We did it. I'm sure that single three-word declaration has you now going to the final paragraph of my previous post to figure out exactly what we did. No? I suppose I can remind you. 

We were at anchor in beautiful Oxford, Maryland waiting for the wind to subside and give us a nice run across Chesapeake Bay to Solomons, MD. It did, and we did, and enjoyed a lovely autumnal cruise. We arrived at Southern Maryland Sailing Association's T-head berth right around 3:30pm on Monday, November 11 where we were greeted by club members Robin and Mark (Mark is also the club's dockmaster). We made fast to the dock, while we were receiving a very warm welcome, but shortly our hosts took their leave. We connected to the available 20-amp shore power connection, which is a bare minimum for us to keep warm as the weather is dipping into the 40s at night. 

After the boat was secured and powered, we put feet to the ground and made our way to the Amazon Locker at Safe Harbor Zahnizer's Marina where we had packages waiting, and then on to our dear friend, Cristin's house to enjoy conversation and dinner. Cristin had to leave for Germany on Tuesday, so this was our chance to catch up before we need to continue on our own journey south. 

After somewhere around six weeks of living in our boat on dry land, with almost no fanfare except engines roaring to life, Stinkpot was relaunched on Election Day—November 5—and gracefully made her way into slip 36 at McDaniel Yacht Basin. For the last month or so, we have been scrubbing, painting, scraping, sanding, waxing, varnishing, repairing, maintaining, and attempting to make Stinkpot look like she hasn’t in a long time.

We had intended to do that over the winter in the south, but with my illness speeding our south’ard roll by a month or more, we decided to do it sooner than later, and she looks great. Somewhere in the middle of all the boat work, we were also distracted by the Annapolis Boat Shows as well as boat shopping. I suppose I should fess up that we are looking for the next Stinkpot, and have quietly been doing so for months. I am really hoping to find a boat large enough to have my digital piano aboard. If there is anything I miss from land life, it’s sitting down at the piano. It’s something we have been considering for a couple years, and this period of land time seemed like an opportunity, so we seized upon it. A barrage of emails later had us reunited with our broker, Ryan Miller, and the search has been on.

We actually thought we found a boat. A vessel near Baltimore seemed perfect—a Carver 42, was listed by Jay Porterfield with Knot 10 Brokerage. It appeared very clean, but the mechanical survey and oil samples failed very badly, so we had to pull the plug. I expected the listing to be removed after the broker relayed the findings to his client that the boat needed more work than it was worth, but instead they re-marketed the boat with no disclosure of those findings in the listing, following an all-too-minor price adjustment. This all led me to conclude I will never again look at another Knot 10 listing. Caveat emptor….

​It was a sunny, chilly morning, so we started at the lower helm as we waited for the outside temps to rise a bit with the sun as we made our way down the eastern shore of Chesapeake Bay from the North East River, finishing our cruise for the day in Rock Hall on the free bulkhead/dock there. We consumed a late lunch at Harbor Shack. The place was packed, the view was fantastic, and the food was really not good. I had the chicken fajitas while Stacey ordered a seafood-stuffed quesadilla. I’m not sure how you make fajitas taste so “meh,” but they managed to. Stacey’s comment about the quesadilla was something about how, eating out and “leaving it to the professionals,” is supposed to protect one from consuming objectively bad flavor combinations, but “not this time.”

Following our insipid repast, we took to the hoof for a spin through the tiny berg with our eye on the nearby grocery for bananas. Yes, we know there are many who maintain that bananas are bad luck on a boat, but we have been assured by experts in nautical superstition that the bad luck is specific to fishing, not boating. Since we never “wet a line” we see fit to risk it.

After a successful mission, we returned to the boat to find an official-looking gent eyeballing her suspiciously. I cleared my throat and asked if I could help him. He asked when we arrived and how long we were staying, and I told him we’d arrived in the early afternoon and would be leaving out in the morning. He seemed satisfied that we were not intending to overstay our welcome and left us alone after complaining bitterly about the boat, aptly named “Problem Child” tied up just ahead of us that had apparently been there too much, too often to the annoyance of local government officials, of which he was one.

We had a quiet evening aboard, turning in early and getting underway just before dawn. The wind was coming up, so we angled toward the Chester River, down through Kent Narrows, and down the eastern shore and into the western inlet of Knapps Narrows—our immediate objective was to refuel at Fairbank Tackle, where we took on 181.5 gallons of off-road diesel at $2.809 per gallon. From there, we continued through the ditch heading east, hoping that the building wind and waves would permit us to cross to Solomons, but it wasn’t to be. We retreated up the Choptank River, into the Tred Avon and anchored for the night in Oxford, MD, just across the channel from DiMillo’s on the Chesapeake East—owned by the DiMillos in Portland, Maine. We found ourselves wishing they had a restaurant here as well to offer us a taste of home. Oxford seemed very quaint from the water. With the wind and weather, we deigned to keep the dinghy aboard and intend to return another time for a proper exploration of the town. For now, it has been a scenic place to lay our heads for the night, and nothing more. 

As I type this in the late morning, we are still waiting for the winds to lay down as forecast to give us a reasonably (hopefully?) smooth crossing to Solomons. We can see the trailing edge of the front to the west, and when it's overhead shortly, we will be weighing anchor and getting underway.