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Twenty-six days ago was the last time I recounted in any detail our travels on this page. A shade over three weeks ago, and yet it feels like years ago. So much has happened since then. So many anchorages, docks, new friends, meals—twenty-six days feels like an eternity that just happened. It’s a sensation that, at once, confounds and energizes the soul. It’s why we’re out here living this crazy life. No routine means that we are always forming new memories, and new memories are what prevents time and our very lives from mercurially fleeting and leaving us to wonder “where did the time go?” That’s the blessing of adventure. The curse is, of course, constantly operating outside of comfort zones, but even that has a way of mellowing you out. We take things in stride that would have been untenable as part of our land-based existence.

Twenty-six days ago we were in New Bern, North Carolina where we spent an entire week. We left there on the morning of April 23, and headed back out into the relentless winds that have typified our spring voyage this year. We had a schedule to keep after all, needing to be at the AGLCA Spring Rendezvous in Norfolk in early May. Of course, we had no way of knowing if the winds would be with us or against us. We still had to get down the Neuse River, and up through the dreaded Albemarle Sound (Stacey’s nemesis). The wind forecasts pretty much demanded that we stick with the canonical ICW route and not enjoy cruising Pamlico Sound, as I had hoped. We got a good early start out of New Bern on a favoring, wind-driven current. Our first “bail out” spot of the day was R.E. Mayo’s dock which we breezed past due to the early hour, opting to continue up toward the Pamlico River, which we crossed, heading up the Pungo River. I had thought we’d stop in Belhaven, but the evening’s forecasted SW winds had me deciding that we’d be in better stead to anchor in the nearby Scranton Creek, which is a well-sheltered, shoal draft anchorage.

We had the hook down in the late afternoon sun and settled in for what promised to be a peaceful night in a nice anchorage. As promised, the wind did come up over night, and the wave action outside the creek started reflecting off the Broad Creek Point and set up “harmonic/sympathetic wave action” in the middle of the night, so while the wind was holding Stinkpot bow-to, the wave action was on the beam. The result was an uncomfortable night’s sleep. We have encountered that kind of wave action before. There is no energy behind it, but it is uncomfortable and relentless when it does happen.
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As we sat there at anchor, I planned our next steps. The wind forecast was continuing to be annoying, and it looked like we would sit still, perhaps moving to a different nearby anchorage for the upcoming change in wind direction, and then run the Alligator-Pungo Canal and up the Alligator River and position ourselves in South Lake for a Saturday (April 27) Albemarle crossing. About the time we had all that decided we noticed our friends Jenna and Darlene moving by on their boat, Timeless, headed for the canal. I contacted them on Nebo, and Jenna said they were going for the Albemarle crossing that very afternoon, promising that the sound would be laying down about the time they got there. I pondered this, but was not willing to commit to it.

We readied the boat to move to the better anchorage on the upper Pungo River and got underway. As soon as we left the shelter of the anchorage, we started taking our lumps in the form of a beam sea from a not quite angry, but clearly frustrated Pungo River. Once we made it to the navigation channel, I was able to make a turn, putting the sea on our stern. We had a choice to make. I could put the seas on the beam again to turn into the new anchorage, or we could keep pushing into the canal and the flat water there. It was an easy decision.

I told Stacey at that point that we would continue to assess whether to continue and how far we would run based on the conditions. When the canal dumped us into the southern end of the Alligator River, we assessed that the river looked fine. We ran up the river nearly to the Alligator River Bridge, at which point I radioed ahead to Timeless and asked how the Albemarle Sound was treating them. Jenna assured me that it was absolutely doable. We called for an opening at the bridge, and instead of making the turn to head to South Lake, we continued onto the dreaded sound. It was not flat calm, but it was not completely dreadful either. About ⅔ of the way across, it did rain for a little while, forcing us temporarily to the lower helm station, but we made it across the sound and ended our day in calm waters in an Elizabeth City, North Carolina anchorage between Anson Point and Hospital Point, just before sunset.

We awoke on April 25 to a bright, sunny morning. We didn’t need to be in Norfolk/Portsmouth until May 5, so with a full 10 days to go 50 miles, we decided to make ourselves comfy on the Jennette Brothers’ free dock for a few days, just north of the Elizabeth City Drawbridge. To wit, we weighed anchor just in time to get through first post-rush-hour opening of the bridge, and spun ourselves onto the dock. In our four days on that dock, we enjoyed many of the local eateries (part of the quid pro quo for docking on a commercial food distributor’s bulkhead). One day, I put my bike on the ground and rode to the local Harbor Freight to buy a 5-gallon diesel can.

By this point in our journey, we hadn’t filled our tanks since Wacca Wache Marina (just above Georgetown, SC), and they were starting to get uncomfortably low. There was a place on Chesapeake Bay with a really good diesel price, so I had been biding my time until we got there, but I didn’t want our extensive generator use while on the bulkhead to bite our hiney. I figured we were using about a gallon a day, so I decided I’d “put it back,” which is exactly what I did, buying 5 gallons at the local fuel stop and dumping it into our starboard tank, which was just enough to move the fuel gauge above ¼ tank, which was enormously gratifying and very much alleviated my burgeoning fear that the tank was getting untenably low.

The fuel plan was to pick up just enough fuel in the Norfolk area to get us up Chesapeake Bay to Fairbank Tackle which was promising a very good price on Waterway Guide, so with my new-found confidence that our new fuel sending units were not lying, we continued to take in the culinary delights of Elizabeth City, leaving off the wall for the Dismal Swamp Canal just after noon on the 29th with the immediate plan to run at dead slow speed and time our arrival for the last locking of the day at South Mills, and spend the night on the bulkhead just beyond the lock, which is exactly what we did. The wind was still howling, but we were on a winding river with hardly any wave action to spoil our fun. The sun was out and warm, and we made our way to the lock, locked through, and tied up on the wall just before the bridge. We walked around the neighborhood there. I even filled my diesel can and gave the starboard tank an extra 5 gallons for good measure while making a beer run to the local store.

As the sun was going down, other boaters who were “trapped” with us between the lock and the drawbridge chatted with locals on the edge of the canal, just off Stinkpot’s port quarter. Friendships spawned, and one of the local guys trudged off to his house and brought back gifts for all of us. He gave me a frozen package of duck breast that he harvested while recently hunting nearby. One of the other boats received a gift of venison. The hunter’s wife came by cuddling a baby bunny in her hands and allowed Stacey to enjoy holding the slumbering creature—an experience she is still talking about now, almost three weeks later. Inevitably, the dark descended, and all of us returned to our boats and homes.

Morning came, and we all were ready to go when the lock/bridge tender opened the bridge for us all at 8AM. Stinkpot kept her place at the head of the pack and we all made our way to the Dismal Swamp Visitor’s Center (which is also a highway rest area), a cruise that took all of an hour at headway speed. Upon arrival, I spun the boat around and tied up so that the south breeze might keep us cool as the temperatures were starting to warm during the day. We checked in, filled our water tanks, off-loaded our trash and recycling to the nearby containers, and then donned our hiking boots to enjoy the Dismal Swamp State Park’s trails, across the canal by way of the floating bridge. It was a perfectly lovely day, followed by a lousy night’s sleep (at least for me) precipitated by the bright lights of the rest area. The next morning, we decided to continue on and ran to Deep Creek Lock to stay two nights on the Elizabeth Dock where we also enjoyed free shore power!

While there, we walked to the nearby Food Lion to restock the larder, which was far easier said than done. It really wasn’t far, but the drawbridge we had just come through on the boat needed to be crossed, and it was under construction, and the sidewalk was closed. We were towing our trusty four-wheeled cart, and our rush-hour arrival at the bridge presented a difficulty. Ultimately, we stopped traffic in both directions, much to the consternation of the unsympathetic drivers also trying to cross the bridge. We did our shopping, enjoyed burgers at Hardee’s, and, upon our return to the bridge, decided to join the traffic that was going our way. The driver behind us was so amused by our antics that he held traffic back until we were safely out of the lane of travel and traversing the nearby church parking lot in the absence of a sidewalk. The next day we made the same journey in a far more simple manner (and without a cart behind us), but this time to the nearby Mexican restaurant in the same strip mall—a place called El Puente, and it was quite good. They even had a house-made hot sauce that was amazing. We both had fajita salads.

Friday, May 3, we dropped lines and locked out of the Dismal Swamp Canal. It was a rather large 12-foot drop in the lock owing to it being low tide. Once again in brackish water, we made our way to Top Rack Marina to grab a little fuel. My intention was that we’d take on 85 gallons for $3.78 per gallon, which should be just about enough to get us to the significantly cheaper fuel at Fairbank Tackle up the bay. While we fueled, the dock attendant pumped out our black water tank. Stacey was reading the numbers off the pump to me, and I thought it remarkable how fast the fuel pump was working. We had tanked 85 gallons in no time flat, or so I thought. When I got to the counter to pay for it, we had taken on 22.5 gallons which came to $85. Stacey was reading the wrong numbers on the pump. No matter, we had some fuel, and I decided that we should continue on to claim our spot on the High Street Landing free dock before other people got there ahead of us. I found another place nearby with a similar fuel price and decided we would top off in Portsmouth before running up Chesapeake Bay.

We arrived at High Street Landing and grabbed the only spot left on the “normal” bulkheads. I had intended to take the eastern side, but decided not to fight the relentless east wind for it, and this turned out to be just fine. I took the western side and let the wind "dock us." We spent two nights there, enjoyed some of the local cuisine, first at Roger Brown’s Restaurant (what we got was surprisingly good, but I wasn’t crazy about the place). The next day we sampled The Bier Garden (meh) in between worthy visits to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Museum.

Sunday morning, I called the Tidewater Yacht Marina, where we were to tie up for the Rendezvous, as soon as they were open to ask how soon we could get in, and they said, "now." We dropped lines and were tied up mere moments later with power, water, and all the good stuff. Our cruiser friends, Larry and Erin also came and got us so we could tour their boat, which they are trying to sell. Nice vessel, but it will not be the “next” Stinkpot, alas. In the marina we were surrounded by loopers, and got to know several of them that evening at docktails in the marina’s restaurant, Fish & Slips (where we also enjoyed the decent hot wings at happy-hour prices).

Monday through Wednesday we spent at the looper Rendezvous across the river in Norfolk (which required a stupid-long walk on either end, with a $2 ferry ride in the middle—we stowed away in cars and Ubers as much as we could), meeting folks and working the Argo table. We had fun getting to know so many new folks, many of whom have been following our adventures for a while. The Rendezvous is a big event of which our part was small and repetitive, and our part was done by Wednesday night.

Thursday morning, later than I would’ve liked, we dropped lines, fueled “around the corner” at Portsmouth Yacht Center (Erin and Larry’s marina), taking on 70 gallons at a surprisingly very reasonable $3.43 per gallon and pumping out our black water tank yet again. We pointed the bow into the bay and had a lovely run up to Deltaville, Virginia on a favoring current, anchoring in a favorite spot that we’ve used in the past. We tried to get a spot at the nearby Fishing Bay Yacht Club, but we didn’t make contact before we were anchored, and by then we were content to stay anchored despite getting an invite to the T-head.

The next morning we left Deltaville intending to run to Tangier Island, but the winds were building on the bay, and we ultimately changed course to soften the blows of the waves and ended up heading to the familiar waters of Reedville, Virginia instead. As soon as we changed course, I emailed our friends Walt and Mary who own a piece of paradise there on the water. In the meantime we docked at the Reedville Market’s free dock, and hadn’t been there two hours when Walt emailed and waved us in to his dock. We dropped lines and headed straight over, tied up, connected the shore power and water, and headed up to the house to chat with our hosts. Walt was alone at the moment, but Mary came in within a few minutes and we made plans to dine with them on our own food—they already were planning to eat leftovers, but Mary was going to toss a salad to share. We returned to the boat where I threw together some quesadillas, and, at the appointed time, we assembled around Mary’s fancy Viking stove where I heated our food through while Mary reheated their leftovers in the microwave. Everything ready, we moved to the table and enjoyed a lovely meal with excellent conversation and fun! In the morning, we dropped lines and continued pounding up the bay.

Chesapeake Bay can be angry. It wasn’t. It was a trifle miffed the entire time though, and tired of the wind and waves, we put in at Solomons, Maryland and spent the night on the T-head on Southern Maryland Sailing Association’s dock after a couple Facebook messages to the right person secured us an invitation (I have played music for them in the past, and will again, likely this fall, on our way south). We decided to have an “app walk,” which is when we take a walk to nearby restaurants sampling one or two appetizers at each. We had the fried pickles at the Tiki Bar which were pleasantly crunchy but lacked flavor, and then moved to The Pier where we enjoyed fried haddock bites with a creamy sriracha dipping sauce and split a Caesar salad, all of which was quite good.

Sunday, May 12, we dropped lines early, hoping to get out on the bay ahead of the promised strong southerlies and morning rain. Unfortunately, the winds had been going all night, and when we started leaving the Patuxent, the waves were thrashing us pretty hard. We were operating at the lower helm because of the showers. I put the sea back on our stern and ran behind Drum Point to regroup. About the time we were back on flat water, the sun peeked out. We prepared the flybridge, and turned back toward the bay. The flybridge is a much more comfortable location to operate from in those kinds of seas—especially for Stacey—and it’s a far better vantage point to see crab floats in rough seas. It took the better part of an hour, but we got out into the bay and finally put the chop on the stern, giving us a reasonably comfortable ride north up the eastern side of Tilghman Island and into Dun Cove where we dropped anchor for the evening, enjoying dinner aboard.

With first light, we were firing up the engines and we ran back down to the northern end of Tilghman Island where we entered Knapps Narrows, went through the drawbridge, and turned to port into Fairbank Tackle. It was a tricky docking, stern-to the bulkhead between two pilings (and two crab boats). This is a commercial fisherman’s fuel stop, so there are no dock hands, and no frills, but the diesel price of $2.99 per gallon makes it very much worth the trouble. We pumped 225 gallons of fuel into Stinkpot at that price—which means we had 75 gallons left aboard. In boating terms, that’s running on fumes.

Fully fueled, we continued out of the Knapps Narrows and up the bay to the mouth of the Patapsco River where we turned inbound and made our way toward Stoney Creek and our next destination—another private dock belonging to some new friends who have been following our exploits for some time—but first we had to take in the enormity of the Key Bridge disaster. We grabbed a few photos of the Dali, helplessly marooned on the riverbed with tons of debris still on her bow. This was the same afternoon they were to set off explosives on the bridge structure in an attempt to somewhat free the ship, so we captured some of the very last photos of the freighter with the bridge trusses laying across the bow. There was a 2000 yard security zone around the area, so we were steering very deliberately toward Stoney Creek so that we would not have to explain our presence nearby, and we were docked before long on Kathleen’s and Michael’s dock in a manner that certainly Stinkpot is rarely accustomed to—flanked by boat lifts bow and stern.

Kathleen gave us a lovely lunch on her deck, we shared some stories of our recent adventures, and they took the nickel tour of Stinkpot. Soon though, they left us to attend to some other social events that they had committed to before they knew we’d be coming through. We settled in and then went for a walk to see where we were. Somehow we found ourselves in a local watering hole called the Pit Stop Pub that was quite good. We were enjoying some decent ribs with the fixings when the explosives on the Dali were set off, and we never heard it.

We walked back and donned our bathing suits. Our hosts had invited us to make use of their hot tub in their absence, and we were all too glad to do so. We relaxed and simply enjoyed ourselves for the evening. In the morning, with overcast skies and southerly winds once again building, we said our goodbyes and dropped lines to continue to Havre de Grace, our intended stopping point for this leg of our journey north. It was a rough run, similar to previous days on the bay. We ended up “tacking” back and forth to avoid taking the seas on the beam as we came out the Patapsco and started turning north. It wasn’t until we were abreast of Pooles Island before the seas were fully on the stern and we could relax a little. Of course, the overcast gave way to showers, so we had run from the lower helm for quite a while. Arriving finally in Havre de Grace just shy of 1PM, we pulled up to the fuel dock to pump out our black water before taking our spot on the end of the pier.

Returning to the marina office to fill out the paperwork for our stay with the dockmaster, Steve, we were blindsided by what came next. Steve told us that the price of a one-month transient stay at the marina had increased from $9 per foot to $20 per foot, and he apologized profusely for neglecting to warn us. This really was an unexpected and untenable increase given our budget for this part of the voyage. Steve stood there with us for the better part of the next hour making phone calls and trying to help us secure affordable dockage. He’s a real friend, and we very much appreciate his help. Ultimately, after calling nearly every marina within easy driving distance of Havre de Grace, and even visiting one that seemed promising, we ultimately concluded that staying still was our best option. We paid the bill and settled in.

Our friend, John, came and got me and brought me to our car which was waiting for us reasonably nearby. We drove to the grocery store and stocked up on some staples. We slept well, despite the relentless south wind gently rocking the boat all night.

Wednesday morning, my phone rang. It was a woman named Tina whom Steve had referred us to. She manages a currently closed marina in North East, Maryland—about 15 miles away—that is about to re-open under new management. She invited us to come on over for about half what we were paying in Havre de Grace. Stacey and I agreed it was a good plan, so I went and saw Steve. He refunded us for all but our “overnight” in the Havre de Grace marina, and we got underway again, making the two hour run to North East in wind and rain (with minimal seas), running all but the entry to the McDaniel Yacht Basin from the lower helm. Tina guided us in over the phone and met us on the dock. We secured Stinkpot in this large and mostly-empty marina, and couldn’t believe the luck. This place is just beautiful. This will be home until mid-June if not the end of the month, and we could not be more pleased with where we’ve ended up. What’s more, this marina is a mere mile or so from the church where my May 18 concert will be held, and the concert promoter, John, gave me a ride back to Havre de Grace to retrieve my car on Thursday afternoon. We are, once again, settled in, and loving the novelty of our new temporary town. 

This blog chronicles our travels, and it contains the good, the bad, and the ugly. There is very little ugly that happens, really, but it’s my intention to be able to re-read these entries ten or twenty years from now and remember what I was feeling, places we’d been, and generally be able to relive these moments. With that in mind, I want to chronicle something that has been brewing over the course of the last month since we left Downtown Sanford Marina, and has really colored my last three days in a not-very-nice way.

For months before we cast off lines to leave Sanford, Florida, we knew “to the day” when it would be happening. I was going to finish playing my St. Patrick’s Day gigs, drive our car north where it would "greet us" when Stinkpot arrived in Havre de Grace, Maryland, fly back to Florida, rest up sufficiently, and then we’d go. It was carefully choreographed. St. Patrick’s Day is always March 17, so everything would fall in line with that. March 18 would be my big driving day. March 19 would be the flight home. March 20 would be final arrangements, goodbyes, and rest. March 21 would be the big day when Stinkpot motored out of the marina for points north. No sooner did I have the plans set, we notified the office at Downtown Sanford Marina of our departure out of courtesy and, truly, obligation. We did allow that things might shift by a day or so in deference to weather conditions or travel snafus, but the plan was set, and January 27th I purchased my plane ticket from BWI (Baltimore, MD) to MCO (Orlando, FL) for March 19th.

Despite our giving notice to the marina of our impending departure, the office still charged our credit card for the entire month of March, as though we were to be there for the full month, and not the ⅔ of a month that was closer to reality. We thought nothing of this since we were sure the marina would be giving us a credit for the days we would not be there when we checked out. When that day came—March 21st—we visited Deb in the office to tell her we were going and ask for the refund. She told us we’d have to deal with Evans, the marina's general manager, about that, but Evans was away on vacation that week. Without worry, and expecting the marina to do for us what virtually every other marina we’ve ever enjoyed an extended stay has done, I sent Evans a very optimistic email and received a cordial response as well as a request for a letter of recommendation for him, which I wrote. Here is the entire exchange, as well as the letter I gave him for his files (I also sent a more detailed version to his current employer as a demonstration of my ultimate respect for his work and accumen):

Hi Evans,
Sorry you weren't around when we were casting off for a proper goodbye. We appreciate everything you have done for us over the last year. 

We did ask Deb if she could deal with prorating the monthly rate for the month of March to credit us for the 10 days we never planned to be there, but she deferred us to you to deal with it. Our card should still be on file. :) If there is any issue, please let me know. We did turn our keys in with Kevin when he was scooting by the boat before we cast off. I trust they were properly accounted for. 

We have had a lovely run down river—sitting at anchor in Jacksonville, about 3 miles from the ICW. 

Be well, my friend. We look forward to seeing you again!
-Dave
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Morning Dave,
Glad you’re traveling safely and thank you I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind writing me a letter of recommendation, I always a good thing to have in a personnel file.  And I am working with corporate on the prorating the month of March.
Take care and stay in touch
Evans
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See attached, and thank you. 
-Dave

After some time of hearing nothing about this, on April 6, I sent another email asking for an update: 

Finally, while we were in New Bern last weekend, I got a phone call from Evans telling me that corporate would not agree to a prorated refund for our March slip rent. He said he wanted to call me and not handle this bad news over email, which I appreciated, but that doesn't negate the fact that this policy is, to me, tantamount to theft. We gave plenty of notice of our departure and even left on the day we had planned exactly. His willingness to try to deal with this on our behalf, to me, also means that he saw the fairness in a partial refund as well. If he didn't, I expect he'd have said so from the outset. 

I told him during the call that I considered corporate's decision to be wrong, and that I didn't appreciate having my pocket picked in this way. I promised to fight it—nothing personal—but the phone conversation would surely not be the last he heard of it.

Downtown Sanford Marina is owned by the City of Sanford and run, under contract, by F3 Marina (AKA, corporate). The first thing I did was email members of Sanford's city management and one or two political figures, including the mayor. The response I got (names redacted) was not at all satisfactory, but contained "additional information" that Evans provided to these individuals to support the decision—and much of it was based on distortions and (surprisingly) flat-out lies:  

So far, since the last salvo, I have heard nothing from the marina or the city, and I don't expect to at this point, but I have to admit that the entire thing makes me sick to my stomach. I can't believe that after over a year of being good citizens and customers that this is how the marina management and city would like for me to feel. I can't believe that this person I really thought was a friend, Evans, was willing to support corporate's decision to the city by cherrypicking the marina own published price list and misrepresenting the agreement we had with the marina to the city officials. It's all beyond the pale to me. 

I have to admit to being very sad about all of this. It has been weighing on me for days, and all I can do is talk about it, which is why I have decided to make it part of the blog. I just need to purge these bad feelings, and I feel that making it part of this blog might be balm for the soul. 

As I write this, we are tied up in Elizabeth City, NC on the free bulkhead by Jennett Brothers Foodservice Distributors. I will fully blog about the latest leg of our journey and what brought us here and now in the next post. For now, I'm going to try to relax and not think about any of this anymore. 

Signed, 
Saddened in Liz City

Today’s a “snowday.” So sayeth the boatswain! Well, not snow, really. It has been dreary, often rainy, chilly (in the mid-50s Fahrenheit—and damp), and we are docked. We don’t often lay out hard-won lucre on marina stays, but when we do, either we really need dock time to cure issues with the boat that we just can’t cure away from land, or it’s a REALLY nice place and we want to spend some quality time getting to know the area. Sometimes it’s both! Well, at least this time.

We have made it to New Bern, North Carolina which is about 25 miles up the Neuse River from the ICW, and we had planned since we cast off lines in Florida to spend some quality time here, so this isn’t a completely unexpected stop for us, but we never expected to be here for a full week, nor did we expect to like it as much as we have.

I suppose I should back up and tell you how we managed to get here first. New Bern is not altogether across the street from Duck Creek, South Carolina, where our previous blog entry left us. To the Wayback Machine, Sherman!

We left Duck Creek on a very nice morning—I remember it well! It was my 51st birthday. The sun warmed us, and the current pushed us first through the Minim Creek Canal and then up Winyah Bay and the Waccamaw River. We were still fighting daily, gusty winds, as we had for most of our trip up the east coast so far, so an early start would get us ahead of the winds coming up on the bay, and hopefully see us to the more sheltered waters of the river before wind might anger the seas. That’s exactly what happened. And we enjoyed the flood all the way up river—and when I say “all the way,” I mean “all the way.” Our day ended about as far up the river as we are likely to ever go, in Conway, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

I have been keeping close tabs on fuel prices since before we cast off in Florida, and we have known for that we likely would be stopping at Wacca Wache Marina for fuel on our way up river. As it turns out, their fuel price held! We stopped and filled up for $3.55 per gallon, pumped out our black water tank, and filled our potable water tank. We had thoughts of ending our day nearby and dining at the restaurant attached to the marina for my birthday repast, but when we nosed around the corner into the nearby anchorage, the wind was coming up—and coming straight up through the anchorage. I made the snap decision to continue on up river to Conway.

Now, astute readers will remember I predicted back when we flushed our potable water system in Georgia that I would be doing it again soon. By this point in our journey, my prediction was fast becoming a curse. We were plugging new filters on a daily basis with a bacterial slime, and I began shifting our filter system around to try to mitigate the problem. With our full tank of tainted water, we knew what we really needed was a dock with potable water for another extended stay so I could flush and use the new, fresh bleach we acquired during our shopping in Beaufort, SC. We started trying to make contact with the marina in Conway. It just rang and rang when we called. There was no voicemail or answering machine. There was no email listed. After a beautiful run up the river, we arrived at Conway’s free dock, and still no access to freshwater to do the job. We continued to muddle through.

Mind you, the bacteria we have been dealing with is a common, non-toxic slime bacteria, often found in metal potable water receptacles (our tank is aluminum), but it was starting to make every glass of water just a little cloudy.

Be that as it may, we enjoyed our time in Conway. We ate at the barbecue joint by the free dock on our first of two days there, and at a pizza joint downtown called Chanti’s on the second day. The BBQ could win awards and definitely got our “best of Conway” award for the day. The pizza was—and understand this in the spirit in which it is intended—good for Conway.


To wit, four years earlier—during early COVID—we celebrated my birthday in the same town on our way north, and the only food we could get with most of the town closed for the pandemic was, and I’m being charitable as I say this, the worst pizza I have ever eaten. During COVID, even that tasted great because I was sick of my own cooking, but that doesn’t much help the quality of that particular pizza, the best part of which was whatever I washed it down with. The Chanti’s pizza this time around was a pesto, tomato, and chicken pizza, and it was good. Stacey had a meatball sub, as I recall.

We never did make successful contact with the Conway dockmaster, and after the rain cleared out, we headed back down river on Friday, April 12th, still with our water tank stowaway running amok. We ran all the way through Myrtle Beach (near where our friend, Bryan, took the video, above from his back porch) and ended our day in our favorite anchorage in Southport, North Carolina where we also spent two nights. On our first night there, we did dinghy ashore and enjoyed beverages and appetizers with dear friends, and fellow Mainers, Ian and Jen. They loaned us their Honda pickup the next day to run a few errands, for which we are eternally grateful. Still fighting with our slime water, we had intended to get a slip at Carolina Beach State Park for a couple days, but when we called, they waived us off, blaming silting in the marina.

Sunday, we weighed anchor and made our way up the Cape Fear River on the late morning flood and whizzed past Carolina Beach entirely, still with a tank full of slime. We pulled into Wrightsville Beach with thoughts of anchoring there, but with predicted, strong southwest winds overnight, the only anchorage that suited us was too full already. We even tried to drop anchor there, but by the time we had let out sufficient anchor scope for the winds, we were in about 4 feet of water, and it was high tide. No good. We brought the anchor back aboard and made our way to the relatively-nearby Big Lollipop Bay. We dropped the hook in a position where we would take minimal punishment from a southwest wind and settled in. Being a Sunday afternoon in Wrightsville Beach, of course waterskiers and wake boarders tastelessly zoomed around us all afternoon, but we were just happy to have a place to chill away from most of Wrightsville’s weekend hoi polloi.

Mind you, the hour was still early when the hook was finally down for the night, but there was no reason to proceed further. There is a dearth of adequate anchorages between Wrightsville and Swansboro, and, had we proceeded, it would’ve been well after dark before we found a place to end our day.

Monday morning came and we had the anchor up with the sun, making our way to Swansboro. We spent the day adjusting our speed against the incessant current that was on the nose for most of this leg. At issue was the swing bridge at Onslow Beach which ONLY opens on the hour. When I plotted a route to the bridge, I realized if we did 7.5 knots the whole way, we’d arrive just in time for the noon opening, which is why we had to adjust our speed as the current changed. We were passed many times on the way, and some of the more cordial folks we reminded of the bridge timing. The last boat to pass us was one of them, and he slowed down to do 7.5 knots with us rather than spend half and hour bobbing in a current waiting for the bridge to open. There was something gratifying about arriving just in time for the bridge and seeing every boat that had passed us all morning waiting for us.

Sometime during that late morning or afternoon, we did call ahead and got a reservation ($1.50 per foot of vessel length) at the Church Street Dock, which is a transient dock owned by the town of Swansboro. It gets terrible reviews for many reasons, but they have power and (most importantly) water—though the power sometimes doesn’t work, according to the reviews. Other reviews complain about the strong current. By the time we arrived, the wind was once again blowing over 10 knots with gusts to 16+ knots or so, and the current was barreling through the docks. I took one look at our assigned dock with the current and the wind behind us and decided it simply wasn’t wide enough for Stinkpot and waved off. We called to cancel our reservation, and the helpful lady on the other end of the phone line offered us another dock on the other side. We turned around to have a look as this would’ve had us coming up wind and up current, hypothetically a much better scenario. When we came back around and crab-walked the boat back to the docks, we realized the fairway, which ran perpendicular to the wind and current, between that “other side” and the next set of docks was WAY too small for Stinkpot to turn with the wind and the current running together. A “no-go.” We thanked her and asked for a refund, which she processed. We took ourselves and the sentient alien evolving limbs in our water tank to a nearby, well-sheltered, familiar anchorage and enjoyed a very peaceful night there.

Tuesday morning, we again weighed anchor at sunrise and made our run through Bogue Sound on a favoring tide, making the turn up Adams Creek, after Morehaven City, we again had the current on the nose, but the weather was lovely and we enjoyed our cruise. Arriving at the Neuse we put the building wind, current, and seas on our stern and ran up river between two and three footers all the way to New Bern where we had successfully booked a slip. We did have to wait 30 minutes or so for the drawbridge opening, but we were through before long and moving toward our assigned slip. We had made contact with the marina and they were waiting for us on the pier. I turned into the fairway and the boat was immediately crab-walking due to the wind and current. I made two partial attempts at the slip and begged off. There was a dinghy in my way, and there were shadows of the previous day’s docking debacle in Swansboro. The combined wind and current were such that, if I could turn the boat fast enough to set us up perfectly for the slip, they would have carried me in and I would have had no control over any of it—and this boat can’t pivot that quickly anyway. It wasn’t going to work.

The dockmaster was quick on the radio and reassigned us to a slip on the other side of the same pier where I could come up wind and up current. Déjà vu all over again, but unlike Swansboro, there was enough space in the fairway to make the turn without being forced onto other boats or immoveable objects. I pulled up in front of the slip, spun the boat, and had it in the slip in one beautiful motion! We were docked! The dockmaster, Jon, quickly told us to settle in and to not worry about the paperwork until the following day when we could get over to the office. He told me the codes for the gate and the bathrooms and disappeared. We were elated!

We got secured and connected, and I set to work to eradicate the primordial soup from our water tank. Seriously, we could no longer see through a glass of water. It wasn’t making us sick, but it certainly did not seem like anything we should be drinking—and the water was starting to have an off-taste, as evidenced by our level of thirst at the time. I pumped every last drop overboard, then filled the water tank again and pump it overboard as well. All the while, I was doing a power flush to our water heater. On the third fill of the tanks, I put in three cups of very fresh, potent Clorox bleach and proceeded to pump that through all the fixtures. I left it to pickle in the tanks overnight, while we enjoyed the pleasure that is “shore water.” By morning the creature was dead. I flushed the tanks twice more and even dosed the tanks with white vinegar to neutralize the bleach. New filters in place, as I type this four days later, everything does seem to be working perfectly and our water is CLEAR!

Wednesday morning we got checked in, and we have been enjoying this town of New Bern ever since. We did lunch with friends, Michael and Lenora. Michael graduated from high school with my parents, and has been following our exploits for some time on Facebook. A Stinkpot follower and fellow boater, Darlene, kindly took us grocery shopping. We have been walking the streets looking at the 250-year-old homes and buildings, enjoying food and libations in some very nice spots, and just generally acting like we’re on vacation from cruising for most of the last week. In addition to the water debacle, I have also caught up on a bit of maintenance. Friday I changed the oil in the main engines. Yesterday I re-tensioned the engine belts. Tomorrow, I may clean the bowls on our fuel filters and top them with injector cleaner.

Today has been cold and rainy, as I noted, which is why Stacey proclaimed it a “snowday.” We haven’t so much as stepped over the rail today, and it’s now 9pm. It’s funny to consider, but when we’ve been on the boat for days and haven’t had a chance to go ashore, I’d kill to be on a dock like this so I could just stretch my legs, but give me a cold, rainy day, and I can’t be troubled to go ashore. It’s nice and warm in here!

Tomorrow will be another day, and it will be our last day here. I expect we’ll paint the town red one more time, get a good night’s sleep, and get underway headed for points north on Tuesday morning before the winds inevitably come up, as they have been seeming to do every damned day. With any luck, they will lay down enough to let us across Pamlico and Albemarle Sounds before the first of May. We do have a marina reservation in Norfolk on May 5th and promises to keep.

​As I sit down to write, Stinkpot is laying at anchor on the Stono River, a mere mile and a half from Elliot Cut/Wappoo Creek, and a half-hour’s cruise from Charleston Harbor, South Carolina.   The solar eclipse is in progress over our heads, though, this far from the path of totality, it’s not amounting to much except about a half hour of poor charging from our solar panels. It has been a mere 11 days since I last hit “post” on this blog, and that feels like an eternity ago.

Our week on a Brunswick, Georgia dock in a scenic location (Two-Way Fish Camp and Marina) was at once relaxing and fruitful. We received Amazon packages, fixed broken stuff, and generally enjoyed not moving for a little while. After 17 months of (almost) not going anywhere by boat, having that time to decompress from the pressures of being underway, as we nudge back toward being "on-the-move" boat nomads again, really felt nice. On Monday, April 1st, I did drop our dinghy, Li’l Stinker, and took a 5-ish mile round trip run through Governors Cut to Darien, GA, where I towed our folding wagon to the hardware store, a weird Family Dollar/Dollar Tree combo store, the local grocery store, and the liquor store to stock up our rapidly depleting ship’s stores. I left Stacey behind to leave room in the boat for loot. The dollar-store trip was to buy a cooler because I forgot to bring an insulated container of any kind for frozen or refrigerated stuff. I bought a small Igloo that is about the right size for a 12-pack of beer, which I believe is the standard of measurement that is used in these cases.

The furthest of the stores from the dock was the dollar store, which was 1.3 miles from Darien’s town dock. The sun was hot, so I looked for fleeting shade on the sidewalks as much as I could find it. With the goods in tow, I made my way back to the dinghy and to Stinkpot. During the trip to Darien, I averaged about 10 knots with the mostly empty boat. The trip back had me more around 5 to 6 knots with all the stuff and the current, and the wind had come up a little, so I did have a few “wet” moments when hitting small waves, but Li’l Stinker got me back without issue.

Wednesday morning, April 3, we got underway and pointed ourselves northard yet again. Winds, again came up out of the southwest about the time we had the anchor down. Now, captain’s mea culpa, I had dyslexically misread the wind direction on the NOAA weather chart I always refer to, and I had it in my mind that the wind would be out of the southeast, so as the wind started up out of the southwest, I was more than a little alarmed since I chose an anchorage with an, albeit minor (and likely only at high tide), southwest exposure on the North Newport River. It was just uncomfortable enough that I made the decision to weigh anchor after only a few minutes and move over to nearby Walberg Creek—a move that put us in a much more comfortable place for getting a night’s sleep, which is exactly what happened.

I timed our morning departure from the anchorage with the tidal currents to give us both a good run across Port Royal Sound and a good run up the Beaufort River (that's Bew-fert—not to be confused with Boh-fert, which is in North Carolina). We decided to try anchoring in Factory Creek, which we did, and, as a result, we now have a new reason to stop in Beaufort, SC. It was a nice, short hop for the day. We spent the night aboard, and dropped the dinghy in the morning for a few errands. We loaded ourselves and our wheeled cart into Li’l Stinker and made way to the nearby boat ramp, tied up and walked the mile or so to the hardware store (which lacked what we were seeking) and Food Lion which satisfied our grocery list entirely.

Upon returning to the dock, we found Li’l Stinker “beached” alongside the floating dock on rip-rap from the falling tide. We really didn’t think we were so close to the water’s edge that would be an issue, but score one for an aluminum boat. With my shoes off and pant-legs rolled up, I dragged our steed into deeper water, we loaded our purchases, and off we went to the boat.

After our purchases were properly stowed, I broached the subject of getting underway. We had previously considered staying in Beaufort for two nights since it was such a relaxing spot, but the weather forecast was looking ominous later in the week with rain and high winds (again) forecast. I suggested that we might want to beat feet to get up the Waccamaw River where there would be tall trees and narrow, winding waterways to hide from the gusting. We agreed that might be for the best, and also agreed that knocking the first 15 or 20 miles out immediately would not be a terrible idea. So, up came the anchor, and off we went. Within a couple hours, we had the hook down in an anchorage at the southern end of Bull River where we enjoyed a lovely meal of chicken fajita quesadillas followed by a solid night’s sleep.

Monday morning inevitably arrived, and we got underway with the rising sun. The goal for the day was to burn some miles to get us ever closer to the Waccamaw River where we would shelter from the weather and celebrate my rapidly-approaching birthday. With a day of mostly favorable currents carrying us, we did exactly that, though this was a leg of the journey we will be remembering for a LONG time.

After we got underway, Stacey went below and made us coffee that we both enjoyed in the dawning sun on the flybridge. We were running through some “shortcuts” since the tide was high, and so I had it worked out in my mind that after we got back on the ICW proper, right after we moved through Fenwick Cut, I would give Stacey the con and excuse myself to take a shower. It was the perfect place. The waterway would widen up, the channel markers are obvious, the charts are simple. It was a perfect plan, and it’s exactly what we did. I stood up, Stacey took the big chair, I descended the ladder and walked into the saloon, and was about to walk forward when it occurred to me I should answer nature’s call, which I will often do “over the rail” when we are in remote areas such as this. I turned around to head back to the door and found myself looking at a large motor yacht coming around Fenwick Cut at an impressive speed, throwing a huge wake. We keep a set of cheap walkie talkies for communicating between ourselves on the boat, so I grabbed it and told Stacey to “watch her six,” to which she responded with a plea for me to return to the bridge. While all of this was happening the boat was getting closer and it was AIMING RIGHT FOR US! I somehow grabbed the radio and asked for a “slow pass” while simultaneously hauling the wheel over hard to starboard and running the throttles all the way up to get us out of the line of fire. No sooner had I done that, the offending vessel came to a near stop right behind us, and then, in a seemingly sheepish manner (though that might be my imagination) moved past us slowly, never saying a word on the radio before throttling back up and displaying to us the vessel name and hailing port: Mais Oui, Boothbay Harbor, Maine. We were almost run down by one of our own.

​[Read Stacey's version of this nail-biting moment on our Facebook page.]

Mind you, I don’t believe this was malicious. I think they had auto-pilot enabled and just were not keeping an “adequate watch” (not a good idea). Our presence in this secluded waterway somehow surprised them—at least that’s what I hope happened.

I turned the helm back over to Stacey and returned to both the rail and then the shower, in that order. I was shaking from adrenaline, and I still was when I returned to the helm, scrubbed and freshly dressed. Stacey was still shaken as well. This shared experience somehow monopolized our conversation for quite some time as we continued along, ultimately anchoring in the very spot where I started writing this blog entry—within spitting distance of Elliot Cut/Wappoo Creek, near Buzzards Roost Point, just west of Charleston in plenty of time to observe what we could of the solar eclipse so far from the path of totality. Dinner was leftovers aboard (and they were still delicious).

This morning (Tuesday, April 9), after a good night’s sleep, we rose with the knowledge that we would not be getting underway until around 9:30 to get a good run through Charleston Harbor on a favoring tide, and that’s exactly what we did, and we had a beautifully uneventful cruise all the way to the familiar “Duck Creek” anchorage just before the Estherville Minim Creek Canal. Tomorrow we will make our way through Winyah Bay to the safety of the Waccamaw River where we plan to cruise and frolic until the foul weather moves through. I’m sure there will be more stories to tell soon, and with any luck, they will not involve other yacht-folk trying to run us down.

So it begins…. As I commence typing, we are at anchor just off Cumberland Island in Georgia after nearly a week underway. Last time I wrote here, we were still in Sanford, Florida, with nearly three months to go until we dropped lines. Boy, did that time seem to just crawl along. I continued to play gigs, order and install boat parts, improve systems. I also spent 10 days in Seattle for the Seattle Boat Show with Argo in early February. We have been nothing but busy, and the last three months feel like three years!

Back on March 5 and 6, we stowed all the tools and parts and had a short “shakedown” cruise, spending the night at anchor in Butchers Bend to try out our new systems aboard, and all worked perfectly. We even dropped the dinghy in the water to make sure the outboard still ran (spoiler: it does).

The week before St. Patrick’s Day was full of gigs at both The Sullivan in Sanford and McK’s Tavern in Daytona, finishing with my finale gig on Paddy’s Day proper (Sunday, March 17) in the street outside of McK’s. They closed the street and turned it into a bit of a festival; it may be one of my favorite-ever Paddy's Day gigs—very cool!

Also that week, a dock neighbor, Jimmy, a trained diesel tech, helped me tune up Stinkpot's engines in exchange for some work I did on his boat's electrical systems. She hasn't run this well in years!

Monday, March 18 started with me packing a small overnight bag, getting in the car, and driving all the way to Aberdeen, Maryland where I spent the night in a Red Roof Inn. Early the next morning, I got back in the car and drove to my friend, Jeff’s house, in Havre de Grace, Maryland, where the car will be parked for the next couple of months while we transit the east coast. We plan to spend much of the months of May and June docked in Havre de Grace, so the situation couldn’t be better.

I spent most of the morning with Jeff, enjoyed lunch with him at a tavern in Baltimore, and then he dropped me at BWI so I could fly back to Orlando. I was rescued from the MCO terminal by Technomad, Chris, with Stacey in tow, and was spirited back to Sanford where co-Technomad, Cherie, kindly had a wonderful Instapot dinner waiting for us all.

​Wednesday, March 20, we finished preparing Stinkpot to get underway. I had a chiropractic adjustment to clear the cobwebs from the driving and cattle-class flight. The evening had us enjoying an ad hoc party in Stinkpot’s cockpit with dockmates and friends wishing us well. Thursday morning arrived and we dropped lines and didn’t look back.

Our first “port of call” was in Astor, where we were docked for our first two months back in Florida following our 2022 cruise north (and, obviously, south). We anchored outside the marina and dinghied in. We were treated to dinner at the nearby Elks Lodge by our friends there, Chris and Cherie (a coincidence, not the same Chris and Cherie as in Sanford). When returning from dinner, I noticed from Astor Bridge that our anchor light lacked the brilliance that I recall it having. Upon return to the boat, I determined that the lenses were too cloudy and deemed it ready for replacement. I ordered one, along with a couple other less-crucial necessities, to an Amazon locker in Jacksonville that I would get when we were to be on the free docks there.

Friday morning we weighed anchor early to get ahead of the winds that were to chase us across Lake George, anchoring for the day among the Seven Sisters Islands. Wind forecasts were for relentless winds for days, so we continued down river Saturday morning, after a leisurely start. It was a relatively short hop to tie up at Corky Bell’s for the night, but worth it for the excellent food (we both ordered the shrimp and ribs off the lunch menu). We also trundled ashore and made a quick trip to the local market, nearby. Sunday morning we got off the dock at dawn and ran in a very brisk wind as far as we could stomach with the NE winds, ending the cruise on the early side in Palmo Cove/Trout Creek to avoid taking seas on the beam were we to go further. Monday, with another dawn anchor weighing, we continued down river to Mandarin Holiday Marina, where we fueled, and then on to the downtown docks in Jacksonville, which we found to be closed for construction, but docked anyway. Realizing all too late that the dock gangways were impassable, I canceled my Amazon order, and we decided to wait just long enough for the tide to turn. Around 2:30pm we dropped lines, and enjoyed a favoring current to our next stop, which we figured (incorrectly) to be the Sisters Creek free docks. To wit, while underway, we noted via available online sources that Sisters Creek had at least 5 boats docked and at least one in the nearby anchorage. This told us the dock was “full” so we diverted to a known “good” anchorage just east of Blount Island, a bit off the river. We had thoughts of dropping the dinghy and going ashore for a walk and, and perhaps even dinner, but the relentless winds kept us from doing so. We’d have likely been fine, but discretion being the better part of valor in an 8’ boat, we didn’t. Instead we rose with the sun, and pointed the bow north up the ICW, stopping once for a pump-out of our blackwater tank and a fill-up of our potable water tank at Fernandina Harbor Marina, before proceeding, unbidden, to the anchorage by St. Marys, GA where we intended to go ashore and enjoy the local delights.

​We had the hook down by early afternoon and decided to wait until the predicted lull in the winds the next day to enjoy some time ashore. The winds did lay down whilst we were sleeping, but came back with a vengeance the next morning, which was not at all in the forecast. It was a dark overcast, chilly, and not at all pleasant. Looking at forecasts around us, we determined that the winds were far less to the north, so we decided to weigh anchor and forego our trip ashore.

​I began preparing the boat to move. We had been using the generator all morning to charge our batteries, heat water for showers, and have a little heat in the boat. As I powered up the inverter, which we run most of the time, I could hear the transfer switch in the engine room struggling to shift back from the generator to inverter position, and it was failing to complete the connection. Into the engine room I slithered (it’s a tight space). It took seven or eight good “Fonzie taps” (AKA “percussive maintenance”) before the transfer switch finally came over, but it finally did. We started out of St. Marys enjoying a nice favoring current, which I knew would be on the nose as soon as we made the turn north onto the ICW. When we made it to Cumberland Sound, the winds were far less there, and with the 3 knot current on the nose when we made the turn, we decided to overnight at anchor by Cumberland Island, where the blog post began. The water was flat calm, and there was plenty of room in the anchorage. It seemed like a good place to just “relax,” which we did.

So, destination in mind, Thursday morning, March 28, we weighed anchor with a howling northeast wind chiding us, made our way out of the anchorage, and pointed ourselves north. With a full 54 miles between Cumberland Island and our marina destination, we started making phone calls and sending emails to try to get a reservation, none of which “hit” for hours, but finally my phone rang, and Rick, the proprietor of Two-Way was calling to confirm us for a week’s stay. I asked about the $3 deal I saw, and he told me that was “old news,” but he’d honor it. Clearly the type of place that I like to deal with—easy going, accommodating, and friendly.

​The morning was sort raw and miserable, with that northeast wind in our teeth the entire time and a cloud cover that gave way to rain a couple times. We enjoyed most of the cruise from the warmth of our lower helm, but in the early afternoon, about the time we passed under the bridge to Lanier Island over the Mackay River , the clouds gave way to sun and warmth, and we jubilantly moved from inside helm to outside helm for the remainder of the trip. We arrived on the “second t-head” at the marina at about 3:25pm and we’re welcomed ashore by Two-Way employee, Mark.

I set to work flushing our potable water tanks and found the new water filter to still look new. I still disinfected the tanks with bleach, though our bleach had lost its smell, and likely most of its potency. I’ll likely be doing this again soon. All the same, with the filter being still clean, something else clearly was the issue with our water pressure. While the bleach was working, I reordered the items we had to leave behind in Jacksonville as well as a new transfer switch. Late last night as I was purging the bleach water from the tanks and refilling the tanks, I replaced the water pump with our new-in-box spare (and then ordered a new spare) and powered up the pump. It was working marginally better than the one it replaced, but still did not sound good and it blew a fuse nearly immediately. I noted on the the new pump that it drew as much as 18 amps, so I swapped the blown 15 amp fuse for a 20 and went to bed.

This morning, I got up, had a coffee, showered (the pump overheated and shut down this time, but the fuse survived. Stacey turned on the dock water so I could finish my shower, and so she could shower, and I got back down to work on the pump issue.

I disassembled, cleaned, and reassembled our old pump and swapped it back into position. Still not the expected outcome. I put my hand back down to take it apart again, and that’s when I felt it. Water was leaking out around the fitting on the intake side of the pump. Eureka! The pump(s) had been sucking air! A short trip through my stockpile of spare parts gave me all I needed to replace the leaking fitting, which was integral to the sediment strainer. Fully reassembled and NOT leaking, I powered on the pump and success! We have pressurized water aboard again.

​I moved the new pump back into place, relegating our “old” pump to spare parts status. I have the brand new one coming as well. Since our anchor wash-down system uses the same type of pump, having two spares aboard feels right. So as I finish this post, it’s Friday afternoon. We are not expecting our Amazon packages until Monday or Tuesday. We will likely get underway on Wednesday for destinations undecided as yet. Our cruising plans up until now have not lined up with reality, so spending a week in a gorgeous spot while the weather gets itself together just feels like the right thing to do. We have a week to review our cruising plans and figure out where to from here and when.

“The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy!”  -Robert Burns

The last time I really posted about our life aboard was last February when we finally made it here to Sanford, FL. I have had many false starts with creating a new installment of the blog, but remained uninspired to do much more than think, "I should write a blog post," to myself. Well, here we are, January 2, 2024, and this one will get posted. You can tell because…well…you're reading it, aren't you?

This last year has had its moments, but let me simplify it a little by nudging the highlights since our last "real" blog. I suffered my 50th birthday last April, which was celebrated by a fabulous crew of friends from near and far—John and Susan even came in from Texas to celebrate with us. We gathered at The Sullivan, which is coincidentally where I have been playing music nearly weekly since we've been here. There was cake, liquid refreshment, and revelry to welcome me to geezerhood, and my friend, Steve, even crashed in our guest stateroom aboard the boat.

As mentioned, I have been playing weekly on Thursday nights at the pub, and I also started doing work as a contracted consultant for Argo Navigation. I started out as a "booth babe" at the Atlantic City Boat Show last March, attended the 2023 AGLCA Rendezvous in Norfolk and the Washington DC Boat Show in May, and have been taking on lots of different tasks to help improve and promote the app ever since.

As noted, we did jump in the car and leave here for a couple weeks at the end of September and into October. We left on a Wednesday and drove to a Econo-Lodge in Petersburg, VA (clean, but not impressive) where we enjoyed dinner "at the club" with our friends, Robert and Paige. I had a string of performances including a Thursday night house concert in Edgewater, MD that was notable because accommodations were not included (surprise!). Our friend Nancy stepped up and provided a place to lay our weary heads that night. From there we started our run to Rochester (Greece), NY, via the home of dear friends, Dan Schatz (also a folksinger) and Geeta Shivde and their rapidly growing offspring, Kiran. It's notable, if coincidental, that Dan is Nancy's son.

We moved along from there to Rochester and enjoyed the ever-accommodating company of (also folksingers) Steve Gretz and Leslie Lee for a couple of days while I performed a Saturday-evening concert for the Golden Link Folksinging Society at Steve's Greece Baptist Church where he is minister. The next morning had me back for a couple songs and a pipe organ postlude at the church's Sunday service. Steve and Leslie really showed us around, took us to dinner a couple times, and we just had a wonderful time catching up with them for the first time in years!

On the Monday morning, we set off from Rochester and pointed our wheels toward the Middleburgh area where we stayed a couple of days with dear friend and folk-music royal, Sonny Ochs. This was purely a social call. Sonny treated us to wonderful take-out from the nearby Chinese restaurant that evening, Tuesday night we treated by foraging at the local grocery and creating a chicken cacciatore which was enjoyed with Sonny and her fun neighbors. Even with the assembled masses, there were plenty of leftovers, which Sonny seemed all too pleased to tuck in the freezer for another time. One of our mornings at Sonny's, of the three we enjoyed, we were graced by the presence of dear friend and (you guessed it) folksinger, Reggie Harris, who was just getting his strength back after a health scare while overseas. It was good to see him, and wonderful to see him feeling better. Sonny made a pancake breakfast for us to all enjoy while we caught up.

Wednesday had us back on the road and headed to Long Island where I was to perform as the featured act for the NorthShore Original Open Mic (hosted by the Folk Music Society of Huntington) that evening. Along the way, we stopped in Mamaroneck to spend a few hours catching up with friends and fellow full-time cruisers, Sean and Louise on M/Y Vector. They had been at the Derecktor Shipyard there for several months for a complete paint job on the boat, with much associated refitting. They treated us to lunch at a local favorite watering hole, and it was so good to catch up with them. We hadn't seen them since we dined with them along with Technomads (and fellow Downtown Sanford Marina dwellers), Chris and Cherie, when Vector was making her way north on the Florida coast last March. After we bid Sean and Louise adieu, we continued on our way to meet up with folky, Michael Kornfeld, with whom we also had a light repast at a Huntington diner before the evening gig. We spent the night at the home of a woman named Sybil who is one of those much-appreciated folk music volunteer types who open up their homes to wayward musicians passing through, saving us untold fortunes on accommodations.

Thursday morning we pointed the Toyota toward the Mason-Dixon and never looked back, finishing up the day checking in at the Folklore Society of Greater Washington's annual "Getaway," where we spent the next four days enjoying the company of folky types (including Dan, Geeta, Kiran, and Nancy, to bring things full circle). Monday we drove back to Sanford and reacclimated to Florida weather after nearly two weeks of actual autumnal bliss.

Since then, we have been working on the boat. I replaced our 35' of anchor chain with 250' and installed a proper chain-stripping spurling pipe, as well as new deck switches, relay, and wireless remotes for the windlass. I replaced the galley appliances entirely, giving us a new gas cooktop, dishwasher, and replacing the microwave with a convection microwave. I have done a bunch of rewiring aboard to increase DC systems efficiency and I also added a second house bank of 200 Ah of 12-volt LFP batteries with a DC to DC charging system. These new batteries will be used almost exclusively for inverter loads, while the existing 12-volt FLA house bank will be just for DC loads. I also have started, and will soon complete, the plumbing and wiring for our raw-water anchor wash down. There are several other upgrades and maintenance items to get through before Stinkpot will be completely ready to depart Sanford in March, but we are excited to venture on after a final St. Patrick's Day extravaganza.

In mid-late November, we were surprised to learn that Sean and Louise were accepting our “standing invitation” to enjoy Thanksgiving with us aboard Stinkpot—which we did. Vector made her stunning arrival (video above) here mere days before the holiday, and stayed throughout the remainder of 2023 and into 2024. While they’ve been here and had a ready source of capable boat-sitters, they did book an almost-last minute trip to the west coast to visit with friends and family. While they were gone, a very unexpected and fast-moving storm developed in the Caribbean Sea and came through here like a freight train—the same storm caused massive flooding in northeastern states on its way through.

When the forecast came down, Sean and Louise asked us to button up Vector for the expected wind-driven rain, and while we were doing so, Stacey had her fingers on both hands crushed beneath a wind-blown hatch cover, resulting in a broken “driving finger.” It’s a minor break and is healing nicely, but the splint that was applied looked vaguely puppet like. When Sean and Louise returned, Sean contributed some googly eyes and Louise made an appropriate, seasonal costume, and Imelda Snarkos was born. Short may her reign be. Broken bones notwithstanding, we’ve completely enjoyed ourselves hanging with these two kindred spirits, enjoying countless wonderful meals, walks, beverages, stories, and even a golf car ride to see the holiday lights in Sanford's Historic District. We will miss them greatly when Vector must drop lines soon and venture forth. Rest assured, Stinkpot will not be terribly far behind….

Happy 2024, friends! There’s lots more adventure to come….

Here in the Downtown Sanford Marina, we are blessed with the vision of a classic paddlewheel-driven riverboat called the Barbara Lee which operates tours on the St. Johns River from a pier here. Tonight, she had a little trouble getting back to her berth. Stacey captured the entire scene on video. If you're just here for wanton destruction and crunching of sailboats, that starts at about 6:30. We may have gasped when that happened…. Rest assured, they did get the vessel tied up eventually. 

Lewiston, Maine, my hometown, became the latest entry into the list of locations of mass shootings on October 25, 2023. Stacey and I dedicated the November episode of our radio show, Folk on the Water, to the people of Lewiston by playing songs by Maine artists. The show aired on November 2, 2023. This is the playlist:

1. I Knew This Place, David Mallett
2. Won't You Call Me Darling, The Kentucky Colonels (with Clarence and Roland White)
3. Home, Dave Rowe
4. A Daisy A Day, Jud Strunk
5. Watch the Fall, Jud Caswell
6. Plain Old Country Folk, Turkey Hollow (Consort) featuring Denny Breau
7. Quebecois, Schooner Fare
8. Letting Go, Anni Clark
9. In These Times, Noel Paul Stookey
10. Boyhood Hallelujah, Dave Rowe
11. Say Goodbye to Heartache, Don Campbell
12. Still, Carole Wise
13. You Needed Me, Lenny Breau Trio

If you missed the show's airdate and would like to hear it, surf over to the show archives. It should post there sometime in the week following its airdate. 

This EPIC blog post has been written over the course of weeks (I started writing 21 days ago). Like fine wine, my prose needs to age and mature before its potential is realized. When first I began flailing at the keyboard, it seemed only natural to begin with the following humorous (and, at the time, à propos) opening line.

​Four-score and seven hours ago, our motor yacht pulled into her slip at Downtown Sanford Marina in Sanford, Florida. It was fully three months in the making. There were missteps. There was a totaled car. There was pestilence. There was a cheap flight to Baltimore followed by a long drive from Solomons, Maryland. There were new friends, historic vessels aground, boat rides with friends, manatees, gators, and finally “The Voyage Home,” but I’m getting ahead of myself. 

Let’s get back to just after our arrival in Astor, Florida. Crazy happened, and I have yet to enumerate any of it for our dear BLOGophiles. 

Those who remember our departure from Florida on April 1, 2022, which predates this BLOG's first entry by about three months, will recall that one of the last things we did before casting off lines was to park our beloved red Toyota Prius, “Ruby,” with our friends, Velma and Kip McConnell, who graciously offered a corner of their Palm Coast, Florida property to store our car. Chris and Cherie (AKA Technomadia—or later in this BLOG, also the "Sanford Chris and Cherie") followed us in Blooper, their van, to Chez McConnell where we carelessly tossed the keys to Velma, who was sick with COVID-19 at the time, turning around and returning to Sanford with the Technomads after a lovely late lunch at a nearby restaurant. The next day we all cast off lines to do a little buddy boating on the St. Johns River before parting company for Stinkpot to continue north. You can read about all the places we ended up in earlier blog entries and also on our Facebook page. Suffice it to say, we went north and returned south, and when we tied up in Astor, we wanted to retrieve our car. 

Kip graciously came to the marina, picked me up, and brought me to his house where I became reacquainted with our car. Ruby looked just fine, but, once inside, it was hard not to notice the smell. During the 7½ months of being parked, unidentified members of the order Rodentia had clearly made Ruby their home for part of our absence, and so I drove back to the marina with the windows down. 

We cleaned and vacuumed the car, replaced the cabin air filter and did everything we knew to in a futile attempt to purge the malodor. We continued to use the car, airing it out before every trip, but after about three or four days of doing so, I got into the car to take a short drive to the nearby market, only to be greeted by a barrage of dashboard lights, an engine that sounded sick, and a car that refused to go into gear. Our furry stowaways had clearly done greater damage to the car than simply stinking it up. We filed an insurance claim for rodent damage on November 14, 2022. A tow truck was sent over and the car was taken to a dealership in nearby Deland, Florida for assessment. After more than a month of insurer deliberations during which the car was lost by the dealership on their own lot (they found it), we were told the car was totaled, and just after the first of the year, we were remunerated quite generously for a 16-year-old car—receiving a check for roughly what we paid for it almost nine years before.

Of course, we couldn’t be without any sort of wheels for all that time, and we weren’t. No sooner had we found out that Ruby was to be towed away than I started making plans to go pick up our “other car”—my trusty 2006 Toyota Highlander which we left parked in Solomons, Maryland at the home of dear friends, Aaron and Cristin. We, of course, had no idea that the Prius was to be totaled, but I had a sneaking suspicion that we might be without a car for a few weeks and renting a car seemed ridiculous. I hopped online and found a $29, one-way flight from Orlando to Baltimore the following week. I grabbed a ticket and, after a lovely ride to Orlando’s airport from boat neighbor, Chris, was soon spirited away to a much colder climate that was enjoying a blessedly warm day.

As an aside, Frontier is not an airline you should fly unless the tickets are stupidly cheap. It’s an uncomfortable cattle call. You will not enjoy it. $29 from Orlando to Baltimore? Yes! It was absolutely 10% the cost of any other airline’s offering. I’d do it again, but not for a farthing more.

On the ground in Baltimore, I was greeted on the ground by Kim—dear friend of decades, music supporter extraordinaire, and recent purchaser of a slick BMW. She was waiting for me when I exited the airport, and after a moment of “hiya” and “howzitgoing,” we were making tracks toward Solomons.

Now this is the moment in the story when I should tell you that one thing I forgot to pack with me was the key to my car. Fortunately, there was a copy of it squirreled away in Cristin and Aaron’s garage. Unfortunately, they are living in Düsseldorf, Germany for Aaron’s final, pre-retirement, US Navy-required, three-year tour of duty on foreign soil as a navy flyboy mucky-muck. Mind you, knowing that I was going to get the car, I had already asked that the key be retrieved by Cristin’s house-key-toting neighbor and deposited inconspicuously under the floor mat in the then locked car. I texted Stacey about my faux pas, and she set about trying to get in touch with Cristin to have the car containing the key left unlocked. It took a few hours, and several of my nails had succumbed to nibbling in the meantime, but eventually Stacey let me know that she had successfully “made contact” and that the key had unfortunately already been “deposited,” and the car had been “locked in the process, as originally intended.” Too late….

So while Kim and I were making the drive from BWI to Solomons, I had to decide how to deal with this latest wrinkle. Do I call the auto club and have them meet me there to save time since I’m about to make an all-night drive back to Florida? Do we just drive to the car and see if the smart auto locks detected the key fob and refused to lock for Cristin’s neighbor? I decided there was a fair chance that her best intentions to lock the car failed and so we did the latter. Upon arrival beside my chariot, I tried the driver’s door and it popped open! Smart auto locks for the win! I grabbed the key and fob off the floor board, swung the door closed, hit the “lock button” and said to Kim, "Let’s eat!"

Back in the Beemer, we made for The Pier, a nearby restaurant that is, predictably, on a pier. With the usually-gorgeous Solomons Island sunset hiding behind the overcast, we enjoyed the views out the windows and the conversation over a lovely dinner, the tab for which was deftly snatched from view by Kim’s expert sleight of hand and dealt with without my knowing while I was in the men’s room. Following an after-dinner caffeine injection, Kim returned me to my vehicle where we said our good-bye, and I pointed my steed southard at around 6PM.

I will save you the point-by-point recounting of my six-state, twelve-hour overnight odyssey, but suffice it to say, 800+ miles later, I arrived at Astor Marina & Motel around 6AM and took a well-earned nap shortly thereafter.

At this point, I pause my writing, only because this seems like the end—it isn’t. There is still a month or more to go before we’d know that our Prius would be totaled by the insurance company and large check cut.  

Blogger’s fatigue shrugged off, and realizing that my flight to Baltimore happened on November 30, 2022, with my overnight drive concluding at dawn on December 1, suffice it to say, with wheels at the ready, we settled into a routine in Astor. Our new slip being a mere hour’s drive from Sanford (in ideal conditions), I reconnected with my favorite pub there, The Sullivan, and began booking gigs shortly before our arrival. So sure were we that we’d have a working vehicle when our weary feet hit the sod that I had to borrow a car from our friends/dock neighbors Chris and Cherie (the Astor contingent) to play the first of the shows in late November after the Prius died, but all the other shows have been since December 1, so I was able to make them with the help of the Highlander. ​

The marina is still very damaged from the high water following hurricanes Ian and Nicole, and repairs are happening slowly since the city-owned facility didn’t have the budget to swing such major repairs.  The videos above from Technomadia show the devastation from the unprecedented flooding in Sanford. There are still two entire piers that are damaged beyond repair, removing some 40 slips from circulation. Officially, the marina is still not accepting new boats, and will not be for quite some time, even short-term transient boats, but this conversation with Luke seemed like it might be moving toward an exception being in the works for Stinkpot.

“Ha! We're waiting with bated breath,” I typed. “That whole place is like family to us, so we're very excited to get home.”

30 more minutes elapsed before I saw the words we longed to hear appear unbidden on my computer screen: “You just won an exciting stay at the Downtown Sanford Marina.”

I accepted the offer, and after a bit of logistical discussion, we agreed that Stinkpot would arrive in its assigned slip, 34B, Monday morning, January 30. Being that it was Friday, and I was still pretty worn from my COVID convalescence, we took our time preparing to leave, despite our excitement to return “home” to Sanford. We decided to make an overnight at anchor out of it. We took one more run to the grocery store to make sure we’d have everything we might want. We began stowing, tying down, and otherwise preparing Stinkpot to be underway after two-and-a-half months mostly tied to land.

We told the Astor Bridge Marina & Motel’s manager, Julie, that we’d gotten the good news, and we’d be getting underway soon, thanked her for everything, settled up any final bills and paperwork. On a beautiful, sunny Sunday morning, we topped off our potable water tank, started the engines, disconnected the shore power, brought our dock lines aboard, and Stinkpot gently nudged back out into the St. Johns River for her final 30 mile, upstream push to Sanford.

The storm happened during a king tide, so the storm surge which came up the St. Johns River proved entertaining for us, but devastating for some of the very expensive homes that were around us in the cove. Clearly some of the homes were built at a time when no one could've conceived of the river level rising much above a certain level. Newer houses were built upon piles of fill, but the older homes were decidedly not, and we watched with morbid fascination as the water rose over retaining walls and docks, up manicured lawns, around patio furniture, and through locked doors into some very posh dwellings. The wind did howl, but there was almost no wave action in our enclosed cove, and Stinkpot came through with nary a scratch. 

After spending three days in the cove with no place to go ashore, your humble captain was starting to go a little stir crazy, so against the better judgement of the crew, we weighed anchor on Veterans Day and pointed the boat out of the cove onto the river to continue up river (south). Our goal was to fuel up at our usual fuel stop at Mandarin Holiday Marina and continue as far as Green Cove Springs where we could dock with power on the municipal docks. Mind you, those docks would've been a terrible choice during the storm because a powerful northeast wind there would rock those docks mercilessly, but post-storm, the winds clocked around to the southwest, and that would be very pleasant there, indeed. I was looking forward to going ashore, perhaps grabbing a pizza or some other culinary perk of civilization while there. It wasn't meant to be.

When we exited the cove onto the river, the river seemed relatively calm, but as we continued south, the wind and wave action on the river became lumpier and lumpier, the overcast increased, and by the time we got to the area around Mandarin Point and Doctors Lake, the seas were uncomfortable  and the numerous, black crab pot floats were increasingly hard to spot under darkening skies. I decided at that point that we should divert into Doctors Lake and run down to Whitey's Fish Camp (a restaurant with a dock) to dock for dinner, go ashore for a walk, and perhaps spend the night if allowed. ​

Stacey called ahead of our arrival, and the person she spoke to was talking as though the docks were bound to be wall-to-wall boats, and we'd scarcely find a place to tie up. I was dubious because, despite it being a weekend evening, the weather was far from prime boating conditions. Stacey persisted with her questioning and asked if we could spend the night. She was told that captains who drink a bit too much are often encouraged to spend the night on the dock. Challenge accepted!

We made the four miles down the lake against the chop to Whitey's and the only boat that was tied up there was one that clearly stays tied up there—presumably belonging to one of Whitey's owners. The restaurant is tucked into a creek and the water was flat calm, despite the relentless southwest breeze. I slid Stinkpot alongside the dock just ahead of that vessel, and the water was already so high still from the storm that we could tell the still-rising tide would take it over the fixed dock. With another two or three hours until high tide, we went inside and told the staff of our presence on their dock and said we'd be in for dinner after the tide recedes enough to let us back off the boat. A plan that we were all too pleased to follow—and we did—and it was delicious—and the captain got a little tipsy as t'was required and foretold. While we were inside, the overcast began to break up leaving us with a beautiful sky under which we took a lovely post-dinner stroll ashore and retired for the evening, and while we were admiring the very nice houses ashore we received a private message from one of our fan/followers on Facebook saying, I see you're at my family's restaurant. I hope you enjoy staying the night on the dock. We told them that we had already accomplished the listed quid pro quo, and were told in no uncertain terms that such drastic measures were unnecessary, and that Stinkpot was invited to dock at Whitey's for the night any time. Fortunately, I did not wake up with a headache the following morning.

The sun rose on that Saturday with nary a breath of wind and gorgeous warming sunshine. We cast off from Whitey's and made our way back up the lake and across the river to Mandarin Holiday Marina for our requisite refueling at the least expensive fuel stop for hundreds of miles in either direction, after which we continued up river (south) in idyllic conditions with a knot or so current against us toward our target for the day of the free docks in Palatka. That current we were running against never waned at all at flood, even though we were still on the tidal portion of the river. I attribute that to the high water and indeed flooding conditions still up river following hurricanes Ian and, to a far lesser extent, Nicole.