This morning we got up and it looked like it was going to be a good day. A gentle breeze was blowing when we got underway going north on the Chesapeake Bay. We went out on the Elizabeth River and started up past all the Navy Activity in the bay area. Up past the Coal Loading area and the cargo carriers unloading containers. Then we passed by the Navy yards in Norfolk and saw all the ships that were in port at the time. When we reached the end of the Navy yard we heard a call on our radio that we were not supposed to be within five hundred yards of a warship. What we thought was a lighted buoy ahead of us about a half mile was really the conning tower of a nuclear submarine. And about that time here comes the blue light special over to us and showed us he meant business if we did not get the heck out of the way so we made a turn to starboard or the right about ninety degrees and went until we were out of his way and then proceeded on. I think I will have my bifocals checked in the next port because it sure looked like a lighted buoy.
Well by the time we reached the end of the Navy Yards we knew that quite possibly the weather man had not told us the whole story because a day that was supposed to have waves of one foot suddenly had grown to three feet with an occasional bigger one thrown in for good measure. We slowed from nine knots down to four and were still getting bounced around to we started looking for a river to head up and out of the wind. We found that place in the Back River just north of Norfolk where we are anchored out tonight behind a little sand dune area that protects us from the wind and I just looked and they are saying not much wind tomorrow and waves of one foot. We shall see if that is true in the morning.
But we also discovered when we were looking in the closet area that we had pin prick of a leak that was coming in from a blister like source that we have no idea where it originated. It looks like it was just a flaw in the way the fiberglass cured up or something. Then we thought it might be coming from the rub rail on the boat because some of the screws were not tightened well. Anyhow all this resulted in Bob’s one suitcase of clothes stored there was wet and we needed to dry them out. He spotted a marina maybe half mile away on the river so we went over and got some epoxy type material to seal the hole where the water was coming in. So were are watching the spot to see if it cures up and we are rid of it. Just checked and it had a new water bubble in the spot. We had the boat put on a lift to check it out and the only thing that had water in it was the rub rail area of the boat. Tightened all of those screws and we will see when we run tomorrow it helped any. Otherwise we may have to go to a boat yard and see what they think. Of course the famous words apply here as of now, you bought it you own and it’s your responsibility even though there might be some kind of warranty for that type of source of the leak in the boat. We just have to work on it some more. Our head also hiccupped again in the rougher water and we had that mess to clean up also. We sponged all of the water out of the bilge and for now we have that dried out and hope that we got it all so we don’t have any mold in the bilges. With all of that happening today we made a total of about twenty miles so we hope things go better tomorrow. This is just a part of the adventure. Where we are anchored there is every kind of bird on the sand dune that has to do with water, gulls, plovers and many others. When anchored there was a lady on the island with them and photographing them.
We traveled about 20 miles total for the day and plan on doing better tomorrow
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