Up early for a start from Solomons to Atlantic Yacht Basin (AYB) in Chesapeake, VA. We planned a two day trip with a stopover in Mobjack Bay for one last night on the anchor before calling it a year. |
Beautiful morning with calm seas welcomed us back onto the Chesapeake |
Sunrises like this make the O-Dark Thirty get up a lot easier to accept.... |
Welcoming us south in all her glory.... |
New Port Comfort told us we were getting close to our evening anchorage.... |
Found an anchorage with the setting sun.... |
unfortunately, it was reasonably quite putting the hook down... and then the 20 to 30 knot winds came up to rock us thru the rising sun! Michele even put her sea-bands on to wear to bed... |
But the sight of the blimp overhead in the morning gave us assurance that it was going to be a great new day! |
Several of these little guys with the BIG GUNS welcomed us back into the Hampton Roads area |
we weren't really this close..... but it seemed like it... |
yes, there real.... and BIG |
Cruise ship left shortly after we arrived... |
Statsraad Lehmkuhl, a Norwegian ship built in 1914 arrived shortly after we put into dock in Norfolk. All the little red figures are actually young seaman/women in training aboard the ship. They sung Norwegian songs as they climbed up the sails as she came into the dock!!! It was just starting to rain so they all had on their rain gear! |
The one Lock we need to clear near our winter storage marina (AYB) was broken so all south and north bound vessels had to hold for a few days. We waited out the broken lock until conditions were such that they would let a few boats thru at a time. |
Our friends Heather and Bill Caillet, developers and owners of the very successful Virginia Beach Woodcraft store joined us for the trip from Norfolk down to AYB. |
Bill took Command of Spirit Journey and put the Admiral right to work! |
Boats were 'stacked up' waiting their turns to get thru the broken locks.. |
Despite the lock situation we all had a great time and some very pretty views. Heather and Bill it turns out live just off this waterway. |
Bills confident that we'll make it thru before midnight.... and we did! But not by a lot..... |
Aerial of AYB... Spirit Journey spent the winter in one of the covered sheds in the upper part of the photo. |
AYB dock space on the ICW |