Yoko and Jacob and Sally - part one

Staten Island Ferry:  See the Coast Guard boat accompanying our ferry?  There is a guy with 

a loaded machine gun mounted on the front.  Yikes.

Today we went in to the city via train and the free Staten Island Ferry.  We had a great adventure at MOMA and with a friend from Dublin, Sally Andre.  I like walking around New York.  The energy is exciting.  First, we walked to the 9-11 Memorial and saw the new building.

Quite beautiful to come around the corner and see this.

Then we took the subway uptown and walked to MOMA.  We saw the fascinating and complex Yoko Ono show.  There was performance art and music and film and poetry from the 1960s.  I really didn't know much about Ono's art, so I learned a good bit by experiencing her work.  At first it seemed violent and scary.  For example, there was a film in which she knelt and people in the audience came forward and used large scissors to cut off pieces of her clothing.  I felt threatened by the danger of the gleaming scissors. It seemed as if she were making a statement about women's being attacked or parts being cut away or not valued.  In a different section she had instructions for writing poetry and ideas for art.  One of her themes is helping the audience make their own art, not just observe hers.  

Some ideas were whimsical. 

This one made me laugh out loud.  I saw her lighter side in these.

We met a Dublin, GA, friend, Sally Andre, for lunch at MOMA.  So fun to visit, hear all about her family, tell about ours, and talk about doing the loop.  We had a thorough chat and then viewed Jacob Lawrence's "Migration" series together.  Tomorrow I will share some observations about that and tell about the end of our day. 

A Walk on Hylan Ave.

We ate here on Friday night with friends from No Zip Code and Fruition.

We are in Staten Island in the great state of New York.  Today was a relaxing day.  We woke up with the sun at 5:30 and realized we had nothing to do, so we slept in for another hour.  After reading our Atlanta paper, George did some engineering work, and I cleaned the boat inside.  A small space really needs to be tidy, so we feel good once the bed is made up, the dishes are done, and the bathroom is wiped down.

We went to a meeting with a group of loopers and our host, John Calascibetta.  He gave us bus and ferry schedules and asked us what we want to do while we are here.  Tomorrow morning John is going to drive us in two groups to the train.  We can take the train to the Staten Island Ferry.  From there we can explore the city.  George and I are going to MOMA to see the Yoko Ono show plus the "Migration" series of paintings by Jacob Lawrence. We are meeting a Dublin friend, Sally Andre, for lunch at MOMA.

John Calascibetta, Great Kills Harbor Host Extraordinaire

George took a huge nap after lunch (12:30 - 3:00).  I did research on subway routes to MOMA and the Brooklyn Bridge and read more of  Wild by Cheryl Strayed.  I woke him up at 3:00, so we could go for a walk.

We walked down Hylan Avenue to a hardware store, trying to figure out how to hang our USA flag.  No luck with buying pipe to hold it.  Hylan Avenue is like Buford Highway with Dunkin Donuts, nail salons, and Italian delis instead of Asian food.  Everyone drives fast, and often people yell out the window.  We did buy a bottle of wine in the deli.  We felt as though Tony Soprano might be sitting nearby:  The atmosphere felt familiar.

We went home and chopped mushrooms, red pepper, and onion for spaghetti sauce.  Blue Willow was on the way, and we wanted to have dinner for them.  They pulled into the slip beside us at 4:30 after a long day with fog and NJ skinny water and bouncy ocean.  So glad to see them.  Yes, they could come for dinner.  We had a good dinner with lots of stories and laughing.

This is the view of Great Kills Harbor behind Aunt Aggie.

The Kindness of Strangers

This was the view in the Atlantic.

We awoke in darkness with a north wind today. As usual, it was windier than we expected or wanted. We ate breakfast, cleaned up, and checked our oil and coolant.  Then we waited for the wind to lessen and for dawn to arrive.  We left Beach Haven at 6:20 am with a little help from our neighbor.

We have had the kindness of strangers so many times on this trip.  Three people stand out in New Jersey.  Jim, the dockhand at Beach Haven, was there when we came in on Wednesday.  In a loud and strong wind, he tied us up securely.  We had six lines on Aunt Aggie.  The next day he offered us the use of his car for a trip to the grocery.   "It's parked right out front.  The keys are in it." So we went to a brand new Acme Market and bought yummy food.

This morning we were in a predicament with one of our lines.  Jim had tied it up high on a piling to keep us from banging on the dock.  When he tied it, he climbed onto the neighbor's larger boat and used the neighbor's boat hook.  Now we were unable to untie it.  No one was awake on the dock at 6:00 am.  I had just decided that we would just untie the line from our boat and leave it when a guy came back from walking two spaniels.  He was the neighbor.  They had arrived last night. I asked him for help, and he got out the pole and lifted the line off, handing it to George.  Yahoo!  We never even got his name.

After a ten hour trip through Barnegat Bay (45 miles) and north on the Atlantic (40 miles), we arrived at Great Kills Yacht Club on Staten Island.  We were met by John Calascibetta, a gold looper and yacht club member.  He welcomed us, grabbed our lines, and tied us up.  He said we'll just pay when we leave.  John is famous in looper circles for his hospitality.  He went home after helping us and plans to come back at 7:00 pm to greet another looper.  What a guy!

Happy Captain George on the ocean.

We are so happy to be here!  Many New Jersey folks were generous to us.  However, traveling through the ICW there was scary and hard.  The water was shallow.  Even today we showed just 3.5 feet on our depth finder at some points.  The wind was high for the whole week.  We had to pay attention at all times.  We left Manasquan Inlet at noon and celebrated our move into the ocean.  It was lovely and quiet.  There was no wind.  Gentle swells moved us north at 10 - 11 mph.  Woohoo! The NYC skyline came into view when we were still 25 miles out.

We think we are finished with shallow water on this trip.  Lakes and rivers and bays await!  Happy Friday!

The NYC skyline as we moved through the bay to Staten Island

Waiting for the Wind

Today we stayed at Beach Haven, NJ, waiting for the wind to die down.  We were hearing from the locals that the winds this week have pulled the water out of the bays, and that's why so many people are running aground.  This talk made us nervous about moving north.  We have been the only boat in sight a few times on the ICW this week.  When we don't see the NJ fishermen, we are nervous:  glad that they are not waking us, but wondering why they are not out here.  Should we be home too?

Instead of moving the boat, we made phone calls, got a pump out and topped off our tanks with diesel fuel, visited with other loopers, walked to the beach, went to the grocery store, tightened the bolts holding our antenna, and pumped up the dinghy.

Cool colors and window 

This plaque on the side of a deli says, "Sandy Oct 2012."

It was about 3 feet above the ground.

The NJ shore is just recovering, and Beach Haven has

lots of new or renovated housing.

Looking down the beach.

I had some reading time too.  Just getting in to Wild by Cheryl Strayed.  I appreciate her buying spree at REI.  When I go to REI, I also feel much more adventurous and skilled than I am.  I can just imagine buying a huge amount of equipment and then realizing that it was too heavy to carry.  What saves me is that I am cheap.  However, I suffer even on short hikes because I like to drink lots of water, and water is heavy.

Headed to happy hour and dinner with Blue Willow.  We have a big day tomorrow.  We plan to leave here at 6:00 am and travel on the inside to the Manasquan Inlet.  Then we will go outside to the Atlantic Ocean and make a left turn, headed for New York City.  Woohoo!  It will be a ten hour trip.
The weather window is the best in days, and most loopers will be on the move tomorrow.

Lots of wind + shallow water

We stayed on the fuel dock at All Seasons Marina last night.  We decided

at the last minute that the wind was too much for us to anchor.  Here's our view.

We had to wait for the tide today:  We left All Seasons Marina, south of Ocean City, NJ, at 12:50 pm. There was skinny water almost immediately.  We made it through and were passed by Beats Working, a large trawler, who was going faster than we.  We are still with Blue Willow.

As we moved north, we had to call five bridges to ask for openings.  Beats Working was first in line, so he called, and then we all went through.  No issues until we reached the NJ Transit Bridge, which was a railroad bridge.  A train was coming, so we had to take a drive up the creek, waiting for the train to pass. I had worried about the bridge openings, but they really went well.  The bridge tenders are not chatty here like the lock masters in the south.  They do not answer until we are right at their bridge.  They do say, "Have a nice day" or something similar when we thank them for the opening and say we are clear.

Remember Ventnor Ave. in Monopoly?  It is yellow and sells for $240 in my memory.

Ventnor City is just south of Atlantic City.  Here's their slogan:  Shorely the Best!

Hope they didn't pay a lot of money to a PR firm for that one.

As we passed inlets to the ocean, there was current, but nothing Aunt Aggie couldn't handle.  We passed Atlantic City and saw all the giant hotels with casino names:  Harrah's, Golden Nugget, Borgata,  and Tropicana. We also noted five windmills that you see for miles, sort of like the nuclear power plant in Delaware Bay.

Here are the windmills behind houses. 

Finally, we came around a bend, and we saw the unadorned windmills.

At the end of the day there was more skinny water and lots of wind!  We were in danger of being pushed out of the channel by the wind, which we knew was at 20 knots by 4:00 pm.  We do not want to be out on the water in the late afternoon, but the tide forced us.  Arghh!  George did a great job keeping us moving.  I prayed for some land forms to block the fetch.  We had about a half hour of big wind and water and waves.  Then we got close to our marina at Beach Haven.  Yahoo!  A great guy who lives at the marina, Jim, came out to grab our lines.  He worked really hard and tied six lines to Aunt Aggie since there is so much wind.  As I'm writing, Jim just stopped by the boat to ask if we need anything at the grocery.  How kind!  People really are so generous.

Note:  On this day Blue Willow ran aground in the skinny water as they came around a bend.  We were following, and we saw them up against the red channel marker.  We stayed with them until we knew Boat US was on the way. Then we went another hour to the marina at Beach Haven.  We were
miserable.  They stayed on their grounded boat all night.  They were over on their side every time the
tide went out.  Boat US tried three times to pull them off, finally getting Mark off the next day around 5:00 pm. He was exhausted.  We had Vicki and Daisy, their dog, on our boat that day.  This was the
hardest day on our loop. Luckily, Blue Willow was not damaged, and they came to Staten Island one
day after we did. We were all glad to be out of New Jersey.

New Jersey ICW

This is our newest grandson, Asa.  He is 5 months old today!

We had to hang around Cape May today until 12:30 to wait for the mid-rising tide.  The ICW in NJ is notorious for being shallow, narrow, and poorly marked.  We had copious notes from the dock master at South Jersey Marina + our Active Captain warning signals to help us through the rough spots.  We traveled with Blue Willow.  We had a good day, but there was shallow water as predicted.

The wind was mighty.  We were being pushed around at times in the channel.  The biggest trouble was when we tried to dock.  We decided against anchoring out because the wind was so rough.  Both Mark from Blue Willow and I admitted that we would not be able to sleep in this wind.  So we found All Seasons Marina near Ocean City, NJ.  They said we could tie up at the fuel dock and then come inside to make a plan.

Asa and big brother Louie nap together in San Francisco.

At 4:30 pm we spotted the marina.  No dock hands were coming out to help us.  The wind was pushing us.  Another trawler was tied up at the dock.  We were in front of Blue Willow, and we pulled over to the dock.  The captain of the other trawler was on the dock, talking on his phone.  He came up and took my midship line.  Thank you!  He tied us, and he went back to his boat.  Aunt Aggie's stern was 6 feet from the dock.  I could not lasso the cleat from there.  George used the bow thruster and pulled our stern in, and I tied the stern line.  He cut off the boat and got off to tie the bow.  Yahoo!  We were secure.

Blue Willow circled around and came in against the wind, which was smart.  We were out there to grab their lines.  Success!  We were ready to sign in at the office.  The other trawler captain said it was too shallow at the slips.  They were leaving to go to another marina.  Oh no!  We helped them cast off.  But George and Mark went inside to ask if we could just stay at the fuel dock tonight.

Vicki and Daisy (their lab) and I waited.  Finally, it was settled:  We can stay here tonight.  We do not have electricity, but that's ok.  We both have generators.  We will sleep fine here.

A bigger worry is that the wind will be stronger tomorrow.  Working with the tide is really tough.  High tide here is at 4:10 am and 5:00 pm.  Can we sit at this fuel dock until 2:00 pm tomorrow and then travel 5.5 hours?  That means arriving at 7:30 pm.  Will a marina take us then?  We think we will leave at 5:30 am and travel 2.5 hours to Atlantic City.  Explore and wait til 2:00 pm and then go the rest of the way, arriving at marina tomorrow night at 5:30 pm.  It is tiring to think of that day.

After tomorrow the wind will die down.  We did not take any photos today, so that's why you get to see the latest pictures of our grandchildren:  Asa, Louie, Addie, and Zoe.

Sweet sisters, Addie and Zoe, live in Atlanta.

Victorian Charm in Cape May

 So many fun shops:  We bought birthday cards.

We celebrated Memorial Day quietly.  Usually at home we would go to the pool, play in a tennis round robin, cook out, and decorate with flags.  Today we did observe flags and read stories about veterans and feel unworthy of their sacrifice.  But it was too cold for swimming.  

After a morning of chores, we napped and then set off for downtown Cape May around 4:00 pm.  It is a 35 minute walk.  We found a charming town full of beach type shops and Victorian houses.  Many houses have been repurposed as inns.  One is the community theatre.  The closer we got to the ocean, the bigger and grander and more colorful the houses were.  I love the color combinations, the porches, the patriotic decorations.  We arrived at the shore and held onto our hats:  It was windy!  

One of many houses built in the 1880s.

This row of Victorians leads to the shore. 

At the beach you can stay at the Inn at Cape May, which looks like a sand castle.

The music at Elaine's B & B pulled us onto the porch for happy hour:  $2 beer and Bahama Mama and calamari did the trick.  The musicians were talented, singing Dylan, Lyle Lovett, the Stones, and more.  We walked home contented.  

Tomorrow we have to wait for mid-tide to leave, which means casting off our lines at 12:30 pm.  We are traveling with Blue Willow for about 35 miles through a narrow and often shallow ICW to anchor near Ocean City.  The weather will be sunny and windy.  If we have internet, I'll send a photo and a story in the blog.  

Tony, Snooki, and Bruce - Oh, my!

We passed this marker on a bridge.

We had a great day in south Jersey.  The sun is shining, and the wind is blowing.  We had bacon and scrambled eggs for breakfast and read the Atlanta paper.  Then George did engineering work, and I did two big loads of laundry.  We chatted with the neighbors about the next section of our trip, fender boards, and boat maintenance.

I spent some time planning our route from here to Manasquan, NJ.  We plan to go on the inside, using the New Jersey ICW due to high winds this week on the Atlantic.  We have to travel at mid to high tide and beware of shoaling.  We also are comparing notes and plans with Mark from Blue Willow.  We all hope to leave on Tuesday.

This is what's fun on the loop for me:  On the way to do laundry, I walked by this bucket of clams,

just sitting by the dock.

Around 2:30 pm we went to Lobster House for a late lunch.  That place is always packed.  We ate yummy seafood and then walked to Acme Grocery, 1.6 miles away.  The walk took 30 minutes.  I found our groceries while George walked a few more blocks to a liquor store.  When we were ready, we called Uber for a ride home.  Andy from Serbia drove us back to the marina for $9.73.  He arrived in just five minutes, and we enjoyed our chat with him.  So happy to get home with lots of veggies, fruit, snacks, and drinks.

Here's a Cape May cozy cottage for my file. 

So now we're back home with the larder stocked, ready for a quiet night.  Fishing boats are passing our slip as the fishermen come home again.  It is chilly here.  Tomorrow we hope to go to the beach.  Andy said we can call him for a ride.  

Welcome to New Jersey!

 Tom helps with lines as we cast off from Summit North Marina in Delaware.

We got the word yesterday that today was the day to travel down Delaware Bay.  Several looper boats  went, leaving at 5:30 am to catch as much of the ebbing tide as possible.  Delaware Bay is tricky because the tide turns on the boater about halfway down the bay.  If there are opposing winds and tides, waves build, and the trip is miserable. There's nowhere to really stop along the bay, so the trip must be done in one 70 mile day.  Saturday was a low wind day.  High tide was at 3:30 am.  So boaters planned to be at the top of the bay early and catch as much tide as possible.  

Our dear friends, Cathe and Tom, were agreeable with our plan to leave at 7:00 am.  That seemed as early as it was possible to ask them to exit Aunt Aggie.  They had to wait around the marina until 9:00 am for their rental car.  They planned to tour more of Delaware and stay in a bed and breakfast for two nights.  

We passed this lighthouse on our trip down the bay.

We had a good trip down Delaware Bay.  The first three hours we averaged ten mph.  That was exciting.  Then the tide turned, and we slowed to 7 - 8 mph.  So the first three hours were great, and the next three were bumpy.  We had just 1 - 2 foot waves.  It was more like swirly swells.  In fact, the water reminded us of our gulf crossing.  George had to work hard to keep us on course. (We do not have autopilot!)  We went left and right and up and down, but we moved steadily to Cape May, NJ. It was so much nicer to be swirling in the daylight.  We really struggled on our November crossing in the dark for too many hours.   The last hour today was inside the Cape May Canal.  

"Welcome to New Jersey!" the sign proclaims.

We moved into the canal and past the sign above.  Yahoo!  We had finished Delaware Bay.  We just saw Delaware for two days.  New Jersey is our 11th state.  Immediately after passing the welcome sign, we were waked by about ten fishing boats as they sped into the bay.  Sorry to say, but New Jersey fishermen have reputations as rude boaters.  It was funny:  "Welcome" and "Get out of my way!"

Tomorrow night we will join the throngs at the Lobster House next door.

We got into our slip and received a welcome bag of gifts:  cranberry wine,  biscotti, and rosemary mint soap plus lots of maps and information papers. Of course, we took a nap.  In the slip next to us is Third Reef, a boat from Maine, whom we met in SC.  Four slips down we found No Zip Code.  

After nap we took a walk.  There was so much traffic!  Many cars were pulling into the Lobster House restaurant.  We hope to go to the grocery store and the beach while we are here.  We're staying three nights, through Memorial Day. We don't want to be on the water with the crazy holiday boaters.  

Items from our gift bag:  The wine is Utsch's Cranberry Wine, named for the family that owns this marina.  

We're off the Bay!

Morning photo before we left Worton Creek.

Yesterday we left Annapolis with Cathe and Tom, our friends from Atlanta.  We made a rainy but calm trip to Worton Creek.  Cathe and Tom were good cruisers, helping George as lookouts while I knitted.  We docked at Worton's Creek Marina, MD, our final night on the Chesapeake Bay.  It was in the middle of nowhere (MON) and we did not have internet even with our Verizon router.  We were a quiet crew, reading and napping for much of the afternoon.

At night we walked to the new restaurant onsite, which had opened that day and ate crab cakes and rockfish for dinner.  Thank you, Tom!  We slept soundly.

Cathe and Tom at the Worton Creek Restaurant.

We woke to sunshine and wind today and took off at 8:00 am for the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal (C & D).  I was anxious because winds were predicted at 15 - 20 mph, with gusts to 30.  It was bumpy as we began the trip.  I settled myself by playing Solitaire. However, after we turned north to the C & D, the wind was behind us, and we traveled with just one foot waves.  Smooth! We saw 11 mph for some of the trip.  Having the current on our team was terrific.  It was quiet enough for us to ride up on the fly bridge.  Score this day as another win for George, who predicted we would be fine traveling.  His reasoning was that it was a fairly narrow stretch, so there would not be much fetch to build waves. Correct!  He did luck into the current since we had not expected that, and it made our journey quite pleasant.

Beautiful day for sailing on Chesapeake Bay

The morning flew by, and we arrived at Summit North Marina.  The marina is also in the MON, but we do have internet.  It is a large place with floating docks.  However, the space they assigned us was crowded with a 45 foot sailboat, and we could not fit on the dock too.  Tom and I secured Aunt Aggie, but we were not in a safe spot.  A dock hand came down after George called the office.  They advised us to move to a different slip, and we did.  The wind was picking up, and we were glad to get settled and tied well.

This is just an ok spot, but Cathe and Tom are troupers.  There is no town:  The marina seems to be the town; no loaner car; bathrooms are far away; one shower; just small bags of chips in the ship store.  Yes, these are first world problems.  We are safe.  The sun is shining.  There is $2.00 beer for happy hour at the bar on the hill.  We took an hour walk in the sun.  The wind is gusting.

George, Cathe, and Tom walking on a country road.
The C & D Canal is on the left.

Two looper boats, Knot There and No Zip Code, are here too.  It will be good to catch up  with them.  I hope we can see them at happy hour. We will cook a Mexican feast on the boat tonight.

Tomorrow we plan to go 69 miles down the Delaware Bay to Cape May, NJ.  (Our time in Delaware is short.) Delaware Bay is one of those big, challenging bodies of water that haunt me.  Our friends on Blue Willow are nearby, and they say tomorrow is the day for traveling to Cape May.  They say if we don't go tomorrow, then we may have to wait here a week.  So we plan to leave Cathe and Tom at the dock at 7:00 am and head to Delaware Bay.  It will be an eight hour trip.  Stay tuned.  

Annapolis - the last day.

Sailboats race here on Wednesday evenings.

We returned to Annapolis yesterday after spending five good days in Atlanta.  We didn't get to see everyone in such a short visit, but we did spend time with some friends, our granddaughters, George's mom and sister, and our daughter-in-law, Jessie.  We will return in June and try to catch up with others then.

We settled back in on the boat and then went for dinner with looper friends from Blue Willow and Roundabout.  It was fun to hear stories of crazy nights at anchor and flooding on the Mississippi River last fall. We laughed and commiserated. The Mississippi is still far enough in my future that I can't imagine doing it.  I've noted that I always focus on the next big body of water.  Now that we feel relaxed on the Chesapeake Bay, I am thinking about Delaware Bay.  Is this a healthy habit or a weird one?  

We cleaned up today and prepared for our company, Cathe Echterhoff and Tom Branch, who are on their way to Aunt Aggie right now in an Uber car.  Yahoo!  Company is coming.  We will show off Annapolis and also travel the last bit of the Chesapeake together.  Cathe wants to see Delaware, so that's the next adventure.  

When we arrived yesterday, this Mama and eight ducklings greeted us.  I think they live under our dock.  

We've had our adventure for today.  We were asked to move Aunt Aggie, so a sailboat with a nine foot draft could use our spot.  As sometimes happens, the dock hand was moving faster than I was, so I did not have time to reset lines and fenders before we were backing out of the slip.  We had been right beside a bridge.  Our plan was to walk the boat back and then move into the creek. However,  the wind was high and had other ideas.  Aunt Aggie was pushed into the bridge pilings and under the bridge, which is only 14 feet tall.  I heard a thunk. George did great, backing up and staying calm.  I had to push us off the pilings on our stern.  Very upsetting.  As we moved to the new slip, people came out on their boats to watch and reassure us.  "You're fine."  

"No," I said.  "We just hit up there.  I am not fine."  We did fit in the new slip, set our lines and fenders, reconnected electricity, and I stopped shaking.  Aunt Aggie hit just on the pulpit and shows no real damage.  But that was bad!  

At least we did that move without company on board.  Tomorrow we will have an easier exit.  

Tonight we can watch the races again.

Annapolis: Home of the U.S. Naval Academy

 There are anchors sitting around the U. S. Naval Academy. 

Big winds last night woke me at 1:30 am.  I woke the Captain to check our lines.  I knew he wouldn't want to miss the excitement. He did double up the stern and spring lines.  Outside the wind was howling and gusting.  Hardware on sailboat masts was clanking. George returned to bed and went right back to sleep. I stayed awake reading 'Tis for a couple of hours.

George did more engineering today, and I did the dishes and defrosted the refrigerator.  We met Sue and Dan from Tranquility for lunch at Chick & Ruth's Deli.  More crab cakes!  I may finally have eaten enough crab.  We enjoyed this iconic spot, packed with Midshipmen and women.  When we exited, there was a line out the door.  We parted from our friends, and George and I toured the U. S. Naval Academy.

The Naval Academy is impressive.  We watched a short introductory movie and took a walking tour on our own.  History and crisp-dressed Midshipmen/women and other tourists surrounded us. It was a beautiful May day.  Here are some of our favorite sights:

First, we walked down the street of homes for the top administrators.  I wonder when these were built. They were lovely and historic. A sign said, "No jogging.  No dog walking." That seemed odd. There are more runners in this town than average.

In the chapel one side of the building had stained glass windows from the Old Testament, and the other had windows representing the New.  The Old Testament scenes were ocean stories. 

The crypt of John Paul Jones is in a room below the chapel.  We learned a lot about John Paul.

This model of a Wright B-1 Flyer hangs in Dahlgren Hall.  

We also toured the museum in Preble Hall.  I tired of it before George and made my way back to the boat.  He stayed another hour to view the model ships on the second floor.  As I walked home, I noted that Annapolis has more houses with flags than typical.  Lots of houses fly more than one flag.  Graduation is in two days, and flower beds are planted in blues and golds too.  Stores have congratulations painted on their windows wishing, "Fair winds and following seas."

Tomorrow we are going to Atlanta for five days to visit family and friends.  The blog will take a short break and return to action on Wednesday, May 20, when we return to Aunt Aggie with friends, Cathe Echterhoff and Tom Branch.  They will be the first guests to travel with us.  We will cruise from Annapolis to Delaware if we have good weather.

Annapolis - Day 2: My Shopping Adventure

I walked by this yard filled with hostas.  Lovely, dark and deep.

We are settled here in Annapolis Yacht Club for the next week.  We moved our boat to the other side of Spa Creek Bridge, and she can stay there while we go home to visit.  We can take a shuttle from here to BWI airport as easily as from Baltimore, so all is well.  

George worked a bunch today.  We met new looper buddies, Kurt and Mary Ellen from Loophole,  and reconnected with two other boats.  We were talking to Kurt when Sue and Dan from Tranquility came under the bridge and headed for a mooring ball.  We cheered them.  We will meet for lunch tomorrow.  Kurt told us that Connie and Jim Gillette from Patriot are here too.  George called them, and they are coming over for docktails soon.  

I walked over the bridge to town, hopped on a shuttle and asked how to get to a grocery store.  The driver said she did not go near a grocery, but there was one out by the Navy Stadium.  Just then we got to the top of Main Street, and she said,"That's the shuttle you need."  She stopped and called the other driver.  I exited and got on the second shuttle and asked James, the driver, how to get to a grocery.  He said it was a short walk.  We drove out to the Navy Stadium.  James told me how to get to Graul's, the store.  I hiked one long block and crossed two busy streets with working walk signs, and there I was.  

I stocked up on a few items:  fruit, muffins, evaporated milk for coffee, tonic water.  Where was the wine?  Next door at Rite Aid.  Then I walked back to the street where James had left me.  I waited maybe ten minutes.  James pulled up across the street and motioned for me to get in.  He said I should just ride since it was so hot, and the shuttle had ac.  Two other riders got on and obviously knew James.  Very friendly folks.  James delivered me back to the State House.

Maryland State House

I like the curved brick work around the State House.

I do not have a good sense of direction, so I walked a long way to return to the boat.  I usually choose the wrong way to go.  Today was true to form.  However, I did pass charming houses and the Naval Academy on the way.