Day 263: Saturday, May 25, 2013

Port to Port: Delaware City, Delaware

Underway: 0:00 am      Motor Off: 0:00 pm      Miles Traveled: 0      Stayed At: Marina

Mile 0 to Mile 0: The wind was roaring today – even on land and in the protection of the marina channel. I can’t imagine what the waves were like on the Bay. A lot of sunshine, though, made for a very nice day to wander around, visit other boaters and just relax waiting for our weather window.

There were a couple of reminders yesterday of why you have to be careful and do your homework when traveling on unknown waters. A sailboat was trying to get into a marina farther back on the C&D Canal when it ran aground hard on a shoal just in the entrance of the marina. It was probably just mud but they needed to be towed off. Wind, tides, current and shifting sand and mud make navigation a combination of luck and skill.

The other accident could have been a disaster. A smaller powerboat was out on Delaware Bay towards evening (why they were out there in big wind and waves is a mystery) and ran into a miles long rock jetty that, at high tide, is mostly invisible and only marked intermittently. (We checked our charts and it is even hard to find when you know what you are looking for). This was around 8:00 pm in the evening – almost dark. They called for help and the Coast Guard tried to respond from a station on the opposite shore of the Bay but ran into 8+’ waves on the beam and turned back. The Delaware City fireboat had to go out the channel and into the bay to rescue the boaters and try to tow the boat back to the marina – the people were okay but the boat flipped and had to be cut loose. They towed it in yesterday and it is a total loss. What was supposed to be a fun adventure on the water almost turned into another sad story of loss of life on the water.

Thankfully, our day was pretty calm. We watched the whitecaps out on the Bay (thankful we were warm, dry and safe on land), poked around some of the shops in town and stopped at the visitor’s center for the Fort. We spent probably an hour chatting with Paul, the ferry captain, who drove us out to the Fort yesterday. He was a wonderful source of local knowledge that will help us decide how to safely get from here to Cape May. We also met   at the local blacksmiths shop (yes, there is a blacksmith in town). He has a ketch-rigged sailboat at the marina he is trying to fix up to use on future adventures. He also had a Minnesota connection – he has gone up to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area camping and fishing and loved it. Walking into his shop takes you back a hundred years – he doesn’t make too many horseshoes now but makes his living as an iron artist.

We also had time to tour Lady Sarah, Bill’s Island Packet sailboat and Carol and Russ’s 36’ Beneteau sailboat. Both were very comfortable boats and we added to our list of potential future floating homes.

We enjoyed a nice dinner at a local restaurant with Carol and Russ. We didn’t know this beforehand, but we would have needed to make reservations if we had wanted to have crab for dinner. They had a $20 all you can eat special on blue crab which many people in the restaurant were taking advantage of . The waitress kept passing us by with large trays stacked with crab and there were piles of wreckage all over. Maybe next time.