Sept 29, 2011-Maryland

We had an early morning today, we hauled our anchor up at 5:30am so we could catch the tide heading up the Delaware Bay. We had such a miserable trip down the bay last year that this year we feel as though we cheated somehow. It was actually a nice day. We were motoring at 8.5 knots, and we had the head sail out for a little while until the little bit of wind that we had died. We even got to see one of our friends from home. I got a text from our friend Tom who had heard us on the VHF radio (I guess our boat name is not common). He was doing a boat delivery to Annapolis with some friends and eventually came right by us to say hello! What a small world! You expect to run into people you know at the grocery store, or if you are traveling...maybe see someone you know in the airport. We never expected to see someone we know from home heading up the Delaware Bay! What a pleasant surprise!
The way the tide works in the Bay for a slow boat (like ours) is if you catch it at the beginning you can ride it all the way through the canal to the Chesapeake Bay. It worked out perfectly, the only problem we had was the debris that was in the water, especially in the canal. Deason had to stand watch at the bow of the boat to look for large pieces, there where whole trees in the water, some with huge root balls. We couldn't avoid the small stuff because there was so much of it, so we just tried not to hit the big stuff, we even saw some 50 gallon drums! Apparently, all the debris is still from hurricane Irene, and the rain that has been falling since!
We ended up anchoring in the Bohemia River, it was as far as we could go, the wind picked up out of the W once we were in the canal, and when we got into the Chesapeake it made for standing waves. There is nothing worst than wind against tide, one woman on the radio described it as "the conditions are rubbish". I couldn't have said it better, so we pulled off and found a nice anchorage, and our friends from the Lagoon 440 "Sail On" (who we met in Block Island) anchored next to us. It was a great night exchanging stories and checking out each others boats.