Day 240: Thursday, May 2, 2013
Port to Port: Portsmouth, Virginia
Underway: 0:00 am Motor Off: 0:00 pm Miles Traveled: 0 Stayed At: Free Dock
Mile 0 to Mile 0: After all our fun yesterday, we needed to get some projects done this morning. First on the list is laundry and showers. Luckily, there is a marina a couple blocks north of us so we paid their dinghy dock fee so we could use their showers and laundry room. It pays to get going early – we were there by 7:30 am and the washers were open so we started two loads of laundry and took showers right away. Three more people showed up to do piles of laundry just as our loads were getting done washing so we lucked out – it could have ended up an all day project waiting for an empty machine.
We met another Looper in the laundry room. He and his wife are one hop from being done with their Loop that they started in Norfolk, Virginia last year. They have had a blast. There should be a lot of Loopers in the area since early next week is the Looper Rendevous in Norfolk Virginia. We aren’t going but hopefully we’ll meet some other fellow travelers.
After laundry, I walked to the library to update the blog and do some research on the Chesapeake while Cindy stayed on the boat doing some organizing. The library is also a nice place to recharge some of our electronics, as needed. The less power we use on the boat, the longer we can avoid expensive marinas and stay anchored out.
Just a couple blocks from us is the Portsmouth Lightship and the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Museum. The Lightship was built in 1915 and served for 48 years of the east coast of the US. I had never heard of lightships but these were special boats used to mark channels or important navigation hazards where it was too expensive or difficult to build a permanent lighthouse. They were typically manned by crews 0f 8-15 men 24 hours a day in all kinds of weather. The men worked onsite for 2 months and then had a month off. Most of the time it must have been incredibly boring (especially pre-internet and technology), while at others like in fog or storms, exciting or downright dangerous. The Lightship was closed for renovations but we toured the outside. The Shipyard Museum was one of the best museums we have toured so far. They pack a lot of information into a relatively small space. It explained in detail the maritime history of Portsmouth and Norfolk and how they became home to the oldest and largest naval shipyard.
When we returned to Aurora, we finally had neighbors – our friends on Slow Churn were parked right in front of us – again – and we had a nice reunion visit. We had planned to go to a movie at the Commodore Theatre downtown so we made a date for later. The Commodore is an ornate 1945 Art –Deco theatre set up like a dinner theatre. Everyone sits at a table and orders dinner and snacks using a phone on each table. The murals, decorations and fixtures are all original. I can’t believe this place has survived the modern world. They have modern technology too, with the latest THX Digital Sound and a huge digital movie screen – a perfect mix of old and new. We watched the movie “42” about Jackie Robinson – every kid in middle school should watch this movie and learn about the ugly reality of racism and how one man can change the world.
Coming out of the movie we met some other boaters walking along the sidewalk by the movie – you can just tell they were boaters – no one else walks more than one block to their car. We will have to visit with them more tomorrow. A post movie treat of ice cream (Slow Churn has a freezer) and home baked sugar cookies (Slow Churn has an oven, too) closed out another amazing day on the Great Loop.