mary's tomorrow, even though the weather will be unpleasant. Sounds like it will be ugly for another 5 days, and I've had it with this place. No library and no internet, and nothing more to see or do. Rained all night, fairly hard. Got up every 30 minutes or so to sponge away leaks, check on things. Everything is damp, damp, damp. Most leaks are coming from inside the walls of the pilothouse; the aluminum frames around the windows must be to blame. 8/29/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Solomons Island MD. Cool, totally grey, but quiet and no rain. Raised anchor about 0930 and headed down to the Potomac. Following wind and seas, lots of nasty grey clouds but no rain. Some nasty rolling when the seas were on the beam, but that happened only in a few spots. Underway, scraped some trim caulk off, then caulked a couple of the pilothouse windows. Started reading Michener's "Hawaii"; pretty good. Anchored in Horseshoe Bend at St Marys City. Great anchorage, spacious but protected. A little on the deep side, 18 feet or so. Sealed the edges of the pilothouse window frames to the fiberglass with paint. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. 8/30/2002 (Friday) At anchor at St Mary's City MD. Removed fuel lines and mounting bolts from one of the genset fuel injectors, but it won't come out of its hole. Dinghied ashore; the college is right near the waterfront, and it's freshman moving-in day. Lots of beautiful women. Did a long internet session at the library. Back to boat. Back ashore, and walked down to "historic St Mary's", which isn't very impressive and wants $8 admission. Stopped at Trinity Church, which is built with a cemetery out onto a point looking up and down the river. Stunning location, absolutely beautiful. Salad and french onion soup for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 8/31/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at St Mary's City MD. Dinghied ashore, did more internet. On the way back to the boat, got nabbed by a MD marine police boat and fined $85 for not having a lifejacket. Also warned about fading numbers and no whistle. The irritating thing is that it's due to my own stupidity: someone warned me several days ago that this would happen, and I carried everything for a few dinghy trips, then got lazy again. Raised anchor about 1 PM and headed for Leonardtown. Motored down the St Marys River, then motor-sailed up the Potomac. Lots of good wind, too much at times. Had to furl the jib in nasty conditions; left it down after that. But I planned the trip well, if I may say so myself: tide and wind in my favor, and it was a comfortable ride (except for several episodes of rain). Anchored at Leonardtown at about 6 PM, at lat 38.17.017 long 76.38.085 Engine hour 2159.0 Salad and hamburgers (4 of them!) for dinner. 9/1/2002 (Sunday) At anchor near Leonardtown MD. Rained lightly but steadily all night, and still raining this morning. Decided not to bother launching the dinghy and slogging over the hill to Leonardtown in hopes of finding a big supermarket not too far away and open on a Sunday morning. Seems like a good travel day; good for nothing else. Raised anchor late, and motored down to the Potomac. Instead of the forecast wind "NE 15 changing to SE late", I got WNW 25, right on the nose, with 2-foot swells and some rain coming the length of the Potomac down at me. Could make only about 4.6 knots into it, and the ride was wet and rough and cold. Made it to Cobb's Pt before I gave up; the last straw was when the main started getting flogged and I couldn't furl it properly; parts were sticking out and catching wind. Gave up and went into the Wicomico River, anchoring right near the mouth just north of Cobb's Island. A little rough, but partly sheltered. Don't want to chance the harbor nearby; the guidebook says it's nice and then gives 5 warnings about narrow channels, shoals, etc. Not as much protection here as I hoped; the swells coming down the river are curving asround the point and hitting me. After a couple of hours of bouncing, and watching boats go in and out of the harbor, I decide to go into the harbor. No problems; anchored as soon as I found a good spot. Still strong wind and some rain, but no swells. Salad and saffron rice and macaroni-and-cheese for dinner. I'm starting to think that I'm really going to hate cold weather on a boat. 60's and damp is really uncomfortable. 9/2/2002 (Monday, Labor Day) At anchor in Cobbs Island harbor MD. Got going about 0745, motoring out. Motored and motored and motored on, as the day got warmer and even a little sunny in spots. Did a little polishing and caulk-scraping and such. Anchored about 5 PM in a very wide spot in the Potomac, across from Gunston Cove. Salad and sausage sandwiches for dinner. 9/3/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in the Potomac River, about 15 miles south of Washington DC. Cool and very foggy, but it burned off as the day went by. Got going about 9 AM, motored up past Mt Vernon (didn't look that impressive), and up to the lower Beltway bridge. Thought it opened at noon, but turns out that is only on weekends. Fortunately, was able to get through at 1230 when a Coast Guard cutter came through. Pretty tricky, since my approach was surrounded by barges and spoils areas, a wind was pushing me toward it, a small sailboat sailed across my bow as the bridge opened, and the bridge tender wanted me to get through as quickly as possible. I cut it close, going between the stern of the cutter and a couple of buoys just after the cutter came through. The traffic back-up was pretty impressive. Motored up into DC. Pretty cool seeing the Washington Monument straight ahead. Airport on the waterfront to the left, Capitol dome ahead on the right. Motored up into Washington Channel and anchored about 1345 in the middle, at lat 38.52.567 long 77.01.462 Engine hour 2176.6 About 6 other boats anchored here. A Navy helicopter keeps roaring up and down the harbor, probably to frighten terrorists away. Must be working; I don't see any terrorists. [Actually, it seems there is major traffic of military helicopters ferrying brass between defense buildings south of me and the Pentagon NW of me, and they fly right over Washington Channel, staying low to stay under the Reagan airport flight pattern.] Sunny and getting pretty warm. Dinghied ashore to Potomac Park, walked over the 14th street bridge, down Water street. Couldn't find the office for Capital Yacht Club, almost couldn't get into the office for Gangplank Marina (it's behind a locked door; alsmot couldn't get out either). They want $10/day just to land a dinghy. Checked in with marine police. No payphone anywhere. Then my luck changed as I found a nice shopping center and Metro stop at 4th and M, called my aunt and uncle, and my aunt and my mom came and picked me up. As we drove through town, past the Capitol, it was amazing to see all of the blocked-off streets and lawns. They're going wild with this anti-terrorism stuff, and probably none of it will be effective at all. At my aunt's house, had a real hot shower, nice dinner, wonderful conversations. Back to dinghy after dark, after multiple circles in the car, trying to find the right bridge (there are 3 parallel 14th-street bridges). 9/4/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Washington DC. Some nearby power-tools started at 0445, and airplanes started at 0630. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. Dinghied ashore to park and lugged my laundry up over the bridge, down to the Metro station, took the Metro through a transfer to East Market, then walked to my aunt and uncle's house. Got there just in time to be taken out to lunch to a very nice Afghan restaurant. Back to the house, started my laundry, and then took my uncle to see Magnolia. He was impressed with its size and wondered what a handful it would be for one person to sail at times. He also noticed how hot it was. Back to the house, finished laundry and did internet, then out to dinner. A marvelous and very expensive dinner at the Occidental, treated by my uncle. My cousin is the wine guru and maitre'd (I think), and my aunt and uncle go there regularly. Had a wonderful time. Back to the boat, ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. 9/5/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Washington DC. Power-tools early in the morning again. Dinghied in to Gangplank marina and coughed up $40 for 4 days of dinghy dockage. At least they have hot showers, took one. Went to library, signed up for internet, then did grocery shopping. Back to boat, had lunch. My back is hurting for some reason. Back ashore, to do library and then to the museums. Library cancelled my reservation; I was supposed to spend my whole morning there waiting for it ! Walked to Mall, looked at Capitol. Went in Botanical Gardens (I've been there before; nice, best part was the Singing Rain murals). Went in east wing of National Gallery of Art and did every nook and cranny of it (wonderful Egyptian tomb exhibit, great small French paintings). Went in west wing of the NGA, and it doesn't seem to have changed in the 5+ years since I was last there. Went in Museum of Natural History, and that was all new (except for the gem part) and the life/fossil/dinosaur exhibit is wonderful. Very footsore. Metro back to supermarket, more groceries, another shower, then to boat. My back is killing me. Salad and pork chops for dinner. Ran engine for 1.25 hour to charge batteries. 9/6/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Washington DC. A couple of boats came in at midnight. No power-tools waking me up early this morning. Dinghied ashore, stopping to chat with one of the new boats. Showered, then walked to the Mall. Did the Air and Space Museum. It has great stuff, but somehow it's never impressed me much, and this time I was surprised to see how many hands-on things didn't work. I mentioned one to a docent, and was told "we've told them about that again and again, and they never fix it or put a sign on it". I filled out a comment form, and the woman at the Information desk said if I didn't put my address on it, they'd probably ignore it. Pretty shoddy state of affairs. Went to the Hirshhorn and saw the non-permanent exhibits, which were good. A city-street photo exhibit, and another which is hard to describe: several latex figures and masks in super-realism style. Went to the Sackler gallery and saw a wonderful exhibit of Persian story-illustrations (Hamya-something). Over to the Museum of American History to see the interesting-sounding parts. A few interesting maritime and WWII and invention parts, but most of the rest was closed or uninteresting. To library for quick email, then grocery, then back to boat. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 9/7/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Washington DC. Dinghied ashore to meet Stacy, who then kindly drove me down to Alexandria to West Marine to buy a barbeque burner (but new burner seems to be lacking deflector that old burner has). Back to boat; bolt holding old burner in is frozen. Went to Smithsonian for lunch in their dining room; nice buffet. Toured the Hirshhorn, then Eqyptian exhibit in east wing of National Gallery of Art. Some library, some groceries, back to boat. Worked on frozen bolt, finally had to drill the head of it off with a hand-drill. Salad and tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. Dinghied ashore to meet Gene and his 4-year-old son Jonathan and take them out to see the boat. Had a nice chat to catch up on 15 years since we saw each other, Jonathan saw various boats and helicopters go by. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 9/8/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Washington DC. Measured fuel level at 9.0 inches at about engine hour 2182.7 Dinghied ashore and Metro'd to my aunt and uncle's house, intending to relax and read newspapers and do internet, but they wanted to charge out and do lunch. So my aunt and I had a nice lunch in Union Station. Then I went to the National Building Museum, where the exhibits were mediocre and small but the building was stunning. Thought of walking to the White House and then the FDR Memorial, but the distances were too long, so I went to Natural History, Smithsonian, Arts + Industries, and Freer. Sat in the gardens for a while, too. Metro back, more groceries, tried a dinghy ride up the channel but it leads into flood gates or something. One last shower ashore, then turned in my marina card. Had a nice chat with the guy in the marina office; he told me a missing piece of info I need to get my injectors out. Put new burner into barbeque; seems to work. Salad and PBJ sandwiches for dinner. Raised anchor at 8:45, moving by 9, down to the bridge in the dark. Fairly scary, but the only real danger was that I would run into an unlit buoy; 2/3 of them are unlit, and they're hard to see more than 100 feet away. A couple of big tour boats made it more interesting. Hard to judge distance, so the bridge tender was not happy that I kept his bridge open a minute or two more than necessary, but that's better than getting too close and hitting the bridge. Anchored just south of the bridge; didn't want to go further and risk hitting a buoy, running aground, or hitting floating wood (there's a lot of it here). 9/9/2002 (Monday) At anchor in the Potomac River a few miles south of Washington DC. Got moving at about 9 AM and motored all day. Not much traffic, nice sunny day, and I had a fair current most of the way. Was doing 7.4 knots at one point ! Had to watch out for floating logs and lumber. Did a lot of stitching on the mainsail. Anchored about 7 PM in Cobb Island harbor, right where I was on the way up. Salad and grilled chicken for dinner. 9/10/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor off the Potomac River in Cobb Island harbor. Motored down to St Mary's City; grey and windy day, tropical storm 400 miles south of me, a little rain. Put stitches in the mainsail as I traveled. Anchored in Horseshoe Cove off St Marys College. Lots of little sailboats coming out for a race as I arrived. Engine hour 2199.7 Salad and chili for dinner. 9/11/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor off the Potomac River at St Marys City. Started blowing this morning, and by mid-day it was blowing a steady 25-30 with gusts to 40+. Hoisted mainsail (furled). Recaulked forward seam on pilothouse. Removed forward injector from genset; lots of carbon on injector and in cylinder. Cleaned face of injector with diesel, put it back in, genset still misfires. Later, got aft injector out too; same result. At least I know I can get them out and in now. I'll start looking for an injector shop to test/clean them. Dinghied ashore for long internet session at library. College kids having lots of fun in the harbor after I got back to the boat: sailing, windsurfing, jumping off the docks into the water. College wasn't that much fun when I went ! Guess I didn't do it right. Salad and saffron rice and chili for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Wind has died down to 5 range. 9/12/2002 (Thursday) At anchor off the Potomac River at St Marys City. Gorgeous sunny, calm day. Went ashore and did email. Stopped to talk to four people who had just docked a cruising boat at the school dock. One of their ancestors about six generations back had attended St Marys when it was a girls seminary in the early 1800's. Various other relatives have attended recently. Back to boat, lunch, worked on drinking water pump. Saw a boat that looked identical to mine coming into the anchorage. On the way to shore again, stopped by to talk to them. Nice couple on 1976 Gulfstar 52 ketch "Carolina" invited me aboard; it was interesting to see the two boat's similarities and differences. They live on the Rappahannock, and started this cruise in company with 21 other boats, but the bad weather chased all but 4 of of them home. They've been cruising for a long time, and have owned about 10 boats (4 cruising boats). They'll be in Marathon in December, leaving the boat at Marathon Marina. They say Tom and Mel Neale stay up the Piankatank on their Gulfstar 53; maybe I should find them. Went ashore and loafed for a couple of hours. Salad and grilled sausage sandwiches for dinner. Ran engine for 0.5 hour to charge batteries. 9/13/2002 (Friday) At anchor off the Potomac River at St Marys City. Up at dawn, raised anchor and moving by 0700. Pretty rough going down the river; wind and swells stronger than forecast. Started motor-sailing when I reached the Potomac, and motor-sailed across the Bay. Had all sails up for a while, on a nice beam reach; did 7.5 knots with engine, 4.5 without. But wind died for a while; went to just main up. Uncomfortable beam swell at times. Anchored at 2 PM in Crisfield, in Somers Cove. Lots of fishing boats going in and out, but I'm the only cruising boat anchored (so far). Hope it doesn't get crowded; there aren't many alternative places to anchor. Dinghied ashore to the only marina, and they want $10/day to dock a dinghy ! And they've carefully ruled out letting you dock anywhere else, either at the public boat-launching ramp or at the huge, empty city dock at the end of Main Street. The harbormaster kindly let me dock at the marina for free if I didn't stay long and didn't use any facilities, but I doubt I can do that again. Score ! My mail from Florida was waiting for me at the Post Office. Should include a new, working credit card. Walked through the west side of town, and I agree with some cruisers who told me Crisfield was "grubby". Maybe all of the nice houses are on the east side, among the trees. Could well be. Back to the boat, and a while later I'm sitting below when I feel the boat moving, hear several boats going by and someone yelling. Maybe they yelled "you've got a boat!" I think some yahoo going by grabbed the float on my anchor trip-line, thinking it was a piece of garbage or something. Anyway, I don't see the float any more, can't tell if I moved much, but seem to be stable again. A couple of cruising boats have joined me in the anchorage. Drinking water pump still leaking; messed with it again. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. 9/14/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Crisfield MD. Other anchored boats left, despite small-craft warnings. Grey, dreary day, with only a hint of sunshine once. Spent the whole day on board, working through my packet of mail, and straightening up. Having a visit from a female-type person tomorrow ! Took air-intake pipe off genset; looks okay. Salad and hamburgers for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Definitely have exhaust water leak from joint where hose meets elbow. Supposed to be thunderstorms tonight/tomorrow. 9/15/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in Crisfield MD. Rained at 0130, and off and on since then. Grey day. Met Jill at 1100, took her to boat, had wonderful conversation. Dinghied ashore and we had lunch. Very nice time; delightful person. The sun even came out a bit for us; perfect timing. Back to boat, suddenly felt very tired. Took nap, woke up with headache. Started raining at 5 PM, hard at times. Pilothouse caulking seems to have stopped bad leak. Mosquitoes drove me out of the cockpit. Added hose clamp to exhaust water joint on engine. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. Still leaking water from exhaust connections. Salad and soup-and-noodles for dinner; felt nauseous halfway through, and went straight to bed. Rained all night. Everything is damp. But no deck leaks. 9/16/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Crisfield MD. Raised anchor at 1000. Just as it came loose, a ferry passed behind me and I had to dash to the helm. Found that the idiot who grabbed my anchor trip line the other day must have cut it off right at the anchor. Motored out into wind and swells mostly on the nose and a little stronger than I hoped. I'm going S to Onancock; wind will change from S to N today, but probably after I arrive. Made good time through a grey and wet day. Rained as I went up the twists and turns of Onancock Creek. Anchored a little too much in the channel for my taste, but the creek isn't very wide here. Arrived about 2:45. One other cruising boat anchored. Engine hour 2215.9 Rain has stopped. Dinghied ashore. Hit payphone and took care of essential errands (activated new credit card, activated new ATM card, closed duplicate IRA account). Was interrogated by various bank employees about phone numbers I last used two years ago in California, to identify myself. Walked through town, which is pretty, but struck out on everything I wanted to buy or do. No library, no grocery, bakery out of bread, hardware stores didn't have what I wanted, etc. Chatted with couple from other cruising boat; they're French, don't you know. Or French-Canadian. Back to boat. Sunny and completely calm, and the bugs are out with a vengeance. Salad and grilled chicken for dinner. My grill is acting funny; I think the hose may have liquid propane in it. The chicken cooked fast ! 9/17/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Onancock VA. Measured fuel level 4.0 inches. Raised anchor at 0700. Very calm, but when I got to the Bay, it was blowing, and there was a large close swell on my beam. Had to zigzag once or twice to get across the Bay; direct route caused so much rolling that I couldn't take it. Motor-sailed across, and up the Rappahannock River to Urbanna. Turned into a beautiful, sunny day as I went. Went up the Rappanahannock to Urbanna, and anchored about 3:45 in Urbanna Creek. 8 or so other boats are anchored here. Engine hour 2224.6 Dinghied ashore to ramp, walked through town, got groceries. Celery and fruit and hotdogs for dinner. Very still night; boats pointing all different directions. 9/18/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in Urbanna VA. Dinghied ashore, went to various stores, did library. Found my credit card still isn't activated. Bought some injector cleaner ($3); many of them don't say if they're diesel-compatible, and this one doesn't either. Guess I'll dump it in. Back to boat for lunch. Beautiful sunny day. Did small bucket of laundry. Back ashore, talked to mechanic about my genset. I told him I'd overheated it and now it was misfiring, fluids are okay, and when he asked I told him it was 30 years old. He just smiled and looked at me, and I said "should I just throw it away ?" His customer said "old engines don't like to be overheated". I asked, did I warp the head or something ? The mechanic said it might be scored cylinder walls or something like that. He could send the injectors away to be cleaned and tested ($50/each, takes a week), but I'm better off looking at the spray pattern myself. If that looks good, I might buy a compression gauge and do a compression test. Hope I don't have to buy a new genset. Will be really irritated if my stupidity cost me $5000 (although a 30-year-old genset is not worth that; replacing would add to value of boat). Talked to people on powerboat that was anchored next to me; they just hauled out, and are doing their own bottom-job (without any ground-tarp to catch runoff, I noticed). I priced a haul-out for myself ($6.50/foot for HBL, $12/foot for paint with Petit Copper, Trinidad probably another $100; total about $950). Not too bad, but I think I want to be in a bigger town with more resources and more to do while it's happening. Bought caulk ($14) and engine-mount bolt. Bought a heap of used books at the thrift shop. Finally got my new credit card activated. Got a long-overdue haircut, from a haircutter who looked quite a bit like Monica Lewinsky. More library and supermarket. Measured fuel level 2.25 inches. Bled the engine primary fuel filters. Celery and grilled pork chops and fruit for dinner. Dumped injector cleaner into tank. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 9/19/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in Urbanna VA. To avoid working on the genset, did a bucket of laundry, removed pilothouse trim and caulked the seam, and messed with the new engine mount bolt. Finally buckled down and tested the genset fuel injectors, and their spray pattern looks good to me; will double-check with the mechanic. So injectors, fuel pumps, filters must be okay. Guess a compression test is next. Dinghied ashore. Mechanic made me unsure if spray pattern I saw was real or from a single stream hitting the cup I used; guess I'll have to double-check. Compression check is logical next step. He'd charge about $50; I'm thinking of buying the equipment myself; would come in handy later, I'm sure. Walked around north outskirts of town; farther than I expected. Nice, but not old. Did library, dollar store. Saw a cartoon that captures my lifestyle perfectly: Woman introducing a man to another woman: "This is Ted. He drinks water from the tap, coffee from a jar, and uses a payphone." "Oh, is he Amish ?" Back to boat, raised anchor about 4:30, and motored across the Rappahannock to Irvington. Nice, spacious anchorage, no other boats anchored. Celery, fruit, spaghetti for dinner. Full moon rose up over the anchorage, bright as a floodlight. Very calm evening. 9/20/2002 (Friday) At anchor in Irvington VA. Tested the genset injector spray patterns again, and on second look the forward injector does look like it's spraying a stream instead of a cloud. Even the aft one looks a little bad. So I'll have to get them cleaned. Took out the glow-plugs and the intake manifold heater plug too; they test okay but it's probably worth replacing the glow-plugs; they are extremely dirty. Dinghied ashore to the only marina that had a fuel dock. What a pit ! More of a junkyard than a marina, although the people were friendly. Mechanic would be back later, although "we don't usually work Fridays". The place reminded me of the line from Monty Python about the castle that "burnt down, fell over and THEN sank into the swamp !" (Although I was told later that the place has an outstanding machine shop; they can do anything.) Some items on the premises: a flight simulator that looked like the front 1/3 of an airplane, and a huge industrial band-saw sitting outside rusting. Decided that 4 cents/gallon cheaper than Urbanna for diesel wasn't worth trying to dock downwind at their tiny fuel dock, with the bowsprit of a boat sticking out 20 feet away. "Town" is an indeterminate distance away. Back to boat, raised anchor, headed for Urbanna. Got there, dinghied ashore, and as I feared, I had dithered a little too long about deciding what to do. At 1 PM, I was told that it was too late to send the injectors out today, they'd have to go Monday. So I didn't do it. And then for the next 30 minutes, everywhere I went in town, I crossed paths with a UPS truck doing its rounds ! And another boat owner told me I should test compression first; if genset was running OK before overheating, injectors probably are okay. About 4 PM, raised anchor and went to fuel dock. Got 50 gallons of diesel ($1.32/gallon) and 5 gallons of gasoline for $73. Also filled up on water. Forgot to use up old diesel from jug on deck; forgot to fill empty water jug. Made a decent departure, given beam wind pressing me onto the dock, and boats tight on both sides of the dock. Then had to put down the anchor twice to end up more or less where I wanted to. Measured fuel level at 8.0 inches, engine hour 2229.7 Eggsalad sandwiches, fruit, and tomato for dinner. I'm tired; I guess it was a busy day, and it was a bit hot while I was trudging around. Nice moon coming up again tonight. Still, humid night; didn't sleep very well. 9/21/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Urbanna VA. Raised anchor at 0830, motored out of harbor, then sailed up the river with all sails set for about 4 hours. Saw a tug with two gravel barges doing circles, with a pump-barge blasting water to wash the gravel into the channel. A couple of non-charted buoys, and a non-charted reef (!) that a local warned me about. Wind lighter than expected, averaged about 3 knots, even with a fair current, covered about 10 miles. Then river turned to put wind dead aft, and the wind got light and fluky. Had to steer full-time; couldn't balance the helm, and sails kept jibing. Did 1.6 knots for a while. Decided that sailing below the Mendoza line (2.0 knots) isn't worth it, and motored up to Tappahannock. Anchored about 2:30, and I was tired and headachey so I just vegged out. Perfect wind came up about 5 PM, about 8 hours too late to be useful. It blew pretty hard, too, making the boat angle strangely between the wind and the tidal current. Hotdogs for dinner, and the grill was tricky in the high winds. Boat keeps swinging back and forth as wind strengthens and weakens, and tidal current and wind fight. Wind died down late at night. 9/22/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in Tappahannock VA. Dinghied ashore, first to ramp 1/2 mile up the creek, and had nice conversation with owner of marine store. Landed next at "public beach" (100 feet wide, storm sewer pipe in middle, rough surf), found everything in town closed (no surprise), but no useful stores within walking distance. Not a useful cruising destination. Back to boat through rough waves, was having lunch when a couple of guys on a Hobie cat went by saying "you're working too hard !". But later I did work hard; messed with the bilge pumps to clean them, and remembered why I hate doing that. Eventually I got them back into proper position, and tested the first two pumps. I really should replace the 1st pump with something easier to position and less likely to foul, and the 4th (AC) pump doesn't draw. Loafed for the rest of the afternoon. Chili for dinner, and cooking it was an adventure ! Stiff wind and opposing tidal current, so the boat kept spinning, and I had to protect the stove flame from the wind as it came from all directions. Propped cockpit cushion up to block the pilothouse side openings, and sat near the stove to block wind from astern. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. 9/23/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Tappahannock VA. Did a little night-sailing: up at 0400, moving by 0430, to catch favorable tidal current. Wind changed direction as forecast in middle of night; all omens good. Sailed about 4 hours, first at 3.5-4.5 knots, then at 4.5-5.5 knots. Sailed 80% of the way to Urbanna. Had to drop jib because wind was dead astern, speed dropped to 3.4, decided to motor. Another tug and barges washing gravel into the river at the spot where I saw one on the way up. Wind and waves picking up as I near Urbanna. So, nearing the entrance to Urbanna, under motor and mainsail, I'm feeling like Joe Experienced Sailor-Man. I turn up into the wind, set the auto-pilot to hold course, and go forward to furl the main (will not be easy in this wind, and the swell is big). I uncleat the furling line and the out-haul, start to pull on the furling line, and something goes wrong. Things are moving, the sail is rising, and then the sail is pulling the furling line out of my hand. Then the tack of the sail, with the furling drum on it, is rising up 20 feet in the air and flogging ! My mind boggles for an instant, I try to cleat the furling line and out-haul line, and the gooseneck (holding the boom onto the mast) comes apart ! Now the forward end of the boom is loose and jumping around ! Very bad. Fortunately, the pilothouse helps keep the boom in place, and I quickly lasso the forward end of it and lash it to the mast. I pick up loose washers from the gooseneck and stash them in the pilothouse so they don't go overboard. I look for the tack of the mainsail and the furling drum, and see them tangled in the mizzen rigging, 25 feet up. I go back there, and the furling line is dangling, so I take a deep breath and haul on it to untangle the sail from the rigging. As expected, I now have an angry sail on my hands, and I barely manage to haul it down 5 feet or so and tie the furling line to the aft end of the boom. Now the mainsail is flogging near the mainmast. I turn the boat downwind to take wind out of the sail. Now the mainsail is plastered against the mainmast rigging, and flogging a bit. I loosen the halyard winch, and start hauling the sail down and lashing it down every 4 feet or so. Takes a while, but it works. I lash the boom to the mast some more. I look around; we're on a good course, no hazards, I haven't been injured, no other obvious damage to the boat. Whew ! I motor into Urbanna, my heart still pounding. The last few hundred yards are beam-on to the swell, and the boat is rolling badly. Anchored at 1000, engine hour 2235.1 As I was coping with the problems, I kept reminding myself not to get myself in a position to be injured. I didn't want to get tangled in a line or hit by the boom and get an arm broken or get thrown overboard. Could have been bad. It appears the gooseneck fitting pivots on a big bolt which simply has a nut-like thing on the bottom of it; no cotter pin. It simply unscrewed itself over time; nothing is broken. I don't see much of a way to prevent it from happening again; I'll have to think of something. I guess I'm lucky it happened while I had engine running and no other sails up; could have worse. Had some lunch, then untangled the mess, and reattached the gooseneck and furling drum. Mainsail has thread pulled out of an edge; will have to stitch it. Dinghied ashore and did library and grocery. Back to boat, and found that Green Dolphin (Jim Edwards and crew) had anchored next to me ! I met him in Marathon, through Gary Elder. Went over and talked to them. They have a bunch of little kids running around, have been up to Maine, are going to put the boat in a slip in Irvington for a while. Heard the kids playing hide-and-seek on the boat later; how can they DO that ? But they are very small kids. Did a couple of hours of stitching on the mainsail. Salad and saffron rice and chili for dinner. Ran engine for 0.5 hour to charge batteries. 9/24/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Urbanna VA. Raised anchor at 0745, motored out, motor-sailed down the Rappahannock to the Bay. Fairly rough day, but wind and tide are favorable. Caulked and reinstalled a lot of pilothouse trim. Rounded Stingray Pt (a little too closely), then went up the mouth of the Piankatank River and into the Jackson Creek entrance to Deltaville. Anchored in the western fork at 1145. Dinghied to "town dock" and walked (over a mile) into "town". Nice library and hardware store, but not much else. Did internet, picked up some free magazines, looked for diesel place, walked down road a bit, went back to boat. Went over to chat with boat that anchored next to me, and found they were a couple I met in Cambridge. They're heading for Hampton tomorrow; guess they're leaving the Chesapeake soon. Put a few more stitches in the mainsail. Salad and two huge, delicious grilled pork chops for dinner. Yum ! Lovely evening but some bugs are out. 9/25/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Deltaville VA. Moving at 0830, motored out to find really nasty swells coming from NE. Slowed me down getting out of the mouth of the Piankatank, then made the ride incredibly rolly as I turned SE toward Milford Haven Spit light. Couldn't stand the rolling, had to motor E and S, tacking back and forth from one to the other. Finally cleared Wolf Trap and could turn a bit SW, which made things much more comfortable. Books and papers all over the cabin sole down below. I hear lots of boats on the radio heading for Norfolk; I guess the migration south is starting. Probably will be a huge wave of boats after the Annapolis Boat Show ends in mid-October. Made the turn around New Point Comfort into Mobjack Bay. Motored up to North River, and anchored at 2:15 well up the river, near R 6. Nice river (but I think I'm getting a bit "rivered out"), some impressive big houses and horse-farms. Nice, peaceful, spacious anchorage. Finished stitching the mainsail and hoisted it. Salad and grilled sausage sandwiches for dinner. 9/26/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in the North River off Mobjack Bay. Gentle rain much of the night and continuing today; foggy. Added 1/2 quart of oil to the engine. Motored down the North River, then Mobjack Bay, fighting the tidal current. Through Swash Channel, which was a little risky: guidebook said "local knowledge only", but it was well-marked, shoals around it were deep enough for Magnolia even if I missed the channel a bit, it was a rising mostly-high tide; never saw less than 9 feet of water, but beam swell was uncomfortable. Saw 6-8 dolphins in Swash Channel ! Then up the York River, booming along at 6.6 knots with tidal current helping. Fog limited visibility to 1 mile or so most of the way, rain was steady and getting slightly harder. Glad I have the pilothouse, although it got soaked inside. Went into Sarah Creek across from Yorktown, and anchored at 1:30 about 1/4 mile up the NW fork. Nice anchorage. Weather going to be rainy for next day or two. Salad and chicken-and-onion soup (actually, more of a slurry) for dinner. 9/27/2002 (Friday) At anchor in Sarah Creek off the York River near Yorktown VA. Surprisingly nice morning; thought it was supposed to be raining and blowing S 20. Was still most of the night; rained only 2 or 3 times. Dinghied ashore to marina, found that they could have someone do the genset fuel injectors, went back to boat and got them and took them to marina. Then dinghied up the NW fork of the creek to find a shopping center that was supposed to be up there. After 1 mile of creek with houses, I had to go up several 10-foot-wide channels through swamp grass. The one described in the guidebook got too shallow for the motor, so I turned it off and paddled. Then it got too shallow for the dinghy, about 50 yards short of solid ground, and I decided not to wade through swamp. Felt like Dr. Livingstone at times. Paddled the dinghy backwards a bit until a wide spot let me turn it arround, then paddled forward until deep enough to put the motor down and start it. Tried another place, but after getting out, found more water separating me from the goal. Tried a third place, but the channel narrowed to 5 feet and then I ran aground on rock. But the fourth place worked; waded ashore near someone's abandoned awning/tent, walked on path through the woods, and suddenly emerged at a huge multi-shopping-center area. Every kind of fast food you can name (the horror! the horror!). Walked around to see everything, bought groceries, and then back to dinghy (getting bitten by various bugs) and back to boat. Hot and tired when I got back, and felt tired and headachy much of the afternoon. Weather never did get as bad as forecast. Some higher wind and threatening clouds in the late afternoon, but generally a pretty nice day. Could have gone upriver, but forecast of high winds and thunderstorms had decided me against that. Wind will be less favorable tomorrow, but I think I'll go anyway. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. 9/28/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Sarah Creek off the York River near Yorktown VA. Got moving about 0830; out into river just in time to have to wait for a Navy ship coming through the bridge at 0900. They were incredibly inept; the bridge had to stay open almost 20 minutes for them. If I'd done that to a bridge, the keeper would have been screaming bloody murder at me. Motored up the river, but it turned out to be fairly boring scenery, headwind was strong and cold, the tide didn't help as much as I hoped, and I really didn't feel well. Pulled over and anchored at about 1115; will head back to Sarah Creek when the tide turns. Boat rocking a bit uncomfortably. Took a nap, read, and felt better after some lunch. Wind eased a little, turned into a nice sunny day. Got a late start back; planned to start at 4 but didn't get going until 5. Some nice sailing, before motor-sailing and then motoring. Paid for late start by just squeaking through the channel into Sarah Creek in the last glimmers of dusk, then had to find a place and anchor in the dark. But it's very calm, and not crowded. Salad and peanut-butter-and-banana sandwiches for dinner. 9/29/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in Sarah Creek off the York River near Yorktown VA. Nasty headache all night and into the day, despite taking lots of pills. Loafed and napped all day. Beautiful, sunny day with nice gentle breezes. Loafed and read and napped all day. Still feel bad in evening. Someone anchored right next to me, with plenty of room elsewhere in the anchorage. Fruit and grilled sausage sandwiches for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 9/30/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Sarah Creek off the York River near Yorktown VA. Another headachy, hard-to-sleep night; feel lousy. Tried to remove swim ladder to take it ashore to be welded, but the legs are galled into their sockets; couldn't get them loose. I could take the sockets off the swim platform, but that's an awkward job with high likelihood of dropping things in the water. Some other time. Dinghied ashore to marina/boatyard. The verdict on the genset injectors: one bad, the other questionable. Decided to buy new nozzles, will take a week or more, they'll assemble them and send them to me in Norfolk. Don't know how much it'll cost, maybe $200 total. Back to boat, lunch, nap, felt slightly better. Changed main engine oil; engine hour 2257.0, got 2+ gallons out. Finally got the oil extractor pump working semi-reasonably: pump till hard, pump slowly with vent part-way open a couple of times, then go away for a couple of minutes. It may or may not draw by itself while you're gone. Repeat. Measured fuel level 4.7 inches. When I started the engine later, at first try the g$#IUO$%U$%OI oil filter housing leaked again ! Had to wipe up about a pint of oil from the engine compartment sole. Got the housing seated properly on next try. Had to add more oil. Took broken lense out of starboard nav light, dinghied ashore to get rid of old oil. Oiled and greased the anchor windlass. Salad and grilled chicken for dinner. Ran engine for 1 hour to test it and charge batteries. 10/1/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Sarah Creek off the York River near Yorktown VA. Still a bit headachy. Raised anchor at 0730, motored down through very calm day to Hampton VA. Did a bucket of laundry. Anchored at 1230. Pretty small anchorage, but looks like an interesting place. Dinghied ashore and got oriented. Did internet and read newspapers at library, did a little shopping, back to boat. Spaghetti for dinner. Nice couple from nearby boat stopped as they were rowing by, and we had a nice little chat. 10/2/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Hampton VA. Dinghied ashore and spent most of the day at the Virginia Air And Space Center, a very nice museum much like the National Air And Space Museum in DC. Saw two IMAX films: Space Station, and Australia. I'm still not convinced the Space Station is worth doing, but certainly it is an impressive technical achievement. The Australia film made me want to go travel in Australia for a year or so. The observation deck (3rd floor) of the museum was wonderful; could see almost to Norfolk, beautiful view of Hampton and much of Hampton Roads, and I saw (3 or 4 miles away) a big submarine coming in. I've always wanted to sail close to a submarine in motion, for some reason. Had a nice conversation with the cafe attendant at the museum; he lives aboard a Tartan 27 in the city marina in Newport News. He says he was in Marathon around Christmas of 79, when the Keys ran short of water, and they couldn't flush toilets or shower most of each day. He said you never heard so much squawking from the visiting New Yorkers ! Nice little walk along the riverside pathway, then back to the boat. Anchorage getting more crowded. Salad and fruit and chili for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 10/3/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Hampton VA. Loafed, then dinghied ashore and spent the middle of the day at Hampton University. Nice art museum, and wandered around and then did email at their library. Pretty hot day. Back to boat for late lunch. Dinghied ashore to go to supermarket, but as I passed neighboring boat "Riverdance", I stopped to say hello, and found out they knew a way to get to the supermarket by dinghy. So we went sort of together. Hot walking, but I got a large load of groceries. Salad and cheeseburgers for dinner. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. 10/4/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Hampton VA. To library (I'm doing lots of research on solar panels), and small art museum next to it. Then back to boat, and raised anchor about 2:30 and started up the James River. Measured fuel at 3.7 inches. Strange day; looked like it would rain in the morning, then sunny and hot at noon, now foggy and partly sunny. Nice following current in the main channel up to Newport News tunnel, then it suddenly disappeared. A bunch of Navy ships in the yard at Newport News, including aircraft carrier 76. Saw what looked like a new aircraft carrier being built. Anchored about 6:15 in Burwell Bay, which is just a little corner off a turn of the Jame River. Not as sheltered as I'd hoped; the swells are curving around the peninsula I'm hiding behind. But not bad. Salad and saffron rice and salami-and-crackers for dinner. 10/5/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in the James River, halfway between Hampton and Jamestown. Woken at 0700 by 8 or 9 dolphins feeding around the boat. Measured fuel level at 3.25 inches. Raising anchor under sail was a pain; wind and tide opposed so couldn't get slack on the rode. Finally got moving about 0815. Had to start motoring within an hour anyway; tight channel with a barge in it, and I'm going very close to the wind. Motor-sailed up the river, past the Reserve Fleet. About 50 ships, mostly cargo or troop or civilian ships. One aircraft carrier. Signs saying stay 500 feet away, but then they're on both sides of the channel, less than 500 feet away on each side. Anchored at 1200 at Jamestown. Wonder how the settlers picked this place; the only thing special about it is that it is an island; maybe they wanted something easy to defend. Hot afternoon. Dinghied ashore and walked to the Jamestown historical site. Big complex of buildings. Groaned a bit at the $11 admission fee, but it turned out to be worth it. Entertaining introductory film, three replica ships that were terrific, and a replica fort that was pretty good. Unfortunately the actual site is about a mile away; they didn't know when they built the site. Got a lot of interest from the people manning the ships when I pointed out my sailboat. Nice conversation with a sailmaker named Mike who likes sailing on the ships. Back to boat, refreshing shower, salad and spaghetti for dinner. 10/6/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in the James River at Jamestown. Measured fuel level at 2.75 inches at engine hour 2273.1 Sailed off anchor about 1030, out into opposing current as expected. But the wind kept heading me, the tidal current didn't switch as soon as expected, and it turned into a rough, cool, grey, windy day. Motor-sailed much of the way. Hard to decide when to stop and where to anchor, and finally ended up carrying on all the way to Hampton. Saw an aircraft carrier coming in as I went through Newport News; the crew was lining the rail, and they probably were cold. Anchored about 6:30 in Hampton. Salad and sausage-amd-baked-beans for dinner. 10/7/2002 (Monday) At anchor at Hampton VA. Fuel level 1.5 inches at engine hour 2279.7 Got to fuel dock about 10 AM, and didn't get away until noon. ALl they had was a large nozzle, and the foam from it chokes my intake hose. So I had to use a funnel between, and go slowly, and my hands and arms and legs got all cramped from holding funnel and nozzle in position for so long. Got 179 gallons for $199 ($1.10/gallon). Now fuel level 16.5 inches. Got water too. Motored out of Hampton, and got into trouble at the harbor entrance as I crossed it. As soon as I emerged from my side-channel, I saw an inbound freighter. I should have turned around and waited, but I tried to get across. Of course, he kept turning and heading exactly for where I was going, and I was fighting a current and making only 4 knots. I started pushing the throttle, he kept turning to keep me right in his sights, and eventually he honked a couple of danger signals at me. I scooted across his bow with 1/3 to 1/2 mile to spare; much too close. My mistake; although the harbor entrance is quite deep and wide, a reading of the chart shows that the official channel is all the way on the far side of it, so that's where he was going to be heading. Saw 5 aircraft carriers at the Navy docks; lots of other ships, but didn't notice any submarines. Anchored about 2:45 at Hospital Point in Norfolk. Some cruise ship docked at Nauticus Museum; they've got a security perimeter around it, and I'll bet they won't let me land at the Nauticus dinghy dock. Called the marine police on VHF, got passed around to USCG and back, and eventually was told it was okay to use the dinghy dock, as long as I went slowly and stayed away from the cruise ship and let the police eyeball me. So I launched the dinghy and went ashore, stopping to chat with nice couple on "Hangout"; they're coming back from their third trip to Maine, and they recommend it highly. And they did an ocean hop from Ft Laud to Charleston in 53 hours, a stretch that probably took me 4 weeks. Ashore, did internet, and found that new genset fuel injectors will cost $300 apiece, instead of the $80 apiece the guy had guessed off the top of his head. I'm asking for more details. For that money, I'll do a compression test first. Back to dinghy, and as soon as I got near channel, a tug came up it, followed by another tug pushing a big barge, with a Navy patrol boat hovering nearby. I got across after the barge, and was chatting to a nice couple on a powerboat with a Siamese cat, when the cruise ship started moving. The first tug and the Navy boat were for her, and I'm glad I didn't get caught in the middle. Someone's anchored about a boat-length in front of me, closer than comfortable. No need for it; there's plenty of room. Salad and salami-and-crackers and potatoes au gratin for dinner. Windy night, with boats swinging too close to let me sleep easily. The boat in front of me was gone when I looked at 0545; don't know when they left. 10/8/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Norfolk VA. Cool and very windy. Dinghied ashore and went to the Douglas McArthur memorial. Turned out to be very nice, with lots of artifacts from all over (he and his father, also a general, covered a lot of territory). A few exhibit captions did point out that some historians think he made a couple of big screwups: fouling up the defense of the Phillipines, making his "I shall return" promise that kept us from leapfrogging the Phillipines on the way to Japan, provoking the Chinese into the Korean War. Back to the boat for lunch, did some laundry, then ashore again. Walked to Basilica of St Mary's, but couldn't get in. Wandered through huge mall, then spent a few hours in the library. Back to boat. Feeling headachy and tired and cold and maybe a cold coming on. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Ran engine for 1.25 hours to charge batteries. 10/9/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Norfolk VA. Cool and overcast. Dinghied ashore, took free NET bus, and went to Chrysler art museum. What a terrific place ! Fascinating videos about glassmaking, then wonderful modern pieces of glass, and tons of Tiffany and Steuben and cut glass. Lots of glass of all types. And then wonderful galleries of paintings and sculptures, with a room or two from each period and area, such as India, China, Medieval Italian, Impressionist, Modern, etc. Just a great museum. Munched trail mix sitting in their garden for lunch. To library for a while, then to supermarket. Managed to miss the bus by 20 seconds twice. Back to boat, had brief chat with couple on another boat. Salad and grilled pork chop and grilled chicken for dinner (when I took the meat out of the freezer, I thought the chicken was another pork chop). Ran engine for 1.25 hours to charge batteries. 10/10/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Norfolk VA. Cleaned the bilge a bit, then dinghied ashore and did some library. Then my friend Stacy picked me up, and we went to a Harbor Freight tool store. What a candy-store ! I could have spent all afternoon there. Bought a funnel ($3), hammer ($3), tap-and-die set ($10). Went to a Mexican place for lunch. Then to his new-old boat which is on the hard in a boatyard in Little Creek. It's a Krogen 42 trawler. He got a great deal, but his work is cut out for him. They're in the middle of a bottom-peeling job (the peeling tool broke halfway through), he's working on seacocks and hoses, much of the teak deck needs to come up, deck leaks need fixing, the condition of much of the instrumentation and appliances is questionable, the dinghy needs refurbishing, and so on. He's also working to sell his house and get rid of other possessions. Back to the boat, just as it started to sprinkle rain. Salad and peanut-butter-and-banana sandwiches for dinner. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. 10/11/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Norfolk VA. Dinghied ashore about 10 AM to Portsmouth; first time I've been ashore on this side of the river. Threatening rain, but it's been threatening for 3 days. Went to Children's Museum, a hands-on science-type museum. Fair number of screaming kids in it, but had a nice time anyway. Most of the 2nd floor was a huge model-train collection and setup, which was cool. On the 1st floor, I enjoyed sitting in the driver's seats of a bus and a fire engine and a police motorcycle. Came out at noon to find it raining. Went to library for an hour, and when I came out it was raining harder. Took a 5-minute walk through the old section of town; beautiful old houses, but not the weather to enjoy them. Sat in the visitor's center for a while to try to wait for a lull, but finally gave up and got in the dinghy, with only an umbrella to protect me. Bailed several inches of water out of the dinghy, started moving, and the rain started coming down harder. Long uncomfortable ride back, but the umbrella protected me a bit. When I got to the boat, got pretty wet hoisting the dinghy. Then it really started raining hard, and got harder as the afternoon went by. Still have a few deck leaks, probably from chainplates and a couple of the ports. Tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. Rained hard until almost midnight, then lightly off and on after that. Powerboat came in about 9-10 PM and gave inept display of anchoring; they must have put down the anchor 4 or 5 times before getting to a place they liked, and there is plenty of open space in the anchorage. 10/12/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Norfolk VA. Got going before 0600, in grey darkness and misty rain. Pretty scary going down the main shipping channel in the dark with rain clouding the windshield. Sailboat "TamRick" behind me. Sunrise didn't bring much light; totally clouded over. Went through two bridges, but only one tugboat to avoid. Then almost ran aground at the fork where I entered Dismal Swamp Canal; I'd just gone under a bridge, the chart was wet, I was wet, and I misread the chart. Managed to back out before grounding, and go in the proper way. Got to northern lock early, as expected, and anchored. Just before it opened at 9, I found out they had canceled the 1:30 opening I needed at the other end of the canal; I'd have to wait until 3:30. Went through with "By George", and picked up "Sumac" and two others who had stayed the night between bridge and lock. So the five sailboats went motoring down the canal, dodging fallen trees and stumps in the water, and overhanging trees above. Very narrow and not as "scenic" as expected, but at least the rain stopped. Two boats stopped at the visitor's center; three of us went to the southern lock. Nasty tight quarters waiting in the canal there, so lock-tender let us through the bridge. While passing another boat in the basin between bridge and lock, I clipped some tree branches and got pine needles all over my deck; this after successfully avoiding dozens of close trees in the canal. Anchored (very difficult in narrow basin) for 15 minutes, then she decided to let us into the lock early. Then we sat there for 45 minutes or so, until it was time to do the locking. Stupid engine is still putting oil out the exhaust; I could see it on the water when idling in the lock. But oil level on dipstick is fine, even high. I did overfill a little when I did the oil change; hope that's it. Singlehanding, I was pleased I did such a good job in the locks. One of the boats with a couple on it had problems in both locks, getting sideways, having five people trying to wrestle them into place at one point. I didn't have any problem in the single lock I went through coming north, too. Lots more motoring. Both of the boats behind me asked to pass, wanting to go faster, and then really didn't go much faster than I had been. Passing was tricky in fairly narrow canal/river. Passed a race of small speedboats at Shipyard Landing; they seemed to be pretty fast but not good at cornering. We had to get through quickly so they could start the next heat. Passed both of the boats who I'd let pass me; they pulled off short of Elizabeth City to anchor; I kept going. Went through a narrow railroad bridge, and then Elizabeth City bridge opened for me. Anchored about 6 PM east of the "city". Nice open space. Salad and grilled sausage sandwiches for dinner. Tired, and glad it's stopped raining. Slept solidly. 10/13/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Elizabeth City NC. Slept late and loafed in bed until noon, reading a Tom Clancy novel. Lovely sunny DRY weather. Hung up lots of damp clothing and towels to dry. Had a nice hot shower for first time in several days. Dinghied ashore. Nice little town, mostly closed on a Sunday. Some nice old houses. Got fresh bread at a bakery, had a couple of nice conversations with cruisers, sat in a park reading a newspaper I'd scored out of a garbage can. One cruising couple is going to wait out the approaching front at the dock for several days, but I don't see what the big deal is. 20-25 knots part of tomorrow, but in a pretty favorable direction; I think I'm going to travel tomorrow. Maybe I'll regret it when I cross Albemarle Sound. But Elizabeth City isn't that interesting, I want to make progress, and it's a holiday tomorrow so stuff in town will be closed anyway. Some rain-clouds passing over, but didn't rain. Started dinghy to go back to boat, and it ran for about 100 feet and then quit and wouldn't restart. Calm conditions and wind was in right direction, so I paddled about 1/4 mile to the boat. Worked on motor, cleaned and gapped spark plugs, but no go. I've got spark and fuel; think the carburetor intake valve is gunked up. Sprayed some cleaner into it, will try again tomorrow. Two major systems down now: genset and outboard. Not good. I was planning to go back ashore for a wine and cheese party put on by the "Rose Buddies", some locals who offer hospitality to cruisers. But the outboard problem killed that. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Ran engine for 1 hour to charge batteries. 10/14/2002 (Monday) At anchor at Elizabeth City NC. Bit of a fiasco this morning. Got up at 0730, blowing 15-20, listened to some weather reports, decided to go south. Raised anchor, started motor-sailing with mainsail up, and it started blowing 30. Started hearing weather reports with winds at 30 instead of 20, then heard small craft warning for Albemarle Sound, which I was going to spend 2 hours crossing. Also, my route would have me heading toward areas of higher winds. And the Alligator River bridge closes if wind gets to 35. So, after going a mile or two south, I decided to turn back. Furling the mainsail doesn't work well in such high winds, and it ended up a little loose and an edge started unpeeling and flogging. And I had to waste 25 minutes waiting for the next time the bridge would open, to go north and find an anchorage more protected from east. Two other boats came through with me, looking for sheltered anchorages. By the time I anchored, the sail was really flogging. Unfurled it and managed to get it furled better. Not the best anchorage, but okay. I've done this before: started out and turned back. I think it's a sign of inexperience to start out when common sense is telling me not to. Wind blew 20-30 all morning; blew my "anchored" day-signal off the boat ! Slowed down to 10-20 in the afternoon. Worked on outboard motor: took carburetor off and partially disassembled it, and cleaned it. Looked pretty good. Put it back on, still no go. Fixed stern light (although dinghy still covers it). Wind down to 10 in the evening. Salad and saffron rice for dinner. Wind went to about 5 at midnight; wasn't supposed to do that ! Woke up in middle of night thinking that I probably have water in my outboard gas tank; that happened in the Bahamas. I leave the tank vent open all the time, because otherwise the tank bulges alarmingly on hot days. But I'll bet rainwater is coming in through the vent, accumulating over 6 months, and killing the motor. 10/15/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor north of Elizabeth City NC. Drained gas tank; couldn't tell exactly what was in there, but I'll bet it had a high water content. Raised anchor and motored back down through the bridge and anchored near town again. Weather isn't doing what was predicted: it's grey with E 10 wind, was supposed to be more like heavy rain with E 20. Maybe I'm in a strange area here. Loaded gas tank with gas from a jug. Bummer; motor still won't start. Tried some starting fluid (ether), and got a cough from it once, but not the next couple times. It's a bit breezy and rough; have to try again on a calmer day, and maybe have to test spark again and disassemble carburetor more. Frustrating to be sitting near town, but not able to get ashore (too rough to paddle). Need to get on email and see about my genset injectors; hope they don't send them to Norfolk. Started raining lightly at noon, and kept going. Conch chowder and rice for dinner; pretty awful. 10/16/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Elizabeth City NC. Rained a bunch last night, cool and grey and wet again today. Still small-craft warnings and 25 knot wind with 3-foot swells in Albemarle Sound south of me, so I'm going nowhere today. Tried to start the outboard just in case it had fixed itself, and the starter cord snapped ! It had been fraying a bit, but I didn't expect that. Took fuel line off and confirmed that fuel is reaching the carburetor when I squeeze the bulb. Paddled the dinghy in to shore and went to the library and a couple of nice small grocery stores. Feels good to get off the boat. Ran engine for 1.25 hours to charge batteries. Salad and grilled sausages for dinner. 10/17/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Elizabeth City NC. First day without small-craft warnings on Albelmarle Sound, and it's a jailbreak ! I woke at 0645 and had anchor up by 0705, and there were 7-8 boats ahead of me. Soon 4-5 boats behind me. Calm, slightly foggy day. Going to be nice. Did a huge bucket of laundry underway; undies and socks and T-shirts covering the lifelines. Albemarle Sound pretty calm. Maybe a 5-knot wind on our stern; a few boats have sails up, but they're just luffing. My flag is hanging straight down. Led a group of 5 boats through Alligator River Bridge. Plenty of boats ahead and behind. Motored and motored on, down to end of open part of river. Anchored about 3:15, about 1/2 mile from where everybody else anchored. Wind is from SSW; was supposed to be NW. Worked on starter cord for outboard motor. Even though the new line I have on board seems to be same diameter as the old cord, the old cord was tremendously compressed in a couple of places; I'll have to get smaller-diameter line. While working on the outboard, saw a military fighter jet a couple of miles away do some high-speed turns and rolls, while ejecting 3 or 4 missile-fooling flares. Pretty cool. Applied a dull razor to 3 days of beard, then had a semi-warm shower. That's the toughest thing about this cool, rainy weather: without a working genset, I have no hot water to shower with (unless I heat some on the propane stove). It was sunny enough today to heat my solar shower. Salad and eggsalad sandwiches and salami-and-crackers for dinner. 10/18/2002 (Friday) At anchor in the Alligator River, at north end of Alligator-Pungo canal. Cold morning, probably high 40's and damp and breezy. Froze my bare feet as I got going. Moving by 0715, and the stampede continues. Boats ahead and behind me and passing me. The canal was monotonous, but conditions on the Pungo River were boisterous. Strong, cold wind: I'm all bundled up even though it's very sunny. Glad to pull into Belhaven and anchor about 1230. Looks like about 1/2 of the boats are pulling in; the rest continuing to Oriental, probably. Paddled the dinghy ashore; fortunately, I anchored as close as possible to the ramp where I go ashore. Did library and various shopping. Turns out they're having a bluegrass and hot-air-balloon festival this weekend (tomorrow). They're launching balloons at 0730; don't think I feel like paddling ashore before sunrise to watch. I should be able to see fine from the boat; it's only about 1/4 mile away. Back to boat. Replaced outboard motor's starter cord, installed new spark plugs, taped up a wire where the insulation has been pierced. Sucker still won't start. Next steps: recheck spark on both plugs, try starting fluid again, check all diaphragms inside carburetor. Salad and huge batch of spaghetti for dinner. Tug and barge will be coming out near me at 8 PM; I'm a bit nervous. The barge came out with no problems. I was nervous because my anchor-trip buoy was drifting 20 feet into the channel. I put a spotlight on it as the barge approached, but he cleared it with 50-75 feet to spare. 10/19/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Belhaven NC. Made some nice hot oatmeal for breakfast on a damp cool morning, and watched 5 hot-air balloons take off over a 30-minute period. Paddled ashore, and went to the bluegrass-and-balloon festival, but it wasn't very interesting. The one thing I did want to do was a walking tour of the town, but after some confusion I was told they would do it at 1 PM, and I plan to be gone by then. So I did my own walking tour of town, and it was really nice. Nice old houses, quiet sunny morning, nice views of the water, very pretty. They even have a Magnolia Street. Tried to find bread in town, but no luck. Nice conversation with owner of wine shop. Library had a sign "closed because of electrical complications", but maybe they just wanted to go to the festival. Raised anchor about 1045 and motored down the river. Sunny and fairly calm, but cool when the wind kicks up. Anchored about 3 PM in Gale Creek, across from G23. Loafed, when I should have been working on the outboard. Joined by 3 other boats by nightfall. Salad and fruit and crackers-and-cheese for dinner. 10/20/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Gale Creek. Moving by 0730, motored down to Oriental NC and anchored. Tiny anchorage; not staying here tonight. Stitched one of the hatch screens underway. When I spray ether into the outboard carburetor, it runs fine for about 10 seconds. So it must be a fuel or fuel pump problem. Paddled the dinghy ashore. Town is dead on a Sunday morning; everyone's in church. Got groceries, talked to a couple of people, then hit a marine store and bought fire extinguisher ($15), solar shower ($15), battery boxes ($43). Raised anchor about 2 PM, motored across the river. Lots of sailboats out, but not much wind. Anchored in Cedar Creek about 3:30; beautiful sunny calm place. 10/21/2002 (Monday) At anchor at Cedar Creek. Foggy morning. Across the fields, I can see a layer of fog no more than 3 feet thick, from about 15 feet up to about 18 feet up. Moving by 0730, motored down the Adams Creek Canal, against a 1.5 knot current, to Beaufort NC and anchored. Wanted to try the Town Creek anchorage, but it didn't look too promising, and I couldn't see anywhere but a busy beach to dinghy ashore. Just as well; it would have been too far from the library (I was remembering another town; they're starting to blur together). So I went through the bridge and anchored in the harbor, just across from one of the dinghy docks. Two anchors down, can't get as much scope as I'd like because it's fairly crowded. Paddled ashore and did library, and then read in the museum's sailing library for a while. Back to boat, and did a big project: removed all the batteries, put them in battery boxes, and reinstalled them. Lots of heavy lifting of acid-splashed batteries, and getting them down into the boxes without dropping and cracking them was tricky. Making the covers fit will be tough, since they're golf-cart batteries but the boxes are for Group 24 batteries (nobody makes boxes for golf-cart batteries). Salad and fruit and egg-salad sandwiches for dinner. 10/22/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Beaufort NC. Measured fuel level 13.25 inches at engine hour 2330.7 Raised anchors and moving by 0730. Motored down through Bogue Sound in nasty, cold, rainy, foggy, somewhat windy weather. My hands were freezing. Tricky piloting, too: Bogue Sound is very wide but mostly 2 feet deep, so you have to be very careful to stay in the channel, which is marked with fairly widely spaced markers. A couple of times the fog was thick enough that I couldn't see the next marker for 30 seconds. After a couple of hours, the rain stopped, the sun even appeared for a little while. Still cool and damp. Down through Camp Lejeune, where they were having exercises with lots of helicopters flying, some explosions in the distance, a bunch of trucks, and two hovercraft with huge fans on the back, parked on the beach. Led a boat "Desta" into Mile Hammock anchorage, calling off depths to them. Anchored, and then found my bilge FULL of water; I left a valve set the wrong way. Could have been bad if I kept going for several more hours. Spaghetti for dinner. 10/23/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Mile Hammock in NC. Fuel level about 12.3 inches at engine hour 2337.7 Got out of the anchorage about 8 AM, and found "Desta" aground about 1/4 mile away, in a somewhat unclear turn/inlet combination. Heard them calling a towing service, and they didn't sound happy. I stopped for fuel (75 gallons at $1.049, $79), and they showed up right behind me as I left the fuel dock about 9:30 or so. Nice, sunny, slightly cool weather. Tiring day, several bridges with restrictive schedules to get through, so I had to push the throttle for a couple of hours, then we had to waste 15-30 minutes before a couple of bridges. Strong currents, in favor and against, most of the day. Pulled into Wrightsville Beach beach and anchored, with a dozen other boats. The beach here is developed to the max; 3 and 4-story houses/duplexes/quadplexes built shoulder to shoulder, for miles. Salad and grilled pork chops for dinner. 10/24/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Wrightsville Beach NC. Got going about 0730, and it took a real exercise of willpower to do it: dark, raining, cool, breezy. A good day for lying in bed reading. But I couldn't sleep, my head hurt, and if I want a fair current up the Cape Fear River, I have to go now. So I motored down to Snow's Cut, found a fair current through the cut, and then up the river. Rained the whole time, hard at times, but at least it's not too cold. Never cease to be amazed that people are out fishing on days like this. Normal people, too, not commercial fishermen. Saw a huge flock of migrating birds, small dark birds cheeping as they went, maybe starlings or swallows ? I know zip about birds. Heading SE, there had to be at least 20,000 of them; they were going fast, and they were passing by for 5 minutes or so, flying about 5 feet off the water. Some were swerving to catch insects in midair. Saw some geese too. Two huge dredges blocking most of the Cape Fear River below Wilmington at two different places; had to radio them and get them to move aside so I could pass. Huge container-ship docks at south end of Wilmington. Then passed the battleship USS North Carolina, which is now a museum; its hull is lower and squatter than I expected. Anchored at noon about 150 yards upstream from it, just across from the downtown Wilmington waterfront. Not many places to anchor here, but I found a decent one. Anchor is in 30 feet, but the boat is close to the reedy bank in 12 feet or so, and I'm out of the way of any traffic. The battleship is looming up over my stern. I'm damp and cold and headachy and hungry; time for lunch and a nap. Paddled ashore, through start of ebbing current. Good exercise; worked up a sweat. Waterfront is completely empty: no boats, no dock office, nothing. Went to visitor's center, to find that I have wait until Saturday before I can get a water-taxi across to the battleship, and they've conveniently moved the big art museum out of downtown so I can't get to it, even by taking busses. To the library, and find that they won't let me put a floppy in the computers (so I can't update the log), and they've discarded all of the comics out of the Sunday papers. Not shaping up as a very useful town. Paddling back to the boat was dangerous; I managed to do it during the maximum ebbing current, and the wind had changed to match the current, so they tried to sweep me out to sea. Had to grab some pilings at the edge of the water and rest, then work my way upstream 5 feet at a time, get above Magnolia, and paddle across as the current swept me down to her. Pretty nasty. Salad and chili-and-noodles for dinner. Long, sleepless, headachy night. 10/25/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Wilmington NC. Ran engine for 3/4 hour to charge batteries. Paddled ashore (through slack water, but still an effort). Did email (turns out the fuel injector people did receive all of my emails; they just didn't bother to respond to any of them; I finally had to phone them; lost about 2 weeks due to that idiocy). Went to Railroad Musem. Wilmington was the headquarters for the ACL railroad, and was a thriving rail center for many years. Museum is small but nice. Got to go in a caboose and sit upstairs where the conductor and flagman sat. Plaque said that the conductor, not the engineer, was in charge of the train. Took bus to supermarket, down Market street which is loaded with beautiful old houses. Head still aching. Paddled back to boat through high slack water, but wind made it an effort. Have to spend rest of day on boat, because next slack water will be well after dark, about 9 PM. Loafed around, doing dishes and reading a book and nursing my head. Then, about 5 PM, in max ebb current, I seemed to be swinging too close to the submerged pilings on my lee shore. So I started the engine, raised anchor (a bit exciting in 30 feet of water with a strong current, and my trip line was twisted around a crab-trap float, but the current helped keep me pointed parallel to the lee shore instead of towards it), and re-anchored a boat-length or two further out. Ran engine for 1/2 hour to charge batteries. Showered and shampooed my head with cold water; not to get disgusting, but with no genset and no sun, I've had to skip a lot of showers, and my head was getting itchy. Best of all, my headache has receded a bit ! Salad and grilled sausage sandwiches for dinner. 10/26/2002 (Saturday) At anchor at Wilmington NC. Paddled ashore, did library, then caught water-taxi across the river to the battleship. Fabulous: you go through all of the interesting parts, such as engine room, gun turrets, command and firing centers. I spent three hours there and could have spent longer. The best parts were the crew commentaries. Next to all of the text about the two spotter airplanes on the stern (it had catapults!) was an officer's commentary that the planes were more trouble than they were worth, spotting with RADAR was better, they had to launch the planes to get them out of the way before they could fire the stern 15-inch guns. Next to a heavily armored command turret for the captain was a commentary that it was so hot and cramped and hard to see out of that the captain never used it. Next to pictures of the 9 captains in 6 years was a commentary that they didn't know anything about running the ship, the executive officer did everything, the captains just came aboard as a prestige assignment on their way to becoming admiral. And I found it interesting that in 6 years of war, the 16-inch guns fired only 2400 shells, the equivalent of emptying the magazines twice. Raised anchor about 3:30, motored down the river with a tremendous following current, and anchored near Southport in very shallow water just as darkness fell. Spaghetti for dinner. 10/27/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in the Cape Fear River north of Southport NC. Got going about 0830, motored down to Little River inlet and anchored about 1:30 in mouth of Calabash Creek. Did a typical thing: looked ahead to an "opens only on the hour" bridge, decided I couldn't make it, slowed down, then 5 minutes later decided I could make it, and sped up. Made the bridge by the skin of my teeth. Daylight-savings-time change always confuses me; I never know which way it should go. Only the laptop knows; even the GPS isn't picking up the change automatically. Now it's 12:30; why am I stopping so early in the day ? But I did 5 hours of travel, and ahead tomorrow is a long stretch of narrow canal with no place to stop, much less anchor. And I just anchored in the only decent place within 10 miles. So here I am. And I guess sunup/sundown will be at 6/6 instead of 7/7 as before. Salad and huge batch of chili-and-noodles for dinner. 10/28/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Calabash Creek, at Little River SC. Moving right about at first light, and motored down through one of the nastiest stretches of the ICW. All narrow channels, including a very narrow rock-lined couple of miles called the Rock Pile. Current against me just about all day. A little rain, but then turned sunny. Motored for about 11 hours, about 60 statute miles down to Georgetown SC. Pretty boring trip, lots of hand-steering in fairly narrow canals, listening to CD's or the radio. Could read my book when the channel widened out. A few opening bridges to go through, a few boats passed me, a few tug-and-barges suddenly appearing ahead to get the adrenaline going as I swerved over to give them plenty of room. Lots of floating pieces of tree-branches in the Waccamaw River; had to zigzag through them, in case any were attached to substantial wood underwater. Put down two anchors in fairly crowded harbor, but I'm within throwing distance of the dinghy dock, which is good. I'm also close to the noisy pulp mill and a freighter being loaded at it, which is less good. Mile 403 (from 0 at Norfolk) of the ICW. About 700 to go to Marathon. Salad and egg-salad sandwiches for dinner. 10/29/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor at Georgetown SC. Still, grey, damp day. Shaved and got ready to go ashore. Noticed one funny thing; water level is higher than usual in the aft toilet; wonder if it need rebuilding. Batteries are a little low too, for having motored 11 hours yesterday. Well, that was thrilling ! Just had my first almost-lose-the-boat experience. Let me explain: The primary and secondary 12-volt bilge pumps haven't been working right; I ran them the last couple of days, and at first neither of them would pump water, then only the secondary (higher) pump would draw. They'd spin, but no water was being moved. Last night I ran the secondary, it seemed to pump water, it shut itself off, I left it powered on. Heard some creaking a few times during the night; couldn't figure out what it was. A wake, or a log bumping the hull ? Got up a few times to investigate, never saw anything. Just before I was ready to launch the dinghy, I opened the engine compartment door and took a quick look inside. Holy ^%$^%#^%#!!! Water up to the top of the transmission, water about 2 inches below the bottom of the battery shelf, water all over the compartment floor ! I open the floor hatch in the aft cabin; water up to 3 inches below the floor level. I'm sinking ! My first instinct is that the bilge pump outlet is siphoning water into the boat. I wade through the flooded engine compartment, gashing my right little toe on something, and shut the through-hull for the 12-volt bilge pumps. I start bailing with a bucket into the aft head sink, but it's slow to drain, there's a ton of water, who knows if it's still coming in. My 12-volt pumps are down, my AC pump is underwater and the genset is down anyway. I get in the cockpit and start pumping the manual Whale Gusher pump. I see that I'll be exhausted in about 10 minutes, who knows if water's still coming in, I'm tracking blood all over the boat. I see someone rowing a dinghy near a nearby boat, and wave for him to come over. When he does, I say "I'm sinking !". He tells me to close through-hulls, launch the dinghy, he'll go get a generator and pump. He tells me not to panic; we can tow Magnolia to a beach if we need to ground her. I spend 5 minutes bailing with a bucket into sinks (which drain too slowly) and turning off through-hulls, with no appreciable progress. Then 5 other cruisers are gathering around in dinghies, a couple come below and say "holy ^%$&^$%^ that's a lot of water !" when they see it almost up to the floorboards, a couple of us are bailing with buckets (one out the aft hatch, me into the cockpit), a couple are pumping the manual pump. When the guy gets his generator going and an electric pump working, soon we can see we're making headway. But they tell me to call the Coast Guard, they'll come with a big pump, so I do. There's a USCG station right around the corner. At this point, I think we've been working for 30 minutes; the others say it's been more than an hour. After lots of questions, the USCG dispatches a boat. SeaTow calls, anxious to come over and start billing hours. I tell SeaTow the USCG is coming, but SeaTow comes over and circles around anyway. In 10 minutes or so a 40-foot USCG boat with 4 crew arrives. They come aboard and investigate. By then, we have 1/2 of the water out of the main bilge; their pump is so big it sucks another 1/4 out in one minute and then sucks air. I assume we'll just check to see that the situation is stable, then the USCG will be out of there. But no, they want to find the source of the leak, so we spend an hour pumping out other pools of water, turning through-hulls back on, looking and listening for water flow. Eventually we find it's exactly what I guessed: after the secondary bilge pump turns off, it starts siphoning water into the boat. Guess I need new bilge pumps. Maybe a vented loop on the bilge pump output too. And I should separate the outputs of the two bilge pumps; they tee into one through-hull right now. The cruisers leave; I thank everyone a dozen times, and we exchange boat cards. The USCG has some paperwork to do; I give them ID and ship's documentation. I expect them to do a full safety inspection, but to my surprise that's it. They take some more details such as my Social Security number (?), give me my papers back, I thank them, they're gone. I run the engine to charge batteries, which may have been drained by the bilge pump overnight. I go around cleaning up the boat, monitoring the bilge water level. The worst mess is from my toe bleeding on the carpets everywhere. The USCG left some nasty black scuff marks on deck in a few places, but I can't complain. My adrenaline is still pumping. After having lunch and watching the bilge for a couple of hours, paddled ashore and did email. Another town where the library won't let you use a floppy; I need to do that to update the log. After library, walked (limped) around to find out what resources are here. One small marine store, reportedly a hardware store and a NAPA store. Walmart somewhere medium distant. Back to boat, got ready to take out bilge pumps, when all the cruisers who helped me started knocking on the hull, wanting to check that I was okay. Invited a couple of guys aboard and gave them beers, and talked for a while. Roy from "Freyja" was in Navy during about Korea, then was a cop. Tom lives aboard 50-ton steel boat anchored in the harbor; he's one of only two liveaboards here. The other couple who helped me are Dawn and Paul from "Bubu Too". Dark by the time I started working on the bilge pumps. Nasty job, as I expected; gouged a nice chunk out of one finger getting the primary pump out. Secondary will have to wait until the morning. Probably should replace all hoses and install vents, improve wiring and mountings, but I hope I can salvage the pumps; they're $100+ apiece. Salad and fruit and egg-salad-sandwiches for dinner; it's dark and I'm too stressed to cook. Damp, foggy evening and rainy night. 10/30/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor at Georgetown SC. Grey, damp day. Got secondary bilge pump out of bilge, at the cost of another deep scratch on one finger. Ran engine for 1.5 hours to charge batteries. Took all hoses for both bilge pumps out. Cleaned, examined, tested everything: no problems. Measured hose sizes; what a hodge-podge ! Paddled ashore, walked a long way to good hardware store, got lots of stuff (some of which was actually on my list). Bought vice-grips ($5), outboard oil change pump ($14), electrical doohickey ($2), bilge hose parts ($4), air horn ($14). They're out of one PVC elbow I need, and no one in town stocks the vented loops I need. Went to marine store next door and bought nav light lenses ($9). Suddenly realized I can make my own vented loops by cutting holes in the tops of the hoses in the right places. To library for email, then back to boat. Spaghetti for dinner. 10/31/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Georgetown SC. Finally a sunny, dry day ! A bit cold in the morning, but nice by 11 AM. Might even get a warm shower today ! Did a bucket of laundry. Since I have the bilge hoses out, painted much of the back wall of the engine compartment (I'm gradually painting it all white, to make it brighter than the dark grey it is now). Put together hose and fittings for secondary bilge pump (I'm changing the routing so the two pumps use separate through-hulls, which will give more capacity if both are running), and getting stiff hoses over plastic fittings is a real struggle. Reinstall secondary pump, works like a charm, but as soon as it stops running, siphons water into the boat like nobody's business. Wonder why this started happening now ? I'll drill a vent-hole in the hose this afternoon and see if that works. Ran engine for an hour to charge batteries. Never got around to drilling vent hole; went ashore, did library, did big grocery shopping. Store gave me a ride back to the dinghy dock. Met nice couple (the Halls) who cruised for a couple of years and just spent the last four years in an RV in Mexico. Grilled smoked sausage sandwiches, salad, cheese-and-crackers for dinner. 11/1/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Georgetown SC. Cool and sunny again. Did a bucket of laundry. Worked on primary bilge pump. Paddled ashore and did library. Back to boat, and raising anchor was an ordeal as expected. Two anchors down, and 4 days of tidal switches have twisted them arround each other. The windlass only works on one of them, so hauling up the other takes muscle, and I have cut fingers. The anchor I'm pulling up by hand catches a loop of chain from the other one, making it harder. Plus there's lovely muck here; washing it off with a bucket is tedious. And just as I get the last anchor up, I'm thinking "what else can happen, maybe a tour boat ?", and sure enough a tour boat appears and passes slowly behind me as I'm trying to turn around without hitting him or the two boats moored near me. Then he slowly goes through the harbor, keeping me form passing him, and he's not listening to the radio as I try to hail him. Fair current down Winyah Bay, then mostly opposing current through canals. Anchored at 5 PM south of McLellanville. Amazingly dark and quiet anchorage after Georgetown, which had a steel mill churning away 24 hours a day. 11/2/2002 (Saturday) At anchor south of McLellanville SC. Cold morning. Raised anchor and motored down to Charleston. Anchored in Ashley River just south of city marina about 1:15, next to a 20-foot sailboat with the mast lying on deck and someone living on it. Nice, sunny, warmish afternoon. I chose my anchoring spot to be a short paddle from the marina, because the stupid outboard still won't start ! Took the carburetor off and looked at various ports and membranes, and everything looks good. Runs fine for 10 seconds when I spray ether into it, but I'm not sure it's sucking gas in, or maybe the gas is bad. I'll have to talk someone into letting me try to start it off their gas tank. Salad and spaghetti for dinner (hey, so I LIKE spaghetti !). 11/3/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Charleston SC. Cool morning. Worked on primary bilge pump; I'm trying to build a mounting for the float switch that will put it all the way at the bottom of the bilge; the old mounting had it 1/4 inch up. Paddled ashore after lunch; was getting there with some effort when someone offered me a tow the rest of the way in, gratefully accepted. Barely enough depth to get the dinghy in to the dinghy dock at low tide; there's a free dinghy dock that is 3 feet above water level at low tide. Marina office is empty, so I end up not paying for dinghy dockage. Marina is in least convenient place possible: NW corner of town, and the interesting stuff in on the E and S edges of town. I walk to College of Charleston library and do internet and read newspaper; lots of cute college girls in the library. Back to boat. Paddling against wind and tide was not going to work, and in perfect timing the guy who lives on the dismasted boat, Lee, comes along and gives me a tow. He built a 16-foot boat in Key West and sailed it up here 10 or 12 years ago, and has been rebuilding his current 22-foot boat (about a 2-year project, he estimates). I raise anchor about 3:15 and leave. Had to try 7 or 8 times to start engine; I think the starter solenoid is getting a little balky. Charleston is nice, especially on a gorgeous afternoon like this. But I'm getting tired of cold mornings, the tide here makes paddling difficult, the marina's going to charge $5/day for dinghy dockage, I've seen Charleston before (from land), the tide is perfect for leaving, and there's a restricted bridge I can hit well by going now. I anchor about 7 miles west of Charleston at 4:15. Holding is not good, but I have plenty of room. Grilled sausage sandwiches and saffron rice for dinner. When the chart says the bottom is "hard" here, it really means it ! Feels like my anchor and chain are sitting on flat grsnite; all night I hear them scraping as they slide on rock, as the tidal currents cycle back and forth. The anchor usually grabs some rough spot after a while, and I never move very far, but it's an odd feeling. 11/4/2002 (Monday) At anchor 6 miles west of Charleston SC. Fuel level 13.75 at engine hour 2387.3 Nice warmish morning. Got going before first light, intending to make tracks, and immediately got to a bridge where the guidebook has the restricted hours wrong; thought I could get through at 0730, but can't get through until 0900. Anchored 1/2 mile from the bridge. At least I have company: 4 more boats showed up behind me for the 0730 "opening", 3 more for the 0800 "opening", several more for 0830. Started raining soon after I anchored, and turned into a nasty day: cool, rainy, enough breeze to blow the rain everywhere. I'm in the land of big tidal range (8 feet or so) and thus strong tidal currents. Kept the throttle pretty constant, where I'd do about 6 knots in calm water, and the speed over ground varied from 4 to 8 knots. Went though Fenwick Cut; was doing 7.9 before the cut, 6+ in the cut, 3.8 after the cut ! Got down to Rock Creek, and boats were pulling over because it was dead low tide and they were running out of water. Anchored about 2:30 in Rock Creek, in about 4 feet of water at dead low tide. Helped "Maverick" get in also. 11/5/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Rock Creek. Cool, foggy morning. Up at first light, raised anchor and moving by 0700, got about 200 feet and was hailed by "Footloose", who was anchored nearby. Their battery was dead, couldn't start the engine. So I anchored, unbolted a couple of my golf-cart batteries, they came over in their dinghy and took them to their boat, and got started. Whole process took about an hour or so. Motored up Coosaw River and down to Beaufort SC, keeping an eye out to make sure "Footloose" was okay. Gale expected off the coast tonight, and 20-25 knot winds at Beaufort. Put down two anchors, in Factory Creek right next to the boat ramp. Paddled ashore, walked about 1.5 miles over bridge into town, looked around, did library (got some terrific free books and magazines). Back to dinghy, picked up grocery cart, and walked 1+ miles the other direction to the supermarket and got a big load of groceries. Tired by the time I got back to the boat. Salad and fruit and grilled chicken for dinner. Suddenly started raining at 7:15, and kept raining most of the night, hard at times, until 9 the next morning. Warm. Had to keep boat closed up because tidal currents keep me from facing into the wind, so rain is blowing in if I leave the main hatch open. Stuffy. 11/6/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in Factory Creek at Beaufort SC. Rain stopped at 9, high wind started soon afterward, day turned clear and cool and sunny. Gusts to 30+ by noon, but my anchor in that direction is holding. I was using some trees and a sign on shore as a range, to see if I was holding position, and then suddenly some guys in a pickup truck came and removed the sign ! It was an election sign. Several boats are "sailing" wildly at anchor in this wind, tacking back and forth violently. I'm not going anywhere today, especially with a non-working dinghy outboard. Just holing up with chores and books and food. Reinstalled primary bilge pump, with a vented loop that had been used in the shower drain pump, and it seems to work fine. New mounting for switch is ugly but seems to work. Now primary and secondary bilge pumps each have their own through-hull; I'll route the shower drain to share a through-hull with the aft sink and 4th-level (AC) bilge pump. Uncomfortable after noon; the tidal current is holding me sideways to the wind, which is gusting to 40+. The opposing wind and current are kicking up 2-foot swells, which are hitting me on the beam. And 30-40 wind is blasting sideways through my pilothouse; I took in the cushions and other movable stuff for fear it would get blown away. A number of boats have left the creek, probably to go to the town anchorage, which is more protected from this wind. It would be hard and dangerous for me to raise two anchors in these conditions, so I'm staying put. The wind was forecast to blow SW for a while (this anchorage is protected from that direction) but never did. Now it's blowing NW, as forecast for later, and we're exposed. Supposed to calm down to 10-20 tonight. Ran engine for 1.25 hours to charge batteries. Salad and pork-and-beans-and-noodles for dinner. Wind went down to 10-15 in evening, as forecast. A relief after the high winds. 11/6/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in Factory Creek at Beaufort SC. Paddled ashore at 8, walked to town, had a lovely stroll around town, looking at old houses. The streets are full of old trees with lots of Spanish Moss hanging from them; very pretty. Did library, then back to boat. Hustled to raise anchors and get to bridge before 11, then bridge-tender decided to skip the 11 opening because there was some traffic on the bridge. He made us wait until 11:30, and the boats there before me weren't happy. Motored down the Beaufort River with a fair tide. Sunny and clear but cool. Opposing current in Port Royal Sound, then fair in Calibogue SOund, then opposing in Ramshorn Creek, then fair. Saw lots of dolphins all day, mostly in ones and twos, but about 8 near the fixed bridge at Hilton Head. Anchored in the Wright River, about 8 miles south of Savannah GA, in barely 4 feet of water (over soft mud) at dead low tide at 5:15. Lovely view of three huge oil tanks south of Savannah. Sun set like a big orange meatball about 15 minutes later (if you've never seen an orange meatball, you've obviously never had my spaghetti !). Spaghetti for dinner. Was planning to skip Savannah, but tide will be perfect, so maybe I'll give it a shot tomorrow. 11/8/2002 (Friday) At anchor in the Wright River. Cold morning. Got going about 7:30, went up Savannah River to Savannah GA. Docked at free dock (twice; first time I ended up in spot reserved for a ferry) at 9:15. Various passersby made comments about what a big boat, etc. Docking is free for 3 hours, so I have 3 hours to see the town ! Walked around until my legs were tired, went to the Telfair Art Museum (very nice), strolled the waterfront. Didn't have time to check out the history museum, the maritime museum, etc. Lots of beautiful old houses and cobblestone streets and nice squares with parks in them. Waterfront full of cute art-school students making sketches of things. Did library but their computer tried to eat my floppy, so got little done. Undocked at 12:30, motored down the river with fair current, then motored against currents through canals the rest of the day. Nice, sunny, warm day. Anchored about 4:45 in Moon River, in very shallow water. I'll probably be barely aground in soft mud at dead low tide. I'm tired and I have a headache. Salad and grilled sausages and saffron rice for dinner. 11/9/2002 (Saturday) At anchor in Moon River. Nothing much to report today; moving at 0700, motored and motored and motored through lots of twisty rivers and across several sounds. Did a bucket of laundry. Nice and sunny and warm in the morning, but turned cloudy and threatened rain in the afternoon. Anchored about 4 PM in South River, at statute mile 654 from Norfolk. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. 11/10/2002 (Sunday) At anchor in South River. Another traveling day: moving at 0700, rained briefly once or twice in the morning. Did nice job of leading a group of 4 boats across St Simon's Sound in rough conditions. Decided to avoid St Andrew's Sound by taking the Umbrella Cut route, which was scenic but prettty shallow in places, even at high tide. Afternoon turned sunny and warm, but still breezy. A dolphin swam along with the boat for several minutes in the Satilla River; I stood on the bow and could see him a foot or two under the water, and then he'd come up for air every 10 seconds or so, practically under where I was standing. He had fun swimming along with the bow of the boat. Anchored about 4 PM in Crooked River, at about statute mile 703. Another 400 or so to go to Marathon. Salad and egg-salad sandwiches for dinner. 11/11/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Crooked River, just north of the FL/GA border. Supposed to be a space-shuttle launch this morning, but I don't know when, it's foggy, and I'm 200 miles away from it. Fuel level 10.25 inches at engine hour 2429.6 Tried to get moving at 0715, but I'm aground ! Have to wait a bit; it's exactly low tide. Oh, well, was planning a short day anyway, because of where the anchorages are. Didn't get free until 0845; did some chores while I was waiting. Did a couple of pieces of laundry as I slogged down through Cumberland Sound. About to enter FL, so I put on my surfer-dude shorts and laundered my denim jeans and shorts (it was a toss-up between washing them or burying them at sea; they were pretty nasty after all of the cold and damp days). Windy day with currents against me most of the time. Threatened rain a couple of times but generally sunny and very windy. Anchored about 2 PM in Ft George River, about 10 miles from Jacksonville FL. Lovely view of two huge cooling towers at a nucular power plant near Jacksonville. Salad and chili for dinner. Nasty cold and headache all night. Brief thunderstorm came through at 11. Only a half-dozen lightning strikes, but one of them couldn't have been more than 300 yards away. 11/12/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Ft George River. Got moving before 0700, and as I went past "Scandia", the couple on board said "have you heard the weather ?". I knew the forecast included thunderstorms, but I decided the anchorage was not so wonderful that I'd give up a day's travel. They were nervous, and looking for someone to tell them what to do. Still have my cold; I'm blowing my way through a whole box of tissues. Motored and motored, through a gorgeous sunny day, but with ugly clouds starting to build to the W and N. I listened to the weather forecast, and it was dire: chances of thunderstorms, tornadoes, waterspouts ! Up to 60 mph winds in tornadoes. So I kept going, more or less fleeing in front of it. I think most of it is going to hit Jacksonville and SE Georgia, behind me. Just as I hoped, it didn't hit me until I got to my destination, a deserted anchorage a couple miles south of St Augustine. Barely made the 2 PM opening of the bridge, and then strong winds hit me from the beam, and lots of lightning to the NW of me. The cushions almost blew out of the cockpit; I had to throw them down below. Had to go through a fixed bridge with 20-30 wind on the beam; that was interesting. Got out the halyard winch handles and a knife, in case I had to take down sails or other things. Rain started about 5 minutes too soon; I got a little wet while anchoring. Then the rain pounded for 5 minutes, but no lightning. Didn't blow amazingly hard either, maybe 35. I'm happy; I'm in a spacious anchorage by myself, so no one to drag into or to drag into me. Grey but fairly bright and still by 2:45. I think the boats behind me didn't quite make it in time; they were 20 to 30 minutes behind me. Really felt lousy by 5 PM; went to bed. Up and down all night, watching for rain coming in the main hatch, sponging up a deck leak, blowing my nose, taking pills. Tuna-salad sandwiches for dinner. 11/13/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor by R18 in Matanzas River, south of St Augustine. Took many tries to start the engine; I think the solenoid is sticking. Got moving about 0645; need to do 50 miles today to get to a reasonable anchorage: the north Daytona area is one long canal. Very cloudy, a little cold, occasional rain. Coughing and sneezing and blowing my nose all the way down the ICW. Got to Daytona Beach and anchored about 2:30, but it's too windy and I'm too far from the landings to be able to paddle ashore. Will make another try at fixing the outboard, but I'm doubtful. Sure enough, no go. Sprayed a bunch of cleaner into the carb and will let it sit for a day. "Limershin" came into the anchorage, but we were all swinging so weirdly that I think they gave up and went to a marina. Chili-and-rice for dinner. 11/14/2002 (Thursday) At anchor at Daytona Beach. Moving at 0700, through a couple of bridges, motored down to New Smyrna Beach. Anchored there in a weird spot, as close to a marina as I could get. Tried to start the outboard, no go, paddled in to the marina, talked to their guy. As I expected, he said "sounds like the carb needs cleaning, leave it here for 3 or 4 days". I said no, thanks, and they let me leave my dinghy at their dock while I went to the supermarket. Moving again about an hour later. Exactly what I expected to happen, and I've been to that supermarket before, on the way north. Long motoring past uninteresting terrain, except for plenty of dolphin sightings. Then NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building appeared, and I could see it all the rest of the day as I motored toward and then parallel to it. Still in sight at the anchorage. Shaved and showered while underway ! I anchored south of the Titusville Bridge, just after 4:30. Salad and grilled pork chops for dinner. 11/15/2002 (Friday) At anchor at Titusville FL. Still sick; coughing and sneezing and headachy. Loafed a bit this morning, didn't start raising anchor until 0745 or so. Lots of mud on the chain, took a long time to wash it off as I brought it up. And just at the end, I found that the trip-line was stuck, probably wrapped on the propeller. Fortunately I hadn't put the engine in gear yet. So I had to shut everything down, put the chain back out, launch the dinghy, poke at it with the paddle. Got the line, but couldn't free it by pulling, and the whole weight of the boat was swinging on it. So had to put on snorkel gear and go diving. Just as I was ready to go in, two huge powerboats came by 100 yards away, making three-foot wakes that pounded my boat and dinghy and made the swimn platform jump up and down as I was standing on it. I screamed curses at them, which made me feel better, but they couldn't hear. The line was easy to unwrap. Finally got moving about 0845. Motored down through dead calm water, no wind. Docked about 11:30 at free dock at Cocoa FL, so I could go to a library for the first time in more than a week. Now I'm sure I'm back in Florida: there were little lizards skittering across the sidewalk in front of me. Stayed in town for less than 3 hours. (My sister says I should write a book "How to see a town in 3 hours"; I stayed only 3 hours in Savannah GA also. But I did that in Savannah because the dock was free for that long, and I was eager to get south and get away from cold weather. In Cocoa, there is nothing of interest to me except the library.) Motored on south. The weather's been nice and warm and mostly sunny for the last few days, but it's going to rain and thunder tomorrow, and then get cold Monday. Anchored about 4:45 near Dragon Point, which sadly has no dragon on it any longer. It had a 20-foot high green dragon that someone made for their kids to play on, but I read a few months ago that it collapsed in a storm. I can see some green rubble on the ground. Salad and spaghetti for dinner. Warm evening. 11/16/2002 (Saturday) At anchor near Dragon Point. Measured fuel level 5.0 inches at engine hour 2465.2 Did several other chores in engine compartment. Got going about 0730, and got anchor up without getting rained on. Motored down into 15-20 wind on the nose, and rain started soon. By about 0945, after covering about 12 miles, my headache grew to the point where I was groaning with pain, and I pulled over and anchored in the last good spot before a 20-mile (4-hour) stretch of no-place-to-anchor. Shut everything down and crawled into bed with a throbbing headache, mostly over my right eye, with light causing more pain (does that make it a migraine ?). Managed to listen to Car Talk on NPR before napping and doing what I could to nurse my head. Rained all day, quite hard at times, and my head improved only slowly. No chance to get going again; I'll have to see how I feel tomorrow. Cheese-and-crackers and eggsalad-and-crackers for dinner. Rained all night, more or less. 11/17/2002 (Sunday) At anchor at Rocky Point. Nice before dawn, then rained like hell from 0630 to 0800. But my headache seems to be mostly gone ! About the time I decided to stay here all day, waiting out the weather, the rain mostly stopped, and I was itchy to travel. So I raised anchor about 0900 and motored down with a big tailwind and some following current. Did 6-7 knots all day. Anchored about 2:45 south of Ft Pierce Causeway. Blowing 20-30 and cool with lots of clouds, but sunny. Wind is blowing up a pretty good chop. Have a little headache, but not too bad. Too tired and wired and windy to cook anything; nibbled all kinds of stuff for dinner. 11/18/2002 (Monday) At anchor in Ft Pierce. Measured fuel level 3.25 inches at engine hour 2473.7 Moving at 0745, and motored down with lovely following wind and current. A bit cool all day, since the wind was blowing right into the pilothouse. Started to look for a place to buy diesel, since I'm getting low. Early on, didn't want to stop because the current was so nice. Then I couldn't contact many places (they didn't answer radio), some looked too tough to get into, and one big one only had gas, not diesel. By the end of the day I was panicking a bit, worrying about running out of diesel with a non-working dinghy (although I do have an emergency jug of 4-5 gallons of diesel). Finally pulled over in a terrifically convenient fuel dock in the most expensive place in the USA, North Palm Beach. Bought 40 gallons of diesel at $1.609/gallon (!), total $68. But as I went further south, there was nowhere convenient, and I'll sleep a lot better tonight now that I have plenty. Anchored at 5 PM in Lake Worth, a few miles south of the inlet, in front of some ultra-mega-mansions. Tired but feeling okay. Glad the end is in sight, about 200 miles away. Spaghetti for dinner. Fairly rough anchorage. 11/19/2002 (Tuesday) At anchor in Palm Beach FL. Measured fuel level 7.0 inches at engine hour 2482.7; higher than I expected. Got moving at 0715, through a couple of bridges, then had to waste a half-hour in front of a restricted bridge. Engine starter solenoid is acting up just about every time now; have to tap it with a hammer to get it to work. A long day of nothing but canals and bridges, although lots of interesting houses to look at. Lots of sprint-and-wait with the bridges; missed a couple by 3 minutes, had to wait 20-25 at a couple. Followed sailboat "Chain Reaction" all the way. A couple of bridges opened only on one side, making a tight squeeze. And one of them had a construction barge taking up about 60% of the total bridge opening; I put my hull about 2 feet from that barge and hoped my rigging didn't hit the open span on the other side. Beautiful sunny, breezy, warm day. But a relief to pull into Lake Sylvia at Ft Lauderdale about 3 PM and anchor. Only a couple of boats here. I'm tired. Took carburetor off the outboard. Nice guy from "Pelican" stopped by to say hello and we talked for a while. Salad and grilled pork chops for dinner. Should have used more spices on the chops. 11/20/2002 (Wednesday) At anchor in Fort Lauderdale. Woke up depressed about everything broken on the boat, lonely, worried about money, you name it. Batteries banks aren't charging/discharging evenly; bank 2 must have a loose connection or a bad cell. Fuel level 6.0 inches at engine hour 2490.3 Could have sat around working on the carburetor, but got moving at 0730 and followed "Pelican" down the ICW. Currents and strong following wind made the bridge approaches dangerous. Clouds threatening rain, but only got sprinkles. Interesting territory, since I did this leg in the ocean on the way north. Worked on carburetor underway; can't find anything wrong with it. Traveled with "Pelican" and "Belle Star" all morning. They peeled off after Venetian Causeway; I went further and anchored for lunch south of Rickenbacher Causeway at 1230. Saw a guy swimming, or at least wading, from the beach; nice to be back in Florida waters. Rather pleased with myself: the timing worked out perfectly. Ate lunch and lounged, waiting for low tide. Skies opened up and poured rain from 1:30 to 2:00, low tide came at 2:20, I got moving about 2:30, felt my way through a shallow, twisty unmarked channel, went into Crandon Park Marina and fueled up (100 gallons of diesel at $1.319/gallon plus tax and some gasoline totals $143). As they were running my credit card, I realized it expires this month ! Fortunately it worked. Fuel level 5.2 inches before, about 13.2 afterward, at engine hour 2495.8 Rain started again just after I finished fueling, and I watched as black clouds covered Miami and made its skyscrapers disappear. I got rained on, but the massive rain stayed 5 miles to the west. Motored down a couple of miles to anchor west of Key Biscayne, probably near Nixon's house, about 4:30. Salad and chili and saffron rice for dinner. A real Wow! moment while cooking dinner: with a bright sun behind me, a delicate half-circle rainbow appeared in front of me, with the Miami skyline and dark clouds off to the left. Various clouds and patches of blue sky in other places. Beautiful ! Rained a lot during the night. 11/21/2002 (Thursday) At anchor in Biscayne Bay near Key Biscayne. Added a little less than a quart of oil to the engine. Moving by 0745. Sand on anchor chain for first time in a long time. Very calm day, once below the ocean entrance. Threatening clouds everywhere, but mostly to the E and NE. Water clear enough in Card Sound to see the bottom in 10 feet of water ! Nice change after the very-strong-tea-colored water up north. After getting through Jewfish Creek Bridge, saw only a couple of boats further south. Eerily quiet. Near Pigeon Key, a small seaplane did a touch-and-go landing next to me; I've seen that guy in the air EVERY time I've gone through here ! He must be flying all the time. Anchored about 4:45 in Cotton Key Basin. A couple of other boats came in from the south just as I did. Salad and grilled chicken for dinner. Fairly rough night, as expected. Blew NW 15-20 and rained, and anchorages here are wide open to NW. Could have stopped 1.5 hours earlier in protected anchorage, but was unwilling to give up the time. 11/22/2002 (Friday) At anchor in Cotton Key Basin near Islamorada FL. Replaced engine heat-exchanger zinc; it fell off when I tried to check it a few days ago. Moving at 0730. Motored down ICW and then out into the ocean through Channel 5 bridge. Nice day, and kind of liberating to be in the open water like this. First ocean motoring since May. Made it through Sister Creek on a falling, near-low tide. Took a tour of the anchorage, admiring a woman in a thong bikini on one boat. Anchored about 2:15. A little close to one boat (not the bikini boat); may move later. Par for the course in this harbor. Trip done ! Engine hour 2512.7 Miracle of miracles: got the outboard going ! Put the carburetor back on, connected up the gallon of fresh gas, pulled a bunch of times, was about to give up, and it started ! Left it running, and added a gallon of "old" gas-oil to the tank; we'll see if that kills it. A good omen, what ? Frantic search for my car and mailbox keys, to no avail. I remember deliberately putting them somewhere safe 6 months ago; the question is, where ? Dinghied ashore and walked a couple miles to the car-storage place (they had a car key). Car battery was dead, but car is fine otherwise. Did internet at a cafe and then the library; the library workers all remember my name ! They were amazed to hear about the trip. Nice conversation with Mike and Martin and Capt Ron at the marina (they loved my story about almost sinking), and saw John who works there. Some things changed, some the same. Now they're charging $150/month for the moorings; includes dinghy dock, but they're hoping to charge extra for that ! Outboard still a little balky, idle needs adjusting, maybe something still a little wrong. Back to boat, to be harangued by the guy in the next boat. He came by saying "you're too close; we're on 100-foot rodes here, my boat's gonna run over and hit yours". Not likely, since he has three anchors down and I have two down, but I was a little too close for comfort. So I started the engine and repositioned each of my anchors, a nasty slippery job with muck all over the rodes and dark falling halfway through. I ended up 50 or 70 feet further away from him. We'll see what it looks like in daylight. Too tired to cook; cheese-and-crackers and salad for dinner. Warm, windy evening. Hard to sleep, with sounds and lights and crowding of a strange harbor around me. [Next log file is http://www.geocities.com/bill_dietrich/Magnolia/MagnoliaLogEarly2003.txt ]