Comegys Bight to St. Michaels is only 20 miles as the crow flies but 55 miles when you sail down the Chester River, tack upwind in the bay, around Kent Island and up the Miles River. The many tributaries into the Chesapeake Bay result in plenty of coastline and waterways. On the way we tacked past the Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse. Of the 45 cottage style screw pile lighthouses in use in the 1900s, only 4 remain and this is the only one still in service. Amazingly, we visited the other three in museums. Seven Foot Knoll is in Baltimore, Hooper Straight Lighthouse is in St. Michaels, and Drum Point Lighthouse is in Solomons Island.
Soon after arriving in the anchorage, Roy found our first new pest. The Japanese Beetle. While it is beautiful, they manage to invade Makai and fly inside the cabin. Luckily, they came, they saw, they conquered and thankfully they left. These beetles can really do a number on leaves, stripping the leaf from a plant, leaving only the branches and veins. Another reason not to grow crops on Makai.
The first few days in St. Michaels were unbearably hot and humid. We laid around completely zapped of energy. Eric cranked up the generator and ran the air conditioner for an afternoon movie. Without the humidity and dripping sweat we felt comfortable. We could only lay around moaning about the weather for so long before we decided to seek out someone else’s air conditioning. A museum sounded like a good possibility.
Even though some of the exhibits were outside, they had plenty of shade and a nice breeze to keep cool with.
The Hooper Straight Lighthouse completed our tour of the four Chesapeake Bay screw pile lighthouses. This design was useful to secure the cottage into the soft muddy bottom with screw posts.
The Fresnel Lens was accessible unlike most of the museum lighthouses where they block off this area. The Corning Museum of Glass, which we visited last summer, has a nice exhibit about lighthouse lenses.
Museum members have docking privileges. With the July 4th events coming up at the museum, people were starting to come in. We met Snickers here and had a nice little puppy break. We miss Topaz but know that she’s a lot happier at Nannie’s house. We sent Topaz ahead to Buffalo so she didn’t have to endure the heat and be stuck on the boat while we tour museums. My mom and her dog JJ are taking care of Topaz. The dogs get three meals a day plus snacks, a pool to swim in, unlimited potty breaks on land, a great living room to lay around in and watch TV, and top notch grooming.
We walked past this little boat with a huge engine and made up all kinds of explanations why you would have an engine this big in such a small boat. I was sure they just towed it here using the boat and trailer for transportation. I was wrong, wrong, wrong. That engine is actually installed in this small push boat.
During the 1800s Oystering was a booming business, but in the last 100 years the oyster beds have virtually disappeared. When motor boats appeared on the scene the oysters were already in trouble so dredging was restricted to sail only. Early attempts to conserve the oyster beds limited the use of push boats to going to and from the dredging areas. Then while dredging, the push boat had to be hoisted up on the davits. Since the 1960s the push boat could be used two days a week. To me, this push boat looks like a floating outboard engine. It is simply a boat with an engine and a propeller.
We spent as much time as we could inside the buildings. They had some fantastic exhibits on the watermen, work and pleasure boating, fishing, oystering, and water fowling. So many of the exhibits explained passages in James Michener’s book Chesapeake. I read this book just before leaving the US to join Makai in Grenada and Eric read it right after that. Now Roy is hooked on it now. I think it’s his most challenging book to date.
They put Old Bay on everything around here. You can buy popcorn and potato chips seasoned with Old Bay. It was developed by a German immigrant in 1939. At that time crabs were so plentiful they were served for free in the bars and Old Bay was used to spice them up a bit to encourage the patrons to buy more beverages. This reminds me of the Buffalo Chicken wings which were also served in bars for free to encourage the patrons to cool their pallet with a cold beverage. That was the good old days, now both crab and chicken wings can clean out your wallet. I can see crabs becoming more scarce, but what about chicken wings?
The kids only have so much tolerance for museums, then the ‘please ring me’ bell display gets a work out. Luckily we were the only ones in that building at the time. Roy looked over the marsh critter exhibit and noted that he’s seen all the animals listed except for the snake. But wait, there’s a snake, now he’s managed to spot them all.
On the way back to Makai we stopped at the Acme market and everyone picked their own 1/2 gallon of ice cream. It’s a much better deal to buy a tub of your favorite flavor at the market than a cup of it at the ice cream stand. We went back to eat our treats and watch the sky for signs of rain. It seems like there’s a weather cycle here of fives days building to unbearably hot and humid, then a cold front brings thunder storms and a few days of pleasant weather before turning hot again. This evening, the cold front came buy with it’s light show, wind and rain to cool us off and encourage us to get cleaned up and ready for the hurricane.
Hurricane Arthur passed by us on the 4th of July, the day after a cold front rained on us from the west. St. Michael’s events are planned for tomorrow so we’ll just take it easy and enjoy the cooler weather. Two seasons back was Hurricane Sandy which the East coast is still recovering from, last year there weren’t any major tropical storms coming up this far, but Arthur is the first for 2014. Makai is the blue dot on the chart above. The wind arrows point in the direction of the wind with the feathers in the back. Each long feather is 10kts and short feathers are 5kts. Our area of the Chesapeake experienced 20+ kts out of the north, Makai is in a small bay reducing the fetch to form wind waves, so we were safe and snug and we didn’t have any rain. By late afternoon Arthur had continued to the north and the wind slowed down. Whew, that was the extent of it.
When it was safe to go out in the dingy, Becky and David arrived for the weekend. Becky and I used to sail, windsurf, scuba dive, play, party and work together when we were in Hawaii around 1990ish. Since then she and David have met us on our adventure and we spent some time with them in D.C.
This weekend Becky spiced up our holiday by bringing her Salsa Dancing troop over for a bbq and fireworks.
We even had a guest dog!
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Makai was brightened up with flowers. They were so beautiful, I really enjoyed them.
We sailed the Hobie, enjoyed refreshing gin and tonics on the bow. Roy picked out a two cup set so he and I could both have a blue crab cup.
Chef David became a fireman when the sausage ignited the greasy grill.
Roy did a little fishing and crabbing, no luck though. The girls came out of their cocoons sporting new hair colors.
Genny with a purple stripe swinging from the spinnaker halyard.
If we were in the Bahamas she would have let go and taken a plunge, but with the threat of sea nettle jelly fish, she held on tight for a safe return. One morning we heard some teasing on the neighbors boat. A couple went for a swim and they guy mentioned feeling a jelly which sent the lady shooting out of the water in a panic while reprimanding him for teasing. It doesn’t sound so funny here on the blog, you had to be there.
Genny made friends with a neighboring boat and went Hobie sailing. Marie carefully sat on a surf board and paddled around. In the morning we woke up in the anchorage with three other boats and by afternoon the anchorage was packed waiting for the fireworks.
When we wait for the July 4th parade in Creede, CO an AT-6 WWII trainer plane flies over the crowd which starts the festivities with a big cheer. Here in St. Michaels we had two dinghies fly by.
I’ve never seen such a thing. Aliseo in Miami sells them and will even provide training. Be sure to bring your Sport Pilot License with you. I think we’ll keep our dinghy in the water.
Makai arrived in the anchorage several days early to secure a good location for the fireworks show. Since our friends on Lux got a late start, we offered a side tie. We met Terry and Peggy last July at their house in the western Chesapeake near Annapolis, MD. They and their partners on this Leopard Cat cruise it to the Bahamas every year where they leave it with a charter company.
Our friends on Whistling Cay told us they raft up all the time and then we started. It’s lots of fun!
Finally the event the whole bay has been waiting for, the July 4th fireworks.
We had people in the cockpit and up on the hard top. This was the display that wouldn’t quit. Every time we thought the last blast of pyrotechnics was the finale, a few more would start and off they go again.
We had a great weekend but are anxious to get the marina. After seven months of hiking for supplies, making water, watching the weather and now with the Chesapeake heating up and not being able to cool off, a much needed break awaits us at the marina. The wind is still out of the south so we tacked down to the Choptank River the first night and then to the Potomac the next day. One the way down we passed the USS Hannibal. The Hannibal served the US until 1944 when she was designated for target practice. In 1966 there wasn’t much left of the Hannibal so the Navy brought in the American Mariner and sunk it next to the wreck of the Hannibal. Out of tradition it is still referred to as the Hannibal and is still used for live target practice.
