Solomons Island, Oxford, Cambridge, MD

We were in Solomons Island, MD four nights; two at Calvert’s Marina and two at anchor near the Holiday Inn. You can use their dinghy dock for $2/day and we could grab the hotel's wifi signal. If we were ZZ Top fans, a bonus would have been being able to hear the live concert coming from the maritime museum Monday night. We’re not huge fans of the classic rock trio so we were glad we weren’t closer to the action!

The other excitement started out with a search for ice cream. We took the long dinghy ride from our anchorage to the other end of town to the public dock and walked a bit.

As we had cones in hand, the sky darkened and the winds swirled down the street. Instead of taking cover, we ran back to the dinghy as we wanted to make sure our anchor was holding in the storm. Here’s a picture of the wild ride back to the boat.

First we got wet from the wave action, then we got wetter from the pouring rain – at least it washed off the salt water! Our anchor was fine but we did see another sailboat whose anchor must have been sliding as they were heading over to a mooring ball to grab on. The storms do come up fast around here.

Leaving the Solomons there was a lot of radio traffic requesting boaters to stay a mile off a specific target area. It was coming from the nearby Patuxent River Naval Air Warfare Center – a good place to stay clear of! During WW II this area was a very active ATB (Amphibious Training Base). Our days of finding locally harvested shrimp on the menu is past; crab, especially Blue Crab, is king here.

We went through another thunderstorm anchored off Oxford, MD off the Choptank River. I think the rainfall levels must be in good shape by now with three storms in the past five days. We saw the m/v Mystic Bond there with a “For Sale” on it. It belongs to Canadian friends we’d met back in IL in Sept. who have finished the Loop but we were surprised to see the boat for sale. I don’t think that will happen to us but you never know!

We moved on to another of the English Crown Colonies, Cambridge, and enjoyed the free dock there for two nights. It was directly in front of the Dorchester County building and we don’t think they minded sharing their restrooms with us during office hours. This was about the time we realized Ginger had an infestation of fleas! This is something we've never dealt with in our Wisconsin weather so it was all new to us. We weren't able to locate a groomer here or any products that might help so we had to take our fleas along with us! To be continued.....

We had a great lunch at Snapper’s Waterfront Café with the couple living aboard m/v “Tardis”, the boat ahead of us at the dock. They’re graduate Loopers and were kind enough to help us with our starter problem as we were leaving.

The boat below is an example of the dreaded "brown mustache" I mentioned awhile back. The cypress roots and other vegetation contains tannins which color the water and it can stain your hull. We don't have one as Cap'n Paul is very diligent about keeping a clean ship!

I’ll close with a sign we saw in the Solomons: