Once more unto the breach

We are under way westbound in the Albemarle Sound, breaking new ground for us as we begin the "Albemarle Loop," a cruise around the sound that involves a half dozen free docks, some with power and water. We've always been in too much of a hurry through here, or had too short a weather window, to do this cruise, and we are looking forward to it.

Vector tied to the town dock in Columbia, NC this evening. A pontoon boat is our only neighbor.

It's been a full week since I last posted here, and a busy one at that, so there is much to catch up. Starting where I left off, with "the plan."  We still don't really have much of one, but we have at least decided to continue south, albeit at a relaxed pace. We have neither a destination nor a schedule, leaving us the freedom to do some spontaneous side trips like this one.

Dolphins playing in our bow wave inbound to Hampton Roads. Always a good sign.

Just after I wrapped up my last post, we rounded Old Point Comfort, entering the very busy Hampton Roads area, where we both had our attention on the traffic and conditions. Our route south along the Elizabeth River shoehorns us between the security zone for the navy base, and the edge of the ship channel, and on this pass, a working dredge complicated matters by forcing us out to mid-channel, threading our way through the traffic, which included the USNS Red Cloud making her way out of port.

"The Lone Sailor," Norfolk. I snapped this on Veterans Day.

We had a fair tide from Old Point Comfort all the way to Portsmouth, and arrived at High Street Landing just as the 3:30 ferry was departing. We found exactly one available spot inside the basin, just long enough for Vector but involving squeezing in behind the ominous fake paddlewheel of a stored ferry (map). One boater ran onto the dock, gesticulating wildly that we were too large for the space, or something like that, and trying to wave us off. After it became clear I was ignoring his warnings, he came over to take lines and was miffed that we neither need nor wanted his help. It took me a long time to come alongside; regular readers may remember that the pilings stop short of our rub rails at many tide levels, and I had to land dead square on our fenders.

Vector squeezed in between a sailboat and the bulkhead. You can see the ferry to our port quarter.

After getting squared away, I carted the recycling off the boat and took a short walk around town to see what was new. The Dollar General store that we sometimes relied upon for milk or other essentials has closed up, along with the Gosport Tavern. A new craft brewery has taken up residence, as well as a chandlery called Mile Zero Marine; I could not figure out if they were in any way related to the Mile Zero Marine that folded up in town a decade ago.

Dollar General no longer. A crappy store, but I will miss the convenience.

In the evening we walked over to the Tidewater Marina, where Dorsey and Bruce had docked Esmeralde, to join them for dinner at the marina restaurant, Fish & Slips. Fellow boaters Tim and Diane, who live in the area, drove in to join us. It was a fun evening, and we enjoyed getting to know Diane and Tim.

I am even sadder about Gosport Tavern.

Monday was, of course, Veterans Day, and as had happened to us on Memorial Day a few years ago, we soon found ourselves surrounded by city employees setting up folding chairs and a lectern for the memorial celebration. They also cleaned out all the leaves in a hundred-yard radius. We set our chairs up on the aft deck to take in the event. Unlike the last time, when Fifth District Commander, Rear Admiral Laura Dickey, stopped by Vector for a chat afterwards, we had no such visit from the current Commander, Rear Admiral John Vann, who was the featured speaker.

RADM Vann delivers his remarks. The USS Kearsarge, LHD-3, makes a fitting backdrop in the BAE maintenance berth.

After the ceremony, Bruce dropped by with his very fancy antenna tester to help me diagnose a long-standing cross-talk problem with my VHF radios. Louise kept calling it a "play date." We spent maybe an hour on it, and identified a lash-up of connectors and barrels that was suspect. After Bruce left I immediately ordered new connectors to our next stop to see if that would help.

Post Secondary Brewing is a welcome addition. I did not have my growler with me when I came across it. Next visit.

In the afternoon I took the ferry to Norfolk to walk around. I found the Waterside entertainment complex, right next to the ferry dock, seems to have entered the same sort of slump that led to its demise a decade ago, before it was completely renovated. The MacArthur Center downtown shopping mall has one foot in the grave, and the two shopping "arcades" were dead quiet.

Through the window at Mile Zero Marine. They are clearly a Victron dealer.

I walked for the first time, after numerous Norfolk stops, to the Freemason Harbor area, where I found a decent dinghy landing and an oriental garden with a pagoda restaurant. Good to know for our next stay at Hospital Point. At dinner time we ended up right back at Fish & Slips with Bruce and Dorsey, this time sitting at the bar. It was prime rib night, which turned out to be quite good.

Freemason Harbor basin. Looks like a good place to land the dink. I wonder who'd complain if we docked Vector.

Tuesday was much cooler, and a quiet day. I had a nice morning walk with Bruce (another play date?), and a separate shorter walk with Louise. But the day's highlight had to be the aircraft carrier George H. W. Bush, CVN-77, passing us on its way north downriver from a maintenance berth at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth to an outfitting berth at the navy base on the Norfolk side. Two tugs pushing astern provided the propulsion and a pair at the bow assisted the steering, while a Seahawk helicopter orbited overhead on security detail. I joked with Bruce and Dorsey that the stern was still passing us as the bow was passing them.

USS George H. W. Bush passing High Street Landing.

In the evening the four of us walked down to High Street Pizza & Pour House for a farewell meal of deep dish pizza. It is uncharacteristic of any of us to spend this much contiguous time with another couple, between our evenings in DC and in Portsmouth. For whatever reason, it just comfortably happened this way this time, and we very much enjoyed the time we spent together. They've already left us far in their wake, and we won't see them again this season unless we end up stopping in Key West.

Her stern passing a long time later, revealing the two tugs serving as propulsion for this maintenance repositioning.

After three very pleasant days in Portsmouth, we dropped lines Wednesday morning, timing our departure to arrive at Top Rack Marina at slack water, as their fuel dock is perpendicular to the current. We gave ourselves extra time to slow roll against the tide, but our plans were derailed when we were first stopped by the Belt Line railroad bridge, and then stopped by Norfolk Southern Bridge 7 for an Amtrak train. When all was done it took us two full hours to run the seven miles from High Street to Top Rack.  Fortunately the current was still mild; we spent an hour bunkering 850 gallons and taking on water.

Monticello Arcade, Norfolk.

Esmeralde, meanwhile, left at first light for the run to Coinjock, and sounded a "Captain's Salute" on their whistle as they passed Vector. We were still snuggled under the electric blanket when we heard it, puzzling over the one long and two short blast signal, coming as it did, among the incessant one long, three short signals of the ferry. I'm sorry we were not on deck to give them a wave. The Norfolk/Portsmouth to Coinjock run is more typical than our slower-pace stop in Chesapeake, and Esmeralde had plenty of company.

Scope Arena and Chrysler Hall, Norfolk.

Lots of boats run faster than that, or get a later start than they did for whatever reason, and we had some mighty annoyed skippers waiting with us at Belt Line and Bridge 7, worried they'd miss out on the last of the prime rib at the Coinjock Marina restaurant. Most of them blew past us under way, and whoever did not, including the sailboats, all passed us while we were bunkering. But the joke was on them, because in the middle of the pack was the tug Gold Coast, pushing a loaded bunker barge. The tug and barge went right to the head of the line at the lock, and nothing else can lock through with a red flag load.

Oriental Gardens park and pagoda restaurant, Norfolk.

We arrived at the lock for the 3:30 locking, and everyone who had passed us before noon was still in the lock waiting to be locked through. That meant they'd all be waylaid by the rush hour lockdown at the Centerville Turnpike bridge and would not get through there until 6pm, well after dark. Not only did they miss the prime rib, they missed dinner altogether, and had to run Currituck Sound in the dark. The smartest among them called it a day and stopped at Atlantic Yacht Basin.

These two exotics were parked outside a $10 haircut joint in downtown Norfolk. I saw one of the drivers go in. Gotta save somewhere to make those car payments.

Adding insult to injury, we were late enough to the lock that the "good" starboard side, which is lined with rubber fendering, was full, and the lockmaster instructed us to come all the way forward on the port side and fender for the concrete wall. That meant that we passed every single boat and were the second to leave the lock, right after the boat immediately to our starboard. All the delay meant we arrived to the free bulkhead in Great Bridge just before 4pm to find it completely empty, and we had our pick of spots, taking the one closest to the bridge (map). Three sailboats that had locked through with us tied up behind us.

A pizza place in Norfolk is using Cushmans as delivery vehicles. Clever.

With plenty of time before dinner I made a quick walk through town to see what was new. The nice walkway along the docks has been finished, complete with spiffy walkway lighting. A new pizza joint has opened just a short walk from the wall, but they serve no beer. I picked up a few things at Dollar Tree and a couple of bagels for the morning at Panera Bread, forgetting there is a much better bagel place across the canal. We walked together to Vino for dinner, our current favorite in town and closest to the dock.

Classic steakhouse in a classic building, Norfolk.

We had planned on a two-day stay here, which is nominally all the city allows, and as such I had Amazon items coming to the nearby locker on Thursday, knowing they might be late enough that I would not be able to pick them up until Friday morning just before departure. So we had all day Thursday in town, and we started the day with a provisioning run to the nearby Kroger.

USS Wisconsin, BB-64, has a lot of holiday lights. I'm sorry I could not see it at night.

Later in the day, before the rain started, I walked around town again, stopping at Walgreens for my flu shot and picking up some much better bagels at NY Bagels across the canal. High spring tides had the lock closed for a few hours in the middle of the day, and our entertainment was listening to the effects of this on the radio. 

High Street Basin. The sailboat that was in front of us left. The parked ferry also went out and then came back, we assume for a routine engine run. It pushed us hard against our fenders.

It was raining all afternoon and I got some rainy-day projects done, including fixing the fresh water pump switch, which was "bouncing" and causing the pump to stutter toward the end of its cycle. When dinner time rolled around it was still raining, and we opted to just go right back to Vino because it was close. My Amazon delivery, as I had predicted, occurred well after dinner and I opted to wait till morning, after the rain, to pick it up.

I'd love to have seen this happen. Someone's bow smashed the nice new rails on the Portsmouth river walk.

Friday morning we ought to have been shoving off, but a forecast of high winds on Currituck sound along with a gale warning and small craft advisory had us remain in port, overstaying our welcome but with a "safe harbor" weather excuse. As if we needed any confirmation, just before they again closed the lock due to high water, the tug and barge Royal Engineer locked through, but then tied to the dolphins just west of us, announcing he was staying put due to high winds on Currituck Sound.

Us, some sailboats, and the Royal Engineer waiting out weather in Great Bridge.

The decision to stay an extra day gave me plenty of time for a leisurely stroll to the Amazon locker for my vhf connectors and some LED indicators I want to add to the transfer switch. I opened up the locker and removed three packages, closing the locker back up before realizing I was only expecting two items, and I had expected them to arrive in a single box.

I stopped in the hardware store to look at wood trim and I grabbed some free popcorn. They're putting it in the same bags they use for self-serve nuts and bolts, with blanks on the back for quantity, SKU, and price. I'm sure these are not food-service rated. Grease stains indicate freshness.

A quick inspection revealed that I had my own package, which I opened immediately in order to discard the outer packaging, as well as two other packages addressed to two other individuals. I stuffed those in my pack unopened so I could return them to Amazon, puzzled that the Amazon delivery person would indiscriminately stuff multiple items into a single locker.

When I got home I opened a chat with Amazon about the extra packages, and the chatbot cheerily told me to just keep them. It collected no information about them, so I foresee Amazon chats from those two recipients as well. One package turned out to be a women's thermal shirt, size small, which Louise is forwarding to our size small niece, who skis. And the other turned out to be, umm, well, I'll just post a photo of the label.

I Googled all the numbers but can't tell if this is "natural," clear, or rainbow color.

Out of an abundance of curiosity we Googled the intended recipient, a lovely young lady who lives in the area. There is absolutely no non-creepy way to reunite her with her lost love, especially considering she likely had reasons for sending it to a locker rather than her home. We hope she achieves satisfaction at a later date. The item is still in its unopened shrink-wrapped package and we are mulling over to whom we should send it; certainly we can not just drop it at Goodwill. The whole episode, along with reactions to a social media post about it, was our entertainment all afternoon.

I made the mistake of starting the VHF connector replacement late in the afternoon, only to discover after cutting off the old one that the new ones do not fit the cable. They need to go back to Amazon, but I also had to jury-rig things to get the radio working again after cutting off what had been a working connector. Fortunately I have some universal coax splices in my kit for just such emergencies and I was able to patch it back together by day's end. We walked across the canal to Buckets Bar and Grill for dinner, which had surprisingly good burgers and Vienna Lager on draft.

Albemarle sound towards the latter half of today's cruise. It seldom looks like this.

Yesterday morning we dropped lines for the 0800 opening of Great Bridge Bridge to run the gauntlet of three diabolically-spaced bridges. Fortunately, on the weekends the middle bridge, Centerville Turnpike, opens on demand, and so we were able to get through at 0825 instead of 0830 and had a more comfortable, but still high-RPM, run to the North Landing Bridge. Once through that at 9am we throttled back to our most leisurely cruise speed and had a very pleasant run all the way to the North River.

Three sailboats that had made the two bridges right behind us called to ask if that was our normal cruise speed, as I think they wanted to run just a little faster. But when they learned we draw 6', they all decided to stay right behind us and let us blaze the trail. We were like the mother duck all the way to Coinjock, with our three ducklings behind. They all peeled off at Coinjock Marina and we had the channel to ourselves the rest of the day. Once in the embayment that is the mouth of the river, we pulled off to Camden Bay for northwesterly protection and dropped the hook (map). We had three sailboat neighbors overnight.

Last night's sunset over Camden Bay, North River.

This morning we made our way back to the channel to cross the bar out into the Albemarle Sound, then made a hard right and set course for the Scuppernong River, which leads to the small community of Columbia, NC. I started typing this mid-sound, but I had to set it down as we approached the bar of the Scuppernong.

Approaching the Scuppernong in calm conditions.

Both our charts and local knowledge told us there is a very narrow bar channel with 7' of depth, and while the lowest we saw was 7.9', the channel was narrow indeed. Once across the bar things opened up, and we cruised another 45 minutes upriver, tying up at the town dock just before the fixed bridge (map). The town, along with the other six stops on the "Albemarle loop," offers 48 hours of free dockage to visiting cruisers. It's an older dock, but it has working 50-amp power and a water spigot.

Town Commons, right next to the dock, with Main Street behind. Louise for scale.

Sadly, there is not a single restaurant in town open on Sunday evening, and even if one of the three options had been open, none serves beer. We verified this with a short walk around town on arrival, and set our expectations for leftovers aboard. I returned ashore stag for a beer run to the nearby Food Lion, and then a lovely walk along the boardwalk trail through the cypress wetland of the Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge. I'm sorry we missed the visitor center there.

Boardwalk nature trail.

While it is nice to have the power and we are allowed another night here, nothing is calling us to stay in this town, and so in the morning we will cast off lines and head across the sound to one of the other stops. The two western-most stops are not Vector-friendly, and so we will head either to Edenton or to Albemarle Plantation. We're looking forward to stops with at least one dining option.

Some maintenance may be in order.

We've learned our friends Stacey and Dave aboard Stinkpot are headed in this general direction, aiming for the Dismal Swamp Canal, which will let them out at Elizabeth City. That's our final stop on the Albemarle Loop, so we are adjusting our timing to intersect with them there. That will be almost a week before Thanksgiving, but we are now giving serious consideration to a standing offer for Thanksgiving dinner together, which would mean tagging along with them wherever for a week. Unless they go someplace too skinny for us (see, they always have an out if they need it), that's as good a plan as any.

Overtaken by events

We are underway southbound in the Chesapeake Bay, bound for Hampton Roads and the greater Norfolk area. I know in my last post I said we'd already be there by Friday, and, soon after, heading south across the Albermarle Sound. That plan was, as they say, overtaken by events.

I found this 10' tall sign in Urbanna, at the town park near the community pool and playground. It feels like the right way to open this post.

I don't generally bring up politics in this blog, and I don't want to start now, so I will stick to how it affects us and our plans. Suffice it to say we were reeling after we woke to Wednesday's news. We started through the stages of grief, and before cooler heads prevailed, there were discussions of fueling up and pointing the boat out into the Atlantic, or at least turning around. Continuing south into parts of the country, and I include here our own domicile of Florida, where we've never felt entirely welcome and now do not feel entirely safe suddenly seemed like deliberately steaming off the edge of the world.

Louise standing in a giant sculpture of watermen's boots outside the art gallery in Irvington.

What we knew for sure was that we needed to get off the Potomac, and so after crying, cursing, and coffee we weighed anchor and continued downriver with all due haste. About mid-cruise the plotter was saying we could not make the mouth in the daylight, and so we set our sights on a new stop for us, the Coan River, where there are a handful of anchorages and we would have protection from the wind.

We did not need to go far in for the protection we needed, and we dropped the hook just off a set of oyster beds just inside the entrance (map). The experience was a far cry from our first attempt to enter this river, when we were very, very green and got ourselves beat up on the Chesapeake. Back then we only had a chartplotter with NOAA charts that did not have sufficient detail or accuracy to make the entrance safely. Both the cartography and our skills have come a long way since then. We had a nice dinner on board, and did not even splash the tender to walk around the small community of Lewisetta.

Even in the age of cell phone maps, I like to find these visitor maps in town.

By the end of the day we had more of our wits about us, and decided we would continue south, but remain in Virginia, at least until our heads were in a different place or we had a better idea of where we wanted to be. From where we were anchored on the Coan, it would have been an easy cruise around the corner to Reedville, with an anchorage, a free dock, and a couple of dining options. Or a longer cruise to a familiar anchorage on Jackson Creek, in Deltaville. In the morning we decided to get underway and make the decision at the turn around Smith Point.

The Irvington visitor center, in what I assume to be a historic train depot. I am standing in the historic Irvington Town Commons, 

The final leg on the Potomac gave me time to look at the charts. The "necks" of Virginia comprise an enormous cruising ground, and while we've done the length of some of the major rivers like the James and the Potomac, we often just poke in to some of these rivers far enough to find anchorage off the bay. And while I am eager to get back to civilization -- Norfolk was really supposed to be just a few days from DC -- we realized that the decision to remain in Virginia meant we could slow down and maybe do something new.

And so it was that, rather than either Reedville or Deltaville, we decided instead to turn up the Rappahannock. We were already familiar with many of the towns, from the many months we spent in Deltaville and the numerous times we crossed the river on the Robert O. Norris bridge, but we'd never actually cruised the river in the boat. We made our way under the aforementioned bridge, just squeezing under one of the northern spans, and turned into Carter Creek, in the small community of Irvington. We pulled off in the first usable spot and dropped the hook (map).

Sitting outside waiting for The Dredge to open.

We knew that there was at least a resort with a restaurant and a dock, but after some research we found a public boat ramp with a small dock that was not listed in our cruising database. That turned out to be the old steamboat landing; we landed the tender there and walked the half mile into town. We stopped into the small but upscale convenience store, Livi's, before they closed, where I found a four-pack of a lovely Baltic porter, and then made a big circuit of the historic town. We are in the part of the country where the small waterfront towns are three centuries old or more.

Vector anchored in Urbanna Creek.

We eschewed the resort restaurants in favor of a small place in town called The Dredge, appropriately so as Irvington is on the Virginia Oyster Trail, and Rappahannock oysters are famous. The place was cute, the service was attentive, and they had some nice draft beers, but my crab cake and Louise's flounder were both disappointing. I would not hesitate to return to try some of the other options, though. We arrived just before they opened at 5 and there was already a line, but most patrons headed for the bar.

On Friday we weighed anchor at the turn of the tide around mid-day for a short cruise upriver to Urbanna, which our guides said was a very cruiser-friendly place with a comfortable anchorage. We arrived to find that pretty full, but were able to squeeze into a spot between a mooring ball and a daymark (map).

The old tobacco building, now a visitor center and free museum. I made a donation.

We splashed the tender and I headed ashore to the free town dinghy dock to explore. It took me just an hour to see the whole town, finding more restaurants than Google knew about, and scoping out the small grocery store and the nice library, where I rested in a comfy chair while using their WiFi. Early in my walk I stumbled into the town museum, in a 300-year-old tobacco-counting building, and admired their copy of the famous 1755 John Mitchell Map. They have one of the surviving third impressions of the first edition of the map, which they happened upon serendipitously and had exquisitely restored. The docent lamented that the town does not do enough to promote this fantastic artifact.

Best shot I could get of the Mitchell Map through the UV plexi. It is incredibly detailed.

After my walk I ran the tender upriver to the Saluda boat ramp, where it would be a mile and a half walk to the town of Saluda, where there is a Food Lion, Tractor Supply, and Dollar General. If we put the mast down, Vector could also squeeze under the Urbanna bridge to access a much larger anchorage if need be, for example as a storm measure.

In the evening we returned ashore together and walked to Mi Jalisco on the edge of town for some excellent Mexican food and draft beers. Even though we arrived at 5:30, the place was packed,  and we were lucky to get a table. By the time we left, the line was out the door. It was a short walk back to the IGA Urbanna Market to provision on our way home; the market was small but well-stocked and we found all that we needed.

Mi Jalisco on my walk. It was packed when we arrived later.

Overnight the winds picked up to over 25 knots, and we added more scope at 3:30am, making that anchorage upriver of the bridge look more attractive. We did have plenty of swing room still, and we went back to bed. Winds were still high yesterday morning, pinning us down in Urbanna, and by lunch time we had more or less decided to just stay another night, especially since the tide would become unfavorable in the early afternoon.

Free dinghy dock, with Vector in the background.

That plan changed when we learned our friends Dorsey and Bruce aboard Esmeralde, who left DC a couple of days after us, were just coming off the Potomac and headed for Stingray Point in Deltaville. We were hoping to see them one more time before they zip off to the Keys for the season, and we knew if they passed us that would be the end of it. So when the winds laid down almost completely at 1pm, we weighed anchor and headed back down the Rappahannock.

We can't really get into Broad Creek, off the Rappahannock, where they were headed. The entrance channel is narrow and shallow, and there's really no place to anchor once inside. So we continued out the Rappahannock against the tide, curled around Stingray Point, and headed back in to the familiar Piankatank. It's an extra ten miles vs. Broad Creek, but the channel is deep and the anchorage is large, and we are extremely familiar with both. We arrived to find the anchorage packed, but we headed right for a known spot that was open and dropped the hook (map).

At the Urbanna Boatyard. Hard to believe neither the owner nor the yard trimmed this vine when it first took hold.

Long-time readers may remember that we spent several months here across three visits to the boatyard here, hence the familiarity. Back then the boatyard also had a marina, which had a dinghy dock that was free to use, but required a small fee for access to the facilities like the lounge, laundry, rest rooms, and loaner bikes. The boatyard owner sold off the marina operation a couple of years ago; basic dinghy access is now $5 and there is some charge above that for facilities. A year or so before the change in ownership, the Deltaville Tap Room and Raw Bar, which we used to patronize when it was over on Broad Creek, moved in to space in the marina building formerly occupied by a brokerage. Back then the marina offered courtesy dockage to patrons dining at the restaurant, their tenant.

Evidently the new marina owners and the restaurateurs do not get along, and dockage is no longer offered; the marina is rife with signage saying absolutely no restaurant dockage, a fact we learned only after we were already almost to the anchorage. We decided we'd just tie up at the boatyard, where we "know the owners" and which we knew would be closed anyway. As it turned out, the dinghy dock was still available and we just used that instead, dutifully walking to the office as directed to pay our $5. That turned out to be closed; oh well.

Another identical watermen boot sculpture in Urbanna. I assume these are the trademark of the Oyster Trail and each community paints one. You step in from the back and there is actually a little platform inside -- they're huge.

Saturday turns out to be prime rib night at the Tap Room, so of course we had to split a piece. It was so good that we lamented we ordered the middle of three sizes rather than the largest. The cheesecake was pretty good, too, and they had one of my favorite beers, Legend Brown, on draft. We strolled around the very familiar boatyard after dinner just for a stretch, lit only by moonlight and the headlamps of boat owners working on their hauled-out boats. We decked the tender as soon as we returned, for an early departure.

The Tap Room was busy. I remember the tables and the boat transom from the other location.

This morning we weighed anchor right after coffee and headed back out. Esmeralde also got an early start from Broad Creek, and they passed us as we were coming out of the Piankatank. They'll be in Portsmouth a full two hours or more ahead of us, but we'll get a chance to see them again either tonight or tomorrow. We met them for the first time on this very leg and in this very place six years ago, almost to the day, and it's been a hoot intersecting with them at various other places in our cruising itineraries.

Today started out nicely, but seas built as the day wore on, and in the middle of the cruise we very nearly decided to bail to Yorktown, where we'd be pinned down for a while. I checked in with captain Dorsey, who was a full hour ahead of us by then, and the report back was that seas were starting to lay down, so we soldiered on. At one point I reduced RPM down to 1350 to avoid slamming into them, but I am glad we pressed on because things are much better now that we're just four miles from Old Point Comfort.

The "other" Chesapeake Inn, in Urbanna. IYKYK.

The plotter is saying we'll arrive to High Street Landing around 3:30, where we are hoping there will still be a spot. That's a long shot; we seem to be mid-pack in the last wave of the migration and at least a dozen boats have been southing around us. If not we will backtrack a half mile to the Hospital Point anchorage.

I honestly don't know what's next. We might spend a few days anchored near Norfolk, or we might cruise the James again or just bum around Hampton Roads for a while. At some point we will need to to to Chesapeake for fuel, and maybe by then we will be ready to continue south. I had planned on a round of doctor appointments in Florida this season, and I still need to do something about that. Stay tuned, and I will post the plan when we have one.

Electing to depart

We are downbound on the Potomac River, having dropped lines in Washington, DC this morning at the turn of the tide. While I wrote in the last post that we'd be here perhaps a week or so, in fact today marks one day over two weeks, owing largely to pleasant weather and the arrival of dear friends. Before anyone asks, election day and any potential mayhem that may go along with it was not a factor in our decision to leave today, it's just high time to be moving further south before any truly cold weather sets in. As it happens, today is gorgeous and in the 70s.

This bald eagle was watchful as we passed fairly close aboard. May the republic be as steadfast.

When last I posted, we were upbound for the Alexandria Municipal Marina, where we tied up on a T-head that is pretty much the only spot there where we fit (map). We were all secure by 3:30, which gave us plenty of time in town. I set out on foot to see what had changed since our last visit, wherein we had arrived via the Metro from DC. The most obvious change of note is that the final two blocks of King Street have been cordoned off into a pedestrian mall, expanding the outside dining areas of the dozen or so restaurants there. We assume this to be the permanent result of pandemic-era outside dining expansion.

The easternmost two blocks of King are now a lovely pedestrian space.

It was a gorgeous evening and we ended up at one of those very tables, at Emmy Squared Pizza. They make thick Detroit-style pizza, which was quite good, and we enjoyed the people-watching on the street. We walked around a bit more after dinner. The historic downtown adjacent to the waterfront is arguably a nicer dockside neighborhood than the bustling Wharf development in DC.

Vector docked in Alexandria. National Harbor is to the left, and to the right, behind her, is the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

Monday morning we dropped lines at the last of the flood for the short three mile cruise to the Washington Channel. On our previous visits we've anchored for nearly the entirety of the visit, but this time we decided to indulge in the luxury of a dock at the somewhat reduced weekly rate. This decision proved prescient, as we noted the small anchorage was packed to the gills. On our last visit I wrote there was room for at most four boats, but we counted six. We backed in to our assigned slip (map) and were secured along side right at noon.

Full house in the Washington Channel anchorage.

We found our friends Dori and Bob, along with their dog Cali, aboard their lovely Ocean Alexander Liberdade, already docked at the club one pier over. We made plans to have dinner at the club later in the week; it was a nice evening that ended with some relatively soft live music, They introduced us to Anne and Sam that evening, also docked at the club aboard their North Pacific Samannetics.

Vector from the rooftop bar atop the Canopy by Hilton hotel.

The club is centrally located along The Wharf, a mixed-use development comprising offices, several hotels, residential buildings, a music venue, and lot of bars, restaurants, and clubs, along with a handful of other shops. I described this in great detail the last time around, so suffice it to say the parts that were unfinished then have since been filled in and the whole complex has become a vibrant part of the district. In addition to the yacht club, we also sampled Kirwans (Irish pub), Lucky Buns (burgers), Gordon Ramsey's Hell's Kitchen (high end American fare), and Lupo Marino (casual Italian).

A nice duo serenades us at the Capital Yacht Club bar.

In addition to those several sit-down meals, I also picked up take-out at Chopsmiths (salads and sandwiches, including breakfast) and Grazie Grazie (Italian deli sandwiches). That accounted for two dinners on evenings when Louise, who came down with a cold mid-stay, did not feel like leaving the boat, and also bagel sandwiches for breakfast on a couple of days. Like everything at The Wharf, the prices were high even for DC, but the convenience could not be beat. All of our meals at the Wharf were good, if not excellent, and I would not hesitate to return. Lucky Buns has a very limited menu, so you really have to be in that mood.

American Constitution docked at The Wharf. She had passed us at anchor a few days earlier.

One experience we'll definitely skip next time is dining out near the Safeway grocery store, where we walked our second day for a few provisions. We had planned to eat at a Korean joint called Momo, but as soon as we were seated, indoors I might add, Louise was being eaten alive by mosquitoes. So we went instead to Station 4, where the service was terrible, the decor gaudy, the prices sky-high, and the food just average.

This newer catamaran cruise ship took Constitution's place a few days later.

I had a lot of work to do while we were here, including finishing the work on the flybridge ladder as well as replacing the transfer switch that had a bit of a meltdown before we arrived. I tried to work every morning until lunch time, and after lunch I hoofed it around town to visit my favorite museums, monuments, and neighborhoods. In the evenings, we would go out someplace together.

A sure sign we need to move south -- the ice rink has been setup at The Wharf, and one at the Smithsonian as well.

On three of those evenings, we opted to scope out some neighborhoods that might be decent places for an extended stay; while it is not on the horizon, we are starting to think ahead to what comes after the boat, and DC is one of the cities where we can see ourselves settling in for a while. We explored Dupont Circle, where we dined al fresco at Mission, offering Mexican fare. We explored Cleveland Park, which we remembered from a previous visit and where we dined at Thai favorite Siam. And we visited "NoMa," where we had the least expensive meal of our entire visit at Andy's Pizza, but the neighborhood itself did not call us.

I arrived stag ahead of Louise at Dupont Circle after a day of walking and I needed a restroom. This was the answer; it's free, but you need to open it with your cell phone. A bit reminiscent of the J.C. Decaux fixtures in our former home town, San Jose.

We also took one evening out to visit our reciprocal club in town, the very upscale Army-Navy Club. The club was very nice, and the food was excellent, but we wish we had booked the much nicer formal dining room, jacket and tie required, than the causal Eagle Grill, which turned out to be in a windowless basement level. We'll keep that in mind if we return.

Leaving the Army-Navy club. We forgot to take a photo inside.

As the end of our pre-booked first week rolled around, I still had half-finished projects all over the boat, Louise was under the weather, neither of us felt "finished" with DC, and we also learned that good friends Dorsey and Bruce would be headed upriver for a DC stop of their own on their lovely American Tug, Esmeralde. So we extended our stay until "at least Friday," which later became "at least Monday, or maybe Tuesday."

We stopped for a drink one evening in the bar at the Waldorf-Astoria, in the historic Old Post Office. Afternoon Tea was being served behind us, complete with a harpist.

On Wednesday, Esmeralde arrived, steaming up the Washington Channel in regal style. Louise was at the worst of her cold, and just waved from the aft deck while I went to help them tie up. The three of us ended up eating together at Lucky Buns that evening, while Louise, who couldn't taste anything anyway, stayed home and subsisted on gruel.

Esmeralde steaming up the Washington Channel.

I ended up walking all over town with Bruce and Dorsey. It was nice to have the company, and they were appreciative of someone who already mostly knew his way around. My step count went up once they hit town, starting right off with a long walk around the Capitol. By Thursday evening Louise was feeling better, and we all headed over to the Navy Yard neighborhood, another on our short list, and had a nice dinner at Circa. We had booked the classic Old Ebbitt Grill near the White House, but evidently they had a pipe burst and waved us off early in the afternoon.

What a difference a half month makes. One lone boat in the anchorage.

One night Dorsey and Bruce fed us aboard Esmeralde, perhaps the best meal of the trip. We also got to enjoy the company of Maisie and Ollie, who were willing to shower us with affection -- and fur. And we all did finally circle back to Old Ebbitt Grill for our last night in town, where, again, the food and service was excellent.

Enjoying a glass of port aboard Esmeralde after the Old Ebbitt Grill.

On the project front I finished the flybridge ladder project, which involved more sanding and varnishing, caulking all the seams, fitting replacement panels at the hatchway itself, and then replacing all the trim and the retractable hatch screen. The parts for the transfer switch were delivered to me at the club and that came together after many hours; I think I may write that up as a dedicated blog post. (My torque wrench did not survive the process, so I now have something else to fix.) I also repaired our weather station using a hangar queen from eBay.

Ladder complete.

When I wasn't working I made it to the National Air and Space Museum, which is down to less than half its normal size due to renovations, the National Museum of American History, the Spy Museum, the National Archives, the Jefferson Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, and several of the war memorials. I also rode out to Crystal City for one last look at the "underground" mall connecting all the buildings, which literally closed for good this month. After that bit of nostalgia I walked to Pentagon City, more of a going concern, before riding back to the Wharf. I passed a number of big-box stores, including Costco, on my walk.

Introducing Blair Leslie, archaeologist from Rio de Janeiro. The "cover" I was issued at the Spy Museum. I really wanted to see their whizzy new building, but the whole experience fell short of the $35 admission. 

That maybe sounds like not a lot for a two week visit, and that's probably right for a first visit. But after nearly two full months in DC across two previous visits in Vector, not to mention previous visits in Odyssey and having come here on and off for most of my life, there's not a lot left on the "must see" list, leaving me to casually wander back to my favorites. If you want to read my write-up of more museums and memorials and see more photos around town, feel free to read through these previous posts:

2018 visit, part 1

2018 visit, part 2

2015 visit, part 1

2015 visit, part 2

We returned home one evening to find paramedics on the dock with a gurney and the fireboat two slips down (where Esmeralde eventually docked). Apparently someone on the superyacht at the end of the pier took ill.

I enjoyed meeting blog readers Joel, who keeps his boat at the Yacht Club, and Glenn, who works in DC and was wandering through The Wharf. And yesterday as a last hurrah I walked out to and around the Washington Navy Yard, a walk of perhaps five miles, taking in the goings-on along the Anacostia, including the spiffy new bridge.

The new Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge over the Anacostia. The through arches on either side only connect below the road deck.

This morning after taking on water and offloading the trash and recycling, we settled our account at the yacht club and said our good-byes to Dorsey and Bruce, who are staying on another day or two, before dropping our lines. Fittingly, just as we were approaching Mount Vernon, we passed a bald eagle perched regally atop a channel buoy. We've had the river almost entirely to ourselves, and the fall color has been delightful, if a bit distant to capture with a cell phone camera.

George Washington's Mount Vernon, in the autumn color.

Update: We are anchored in the Potomac off Stuart Point, just downriver of Fairview Beach (map). We had a fair current most of the day and pushed just the last hour against the flood. With south winds it is flat calm here, and the peace and quiet is a stark contrast from the hustle and bustle of DC. In the morning we will leave on the ebb and should be close to the mouth of the Potomac when we end our day. By Thursday we will be southbound on the Chesapeake Bay, and I expect we will be in the Hampton Roads area on Friday. That's a busy area and I don't expect I'll get back to the blog until we are in the North River and crossing Albemarle Sound in about a week's time.

We anchored just as the sun went down. I tried to catch the afterglow, with the moon and Venus at upper left.

Now please enjoy these photos that I took around DC; I had 50 photos (out of maybe four times that many in my camera roll) for this post, far too many to put in-line:

The outdoor sculpture garden at the Hirshorn Museum has been removed for a facelift.

The carousel on the mall is also missing on account of renovations.

Speaking of missing, the catenary wires have been gone from this rail spur into the city for years, but the very permanent warning signs remain. Freight and the Virginia Rail Express use this line.

Obligatory shot of the Capitol through the mall. Smithsonian tower at right. The crane is the one working the Hisrshorn sculpture garden; the garden is much lower than that, but the crane needs to be able to swing completely over the Hirshorn Museum.

General William Tecumseh Sherman. One of the few monuments in Presidents Park still accessible to the public. Alexander Hamilton just a few dozen yards away is off limits. 

That's Alex at left, outside the south entrance to the Treasury Building. This is the oldest agency building in the capital; only the White House and the Capitol have been occupied longer. It appears on the $10 bill.

The view down Pennsylvania Avenue to the Capitol. Willard hotel at left, Old Post Office Tower with the Bells of Congress on right.

The north entrance of the White House partly obscured by the reviewing stand being constructed for the inauguration. That's Old Hickory on the horse.

Casey Jones was one of my childhood heroes. This was his original grave marker, before his story became larger than life and he got a granite monument.

I'd like to think Erin Sills might also be someone's childhood hero. This is the BMW S 1000 RR on which she broke the land speed record. 

The original studio model of the original USS Enterprise.

A collection of studio vehicles from James Bond films. It was a $10 add-on at the Spy museum which took all of ten minutes to see.

This pair of electric GSA fleet vehicles is out from of the Department of Energy building.

Cardinal represent! IYKYK.

This original costume was in an exhibit on entertainment. I hope it stays that way.

Robert Pirsig's actual Honda from Zen and the Art.

A section of the Greensboro lunch counter. I cried.

Inside the cavernous Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center. My camera could not get it all.

The rotunda of the National Archives. Those are the actual Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights in the cases. I cried here, too.

Darlington Fountain in Judiciary Square. Those are the DC Courts of Appeals behind her. Behind me is the courthouse where judge Tanya Chutkan is presiding over an historic case.

Walking to NoMa on this raised pedestrian path I encountered my first and only homeless encampment on this visit.

Inside the Queen City sculpture commemorating the 1941 seizure of black-owned lands, across from the Amazon HQ in Arlington. See link for description.

I came across this 9/11 Pentagon attack retrospective in the Pentagon City shopping center.

Another obligatory shot, standing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

Nicola Tesla is spinning in his grave. Across from Audi Field.

These Limes were fished out of the Anacostia.

I did not recognize it when I saw this at the Navy Yard a few years ago, but now it is unmistakable to me: this Vietnam-era "swift boat" is basically an offshore workboat with armament added.

Actual gas lamps inside Old Ebbitt Grill, even though the current space only dates back to 1983. This was right above my head.