This year we decided to try a different approach. Instead of trying to cover as much distance as possible during our week of freedom, we would instead limit our explorations to the Western shore of the Chesapeake. My wife has only one requirement when planning these trips. Any prospective itinerary must include a stop at the Tide's Inn at Irvington, VA on the Rappahannock River. Knowing I had to go there anyway, I planned to spend most of our time exploring the Rappahannock with a couple stops on the way there and back.
The original plan had us moving the boat to Salt Ponds marina the Thursday prior to the trip. On Friday, the last day of school, we would all drive over to the marina and spend the night on the boat. Saturday morning we would leave early for the Tide's Inn. This would be the longest leg of the trip. Sunday and part of Monday would be spent at the Tide's Inn before heading over to Windmill Point on Monday afternoon. We would spend Tuesday at Windmill Point, and then have Wednesday and Thursday to explore whatever other spots on the Rapphannock looked appealing. Friday would be another longish slog down to the York River. Saturday we would head to Ocean Marine in Portsmouth (We had tickets for the Avett Brother's concert at the adjacent NTelos Pavilion), and then Sunday back home.
That was the plan, but as usual, things happen. We did spend the night on the boat Friday and managed to get an early start on Saturday morning. A couple hours into the trip we were just crossing the entrance to the York River when I noticed a change in the sound of the Port engine. Going below to investigate, I find this:
That's the belt for the water pump laying in the bilge. Remember when it was squealing before our Memorial Day trip? Maybe I over tensioned it, or maybe the slipping did more damage than I thought. Anyway, I used to have a tackle box full of engine spares, including belts, but some jackass stole it, along with my tool bag, flares, and medical kit. That happened a couple years ago, and I never got around to rebuilding the spares kit. I hate it when my laziness comes back to bite me. The wind hadn't kicked in yet, and looking ahead to a long day of motoring at 3-4 kts on one engine didn't sound fun. We turned back for Salt Ponds around 10:30 AM. I called the parts counter at Ocean Marine and luckily, they had 3 belts in stock at $6 each. I told them I wanted them all! The only problem was the parts dept closed at noon on Saturday. The parts guy graciously agreed to drop the belts off at the marina office so we could pick them up there when we got in.
By way of a favorable current, we made almost as good time heading South on one engine as we had heading North on two. We got back into Salt Ponds around 2PM. My oldest son and I drove back down to Portsmouth, paid for the belts, and bolted back up to the boat. The new belt was installed, and we were back underway by 3:30. The late start meant we wouldn't make Irvington before dark. Having been there many times now, I was aware of the spider's web of fishnet and crab pot floats that hangs across the entrance to the Rappahannock. I had no desire to negotiate that in the dark. Instead, we decided to try for Windmill Point.
We brought the pets along for the first time ever this year
From Montana mountain dogs to Chesapeake Bay sailors
The cat was less enthused, but hung in there
Not too sure about the trampoline
Wolftrap Light, with a surly teenager in the foreground
We had a great day of motoring/sailing, as the wind did eventually come up. We made it to Windmill Point after hours, but before dark, and took our spot along the wall adjacent to the marina club house. What they forgot to tell us when we called in earlier in the day was that Saturday nights are Live Music nights at the attached cabana bar. Yay for us! I think the entire population of Whitestone turned out to see The Deloreans play covers of eighties hits at high volume. Everybody had to walk right by our boat to get from the parking lot to the bar, and then stumble back by again around 1AM when the music finally, mercifully, stopped. The dogs went crazy with each passing. Even better than that was that we had to walk right through the crowd, between the cabana bar and the dance floor, and past the front of the stage to get to the bath house! I escorted our two youngest boys through the crowd with our shower kits in hand, only to discover that the band had converted the shower stalls into their dressing rooms. During a break in between songs we asked the keyboardist, a Billy Idol lookalike complete with tattoos, piercings, and bleach blonde spikey hair if they could move their stuff. They graciously did. What an experience!
Much more peaceful Sunday morning than it was Saturday night
Walking the dogs is a new thing on our boat trips
Scene of the party Saturday night. Just to the left of the bar, you can see the horizontal windows of the bath house. We had to run the gauntlet to get to the showers.
The animals keeping a close watch on the parking lot
Sunday dawned beautiful and bright. Windmill Point could be a nice place, but they have a long way to go. If you look online, you'll see a map that shows condos and docks around a nice harbor. In reality, only about half the docks have been built. The condos are non-existent. The club house is there, but incomplete. The dockmaster told me that the cabana bar is leased out to a separate group that operates it and runs the music. He was a nice guy and even bought me a Northern Neck ginger ale from the soda machine, which he insisted I try. It was delicious. He said the development had recently gone through a bankruptcy, but had been purchased by Vinings Marine group, which runs several marinas in our area. Hopefully they will have the cash to get it finished. The entrance was shallow and scary. There are fish traps on both sides, and I saw --- on my depth sounder twice on the way in. We only draw 3 1/2 feet, so it is scary when we touch bottom in a marked channel. I'll do a separate post on Windmill Point one of these days. It was an interesting place.
We left for the Tide's Inn around 10 AM Sunday morning. We sailed all the way down the river from Windmill Point to the entrance of Carter's Creek. There were several other sailboats out enjoying the day, and we ended up in an impromptu race with a Privilege catamaran and a monohull of some sort. We soon left the monohull behind and started to pull ahead of the Privilege. Eventually, we pulled far ahead of the Privilege. Just as I was starting to feel good about myself, I realized the problem. We were approaching the Rappahannock River bridge and I was going to need another tack to make it through. He was not. Sure enough, by the time we tacked back and forth through the bridge, he had passed us. How humiliating. My boat deserves a better tactician. It was a fun day anyway.
Photo from a previous visit staying at the main docks
This year at The Lodge
The crew on the water taxi all scrubbed up for dinner
The last couple years we have discovered the joys of The Lodge. The Lodge is a defunct part of the resort on the opposite bank of Carter's Creek. The docks, pool, and bath houses are still maintained, but the hotel property has been allowed to fall into disrepair. Not only is it cheaper to tie up at the Lodge, but you pretty much have the whole place to yourself. Even better, there is a water taxi that runs between The Lodge and the main resort, so you can go over to the other side any time you want. It is ideal. You can borrow bicycles to ride into town, or kayaks or paddleboards to explore the surrounding coves, fishing or crabbing equipment, all for free. They have cornhole boards, a giant chess set, a croquet course, tennis courts, basketball hoops, regular or frisbee golf, all included in the price of your marina stay. There are two swimming pools and a spa. They have a casual restaurant by one of the pools, or a shorts and polo shirt kind of place at the bar in the hotel, all the way up to a fancy coat and tie restaurant if that is your thing. There are cookies and lemonade at the front desk all day long, smore's on the beach at sunset, and cookies and milk in the activity room at 9PM each night. It really is quite an experience. We've never actually rented a room there, but I understand it is pricey. The marina is only slightly more than an average marina stay, but the experience seems worth it. Did I mention they deliver the newspaper to your boat every morning?
Wednesday morning we headed out across the river to Urbanna. We had never been there before, and it turned out to be a very nice little town. Urbanna was a colonial era seaport, and has been in use pretty much continuously since then. The entrance is well marked, deep, and wide. There are a couple good anchorages, but we elected to tie up at the Upton Town Point docks. I'm not sure if they are actually owned by the city or not, but the facility was very nice and the dockmaster was great. It turns out that she used to breed Shiba Inus. We had never heard of this breed before my dad got them, but we are constantly running into people that recognize them now. We had a little bit of rain on Wednesday, but not enough to dampen our spirits. We walked into town and had lunch at the soda fountain at Marshall's drug store. Then we walked down to the grocery store for some supplies. Wednesday night was quiet. Family game night got a little heated and Colvin and I were forced to break up our partnership in Taboo in favor of more fair teams. (Translation: they couldn't beat us :p)
Thursday morning we walked into town for coffee and bagels at the coffee shop before heading back to the boat for our departure. We had a great time in Urbanna and highly recommend it.
He's definitely not made of sugar
Still smiling
Soda Fountain at Marshall's
Mmmmm, Scrapple! Grandpa Willis' favorite
Breakfast, Kevin style
Sam keeping watch. Earl thinking about jumping ship.
Keeping an eye on the neighbors
Distorted panorama view of the harbor at Urbanna
Happy couple
Heated game of UNO on the trampoline
Thursday turned out to be a fantastic sailing day. The wind was out of the East, coming more or less straight down the river. We put the sails up as soon as we got out of the channel at Urbanna and started to tack back and forth down the river. Sure, it would have been faster to motor in a straight line into the wind, but this was so much more fun. We eventually made it out and around Stingray Point (so named by Capt. John Smith after he was stung by a cow nose ray near there) and into the Piankatank River. We dropped the sails and entered the tricky channel for the Deltaville Marina on Jackson Creek. We've been here before, so I knew what to expect. Still, this is a stomach churning entrance for me. We made it without incident though.
Ospreys everywhere this year
Peaceful afternoon in Deltaville
Sam is ever vigilant, even in this ideal setting
Beautiful sunset
Morning coffee in town
Deltaville was nice as usual. We got up early Friday morning and walked into town. The new Deltaville Watermen's Museum looks great. The grounds and docks are beautiful. The new museum building looks like it will be very impressive when finished. We had coffee and sandwiches for breakfast, bought some stuff we didn't need at the ACE hardware, and headed back to the boat. We left before the boys woke up and headed South to the York River.
Friday's sail South was fun, but not quite as good as Thursday's trip down the Rappahannock. We had wind all day from the East, but the waves on the beam were not really comfortable. Originally, we planned on trying a new place, Crown Point marina on the Perrine River, just off the mouth of the York River. The idea was that it would give us a closer jumping off point for Saturday's trip down to Portsmouth. The folks at Crown Point were very friendly on the radio, but their options for cats with a 20 foot beam were limited. The entrance was narrow, twisty, and shallow. Once we got in to the docks it became apparent to me that it was just too tight of a squeeze for my comfort. We thanked them for their time and headed back out to the Riverwalk Landing docks at Yorktown.
Riverwalk Landing was one of the first docks we visited after we got our boat. Even though I had been warned about the current at these floating docks, I was still taken by surprise that first time. The combination of strong currents, high winds, and a crusty dockmaster made that first docking attempt quite an adventure. Luckily, I was better prepared this time. Another helpful factor was the new dockmaster, Sue, who was very helpful getting us on the dock. We ended up opposite a massive power yacht that was flying a flag from the Marshall Islands, but whose entire crew seemed to speak Spanish. The upside of being across from the mega-yacht was that it shielded us from the wind. The downside was listening to drunken revelry in Spanish late into the night.
Ti' Punch in the foreground, mega-yacht Albatross in the background
This beautiful schooner is based at Riverwalk Landing and does several trips a day
Another beautiful sunset
Saturday morning, Summer Sailstice Day
Karen and I had already turned in for the night and were reading when we heard a knock on the hull. I suspected our drunken Spanish friends and ignored it the first time. Then came a second knock. Going up to the cockpit I found a very nice couple standing on the dock. It turns out that they also have a FP Antigua that they keep down in the BVI's. They had seen ours at the dock on their way home and stopped to say hello. We are glad they did. It was great talking to them and really stoked our own desire to get down to the Caribbean one of these days. The funny thing was that their boat was formerly Meerkat. I used to follow the Meerkat blog at meerkatcruising.com before the boat got sold. It was a pleasant surprise to meet the new owners.
Saturday morning, Karen and I got up and hit the Farmer's Market right at the end of the docks. We bought all kinds of stuff we didn't need before heading back to the boat. Saturday was the Summer Sailstice, and I was excited to get underway. We had about an hour of motoring out of the river and past the shallow flats that surround the mouth of the York River on either side before we could turn South and start sailing. We wanted to make sure we got to Portsmouth in time to shower, eat dinner, and get good seats before the concert started. We had another beautiful day for it, and the sailing was great. The skies started looking a little ominous about the time we approached the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel, so we went ahead and dropped sails before entering Hampton Roads proper. The storms held off and we made our way to Ocean Marine. After showers for everyone and dinner at Roger Brown's, we walked over to the Pavilion and waited for the gates to open. We ended up with great seats center stage right in front of the sound booth.
Ominous skies, but we stayed dry
Good seats, great show
After a night of great music, everybody was ready for bed. It was cool to walk right out of the concert and onto the dock where Ti' Punch was waiting patiently for us. Sunday morning we left early for the short trip up to Salt Ponds marina, where we have decided to keep the boat for the rest of the summer. It took about 4 trips with dock carts to get all the stuff off the boat. An hour later we were home again. So ends SailSplosion 2013.
