October 16-18

On Tuesday morning, as we passed by the Naval Academy and City Dock in Annapolis, we found ourselves in the midst of a flotilla of PT training boats coming back towards the academy docks. It kept us on our toes as they weren’t all going in the same direction, which necessitated a couple of quick course changes.

Our destination that day was Galesville, where we hoped to make arrangements to have someone look at our autopilot – which has not been so auto. As it turned out, they were already very busy with boats heading south and unable to accommodate us. They did have a great gas dock with fresh water, though, where we were able to spend the afternoon cleaning and washing the boat.

Galesvile is a very pretty marina, with nice scenery as well. This picture, taken as we were preparing to leave Wednesday morning, hopefully captures both.

Our travels took us across to the Eastern Side of the bay, to a secluded creek off the Wye East River called Dividing Creek.

As we departed Dividing Creek Thursday morning for Dun Cove, we passed a number of smaller boats in the Wye East River harvesting crabs. As we took their picture, these fellas joked, ‘Wait and get a picture of us with a trap with crabs in it!’



Dun Cove was a very nice spot, although for the most part quiet and secluded. That changed dramatically at sunrise and sunset, though, as thousands of Canadian Geese congregate or prepare for departure. The din of the honking is truly remarkable and stirs up many memories of home!

October 9-15

The boat show was even better than we had imagined, but left us with a long list of things that we absolutely had to have. We spent the next few days shopping, and in our travels discovered a very interesting store called Trader Joes. While many of the things on the boat-show list will still be on next year’s list, the chocolate-covered cherries from Trader Joes will likely be on every list for some time.

On Friday we were fortunate to be able to join Terry and his friend Captain John aboard Captain John’s Whitby 42. They were a support boat for the final day of the Albacore World Championship races hosted by the West River Sailing Club. The wind was blowing a steady 25 knots with gusts over 30 knots. Twenty-eight of the fifty boats set out for the races, but after a number of capsizes and some rig failures the races were cancelled.

This story shows what a small place the world can sometimes be. One of the sailors that we chatted with on the sailing club yard as they were stowing their gear mentioned that he had grown up in Winnipeg and had attended Silver Heights Collegiate. I commented that it was too bad he had not been able to go to St. James Collegiate, and although he did not agree, he said that his mother had grown up on Linwood Street.

We had a little more running around to do on Saturday and Sunday in preparation for our departure on Tuesday. We had been using the buses quite regularly to get around Annapolis. and we realized that it really was time to move on when we began to meet and continue conversations with people we had met previously on the bus.

We had a great day on Monday visiting Washington DC. It is quite amazing to actually be able to walk up to the stairs of the Capitol Building. We went to the top of the Washington Monument where we had an overview of the entire area. The White House is most easily seen from this vantage point. We also walked over to the Lincoln Memorial, which is very cool when viewed in the Reflecting Pool.

There is a large area between the Capitol Building and the Washington Monument called the Mall, which contains the many Smithsonian Museums. We visited the Air and Space Museum and the Modern Art and Sculpture Gallery. We had hoped to see the American History Museum but it was closed for renovations. All was not lost, however, as we were able to see R2D2 and friends as part of the one hundred and fifty most popular American History exhibits which were on display in the Air and Space Museum.