Thursday, July 28, 2011

Options & Procrastination

We left our cushy slip at Lankford Bay on Sunday morning.  After 3 days in the searing heat (high 90's to over 100 with heat indexes in the 110-115 range...we were in a quandary.....where is this path leading us?  That brought us to 'do we stay or do we go'?  I stewed and we discussed our options.

1. Put the boat in a marina and fly home for a month... that would be not only pricey but a logistical nightmare (no car and most cheaper marinas are far from a grocery store let alone an airport).

2. Find a marina here for a month....much cheaper than for a few days at a time.  You can get an entire month for the price of 4-5 nights (if you go to an out of the way marina or town), but then we would be stuck in the same place for a month without a car and we have a hard time staying in the same place for 3 days let alone a month. We have definitely found we are not the type of cruisers who can just 'veg out' and sit for days on the boat at anchor.  (That may be a bad sign)

3. Start heading back south now and hope we beat the hurricane gamble.

Well, we procrastinated on any rash decisions long enough for the heat to break (Monday night) and it has been great so far this week.  If only it would last!  Another heat wave is coming Friday but right now, at this moment, (this could also change at any moment) we are planning on sticking around the Bay for the near future.  We bought a 12 volt fan for the aft cabin yesterday and the Breeze Booster seems to help...but ONLY if there is a BREEZE...which hasn't been often in this kind of heat.

Sunday we decided not to head up the Chester River to Chestertown as planned ( we were mid point in our options discussions and heading South was at the top of the list) but headed to Kent Island Narrows. We didn't get far ashore but the waterway itself was lively with lots of boat traffic and tiki bar restaurants and marinas.  The biggest difference we noticed was that unlike Annapolis where sails are king Kent Island Narrows is a mecca for powerboats and is a major boating center on the East Shore.
We spent the night peacefully anchored just off of Prospect Bay south of the narrows and dinghied into Owl's Tiki Bar to listen to the band.  There were lots of people there that had travelled miles to see Kelly McGuire singer songwriter and John Patti on Steel Drums, a 'Parrot Head' band from Texas.  I checked out Kelly's web site.  He plays everywhere from Canada to Mexico. It was an unexpected treat to get in on the show.
We left the Narrows on Monday afternoon headed back to the West Shore but we were detered by a big storm coming across so we tucked in near Knapps Narrows another "narrow" waterway that connects 2 bays.  The storm skirted us and we ended up having a quiet night until the crabbers woke us up at 5am.  You would think I would be used to it by now!
Bright and early Tuesday morning we headed across the Chesapeake for Solomons.  At the time we figured we were heading south and we hadn't been to Solomons and we wanted to see it.  Well what can I say except I like it...a lot.  We are on a mooring ball, we have the use of a beautiful pool, bicycles, courtesy transportation, I feel like I am in Club Med.  We met up with Gwen and Walter whom we haven't seen in almost 2 months!  Right now things are going well, we've met some new cruising friends via Gwen & Walter and hopefully the forecasted heat for this week doesn't occur.  We are heading for shore today to explore a little now that we have the darn grocery shopping completed and the new fan installed!  
Maybe procrastinating is working for us!!

The Big Owl Tiki Bar....from a rocking Dinghy

More Restaurants and Fish Houses

Most Popular Tiki Bar 'Red Eyes Dock Bar'

Piney Narrows Marina Condominiums...your house in your slip!  About 6 of these covered slip buildings.  HUGE!

Small Cruise Ship that passed us looked pretty desolate not one person except in the pilot house.

Cove Point Lighthouse....Solomons

Cliffs on the bay approaching the Paxutent River and Solomons Island

Back on the Big Boy bikes loaned by Zhanisers Yachting Center included in our mooring ball fee.

Scene from the bike path on the road the Paxutent river off in the distance.  Crops in the field.

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