We awoke after a much better night’s sleep than the previous one. Janine opted to sleep on the pilot birth in the salon which allowed more air to flow over her and I used the fan in the cave again. We were both up at about 5:30.
Breakfast was again special with the added fresh blueberries to the blob blueberry muffins. They joined thick cut pepper bacon and fresh Maryland eggs washed down with V-8 juice. The only thing that could be better would be Sausage Gravy and Biscuits, but I assume my partner would not feel the same. She is a good sport.
We tidied up the boat and got under way at about 8:30 heading out into the Choptank River under motor. Upon entering the river, we were greeted with a nice northerly wind and since we were heading south towards the town of Cambridge. We had a nice run for about 2 hours. As we traveled, Janine reviewed our resources and found that there was not much to draw us into the town of Cambridge so we turned around and began beating up wind towards the town of Oxford. So far on this trip, I have always come up with an excuse why we didn’t want to beat (sail up wind) but today, I decided it was time to get back to basics and sail the way I used to when I didn’t have a motor to rely on. The wind was stiff and after burying the starboard rail in the water a couple of times (that’s healing pretty far over) I decided to reduce the size of the jib. The boat continued to work well and we tacked back and forth up wind for three or four hours until we arrived at the town of Oxford.
During the trip, Janine prepared a fine luncheon of Spam with Horsey sauce on a wheat bun, chex-mix, and a pudding cup for me and a PBJ, a cup of yogurt for her. We do eat well!
After dropping the sails and starting the motor, we headed for some place where we could buy ice and possibly get on the internet to make another posting on the blog. The marina we chose was Campbell’s Boat Yard. We tied up at the gas pumps and were greeted by a friendly young lady who offered that we could come into her office and use their wireless internet connection, drink her cold water and enjoy her air conditioning. It was another really hot one, however as were sailing up wind, the breeze kept the sting of the heat at bay. When we stopped, it really hit. The young lady is a senior at Tulane University and comes home to the Eastern Shore for the summer. I soaked up as much of the AC as I could and drank as much of her cold water as I could hold before I went back into the intense heat. It seems that there are no good places to tie up while you go into their town and since the weather appeared to be threatening, we decided forgo visiting the town of Oxford and try to locate a mooring spot fairly close to where we were.
The place we decided on was Plaindealing Creek which is off the Tred Avon River on which the town of Oxford is located. This was described as having a well protected cove that would protect one from all points except from the southeast. Southeasterly storms are rare and since they also said that the hold capacity of the bottom was good, we figured that it would be a good place to ride out a thunderstorm. We moved into the suggested cove, dropped anchor and went looking for a sandy beach. A good one was near so we donned our suits and took the Dink to the selected spot. The area was really nice, but the water was quite warm. It was, however, much better than the scorching sun and sweltering heat.
Back at the boat, we enjoyed hors d’oeuvres in the form of Tillamook Cheese, Club Wheat Crackers, and a glass of Gnarly Head red zinfandel. We grilled a couple of marinated strip steaks and had garlic mashed potatoes on the side. Our dessert was apple caramel cake with slathered cream cheese icing. We do eat well!
After supper, we battened down the boat. They were calling for storms and we could hear thunder in the distance. I put a bungee cord around the jib to prevent it from unfurling in case the cleat that holds it were to fail. (We had that happen to us on a previous boat on Lake Erie when we got caught in a storm. It damaged the sail.) We put the sail cover on the main sail and put away everything in the cockpit.
For a while, the wind reversed and came from the southeast – the only direction that our cove did not provide protection. That wind didn’t last long and up until bed time, no storm has passed over us. Bed time – 9:00.S
A few more pictures:
Osprey family in Queenstown Harbor
Dink avoiding the heat in Kent Narrows
Damn Dink at rest!
Huge Freighter in Francis Scott Key Bridge
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