2001 ICW Leg 2 - Weathered In - in Kilmarnock

Thursday 25 October 2001

We expected a front to come through Thursday with strong winds. It did. We had gusts up to 29 knots at the boat, and Indian Creek is very protected. We didn't have any waves there. We heard all kinds of people (on the VHF radio) having trouble out in the bay including a guy who was sawing through his anchor chain. There is an SSCA Island Packet with several cats anchored up past the grain silos and a trawler named JEMIMA which wanted to get to Deltaville, but came in here because they were getting beat up by the waves. They said the waves off the mouth of the Potomac were particularly bad. They are headed for Hilton Head.

For dinner, we tried to get an Italian place to come for us, but the girl was new and had an attitude. So we went back to Jimmie’s Café and Bob had shrimp and I had swordfish.

Friday 26 October 2001 - Fixing the depth sounder

We are still here. Our depth sounder wasn't working, and we consider that pretty important. It warns us when we are about to go aground. I thought it would be clear enough (sun and clear water) so I could freedive and see if it had barnacles. However, I thought it was too cold to go in without a wetsuit (water temp about 66 deg F) and I found I couldn't get down under the boat with the wetsuit on because I was too buoyant.

So Bob got out the scuba gear (putting it on was like a Keystone Cops routine - I did it in the dinghy and eventually I had to fall out sideways). Even with a weight belt, I still couldn't go directly under the boat, so I worked my way down the keel of the boat from the bow and found the transducer and scraped all but one stubborn barnacle off. Bob went up to check the depth sounder while I scraped off the prop. The depth sounder still wasn't working, so I went down the keel again, missed it and went almost all the way to the stern, came back and chipped the last barnacle off. I used 1000 lbs of air.

Bob discovered that the depth sounder had another problem - instead of the wires screwing into a socket they were just taped together. The marina store had the materials to fix it. While we were doing this, Max and Lucette biked into town. They discovered it was uphill all the way. There is a museum in town which is supposed to be interesting but they didn't go (they are not museum people). We heard many people in trouble on the radio, and the CG asked one of them if he had flares, so Bob looked at ours and found they were expiring next month. He was able to replace these too with ones that are good until 2004. Bob grilled salmon and we had salad, new potatoes and green beans for dinner.

Saturday 27 October 2001

Winds were supposed to abate today, and they didn’t. Max walked into town and got a Washington Post and milk. We sat around listening to the VHF

Our bunk - Bob asleep on the right