Stuck in Beautiful Mill Creek

I've just added pictures to the previous post.

Saturday, May 16th: Mill Creek off of the Great Wicomico River, VA

We saw this Great Egret at Tangier Island. I've loved watching the egrets we've seen along the way.

On Friday afternoon, we enjoyed our visit to Tangier Island - one hour from Onancock by fast boat. A few hours were all we needed to walk the narrow streets of the town and read the signs along the way telling the history of each spot: home of early settlers, the first doctor, the general store that also sold coffins and whose owner was also the town undertaker, the first post office, why some homes have graves in the front yard. We visited the open building where crabs are sorted - those having shrugged off their shell being separated from the rest to be sold as soft shelled crab. There were a couple of shops selling T-shirts and such but for the most part, this is a busy community focused around their own business, golf carts scooting around, while people like us nose about and then eat a meal at one of the several restaurants. For dinner, most of us ordered soft-shell crab. We picked the crabs up and ate them with our fingers and they were tasty as only fresh seafood can be. At the end of our visit, we could hardly wait to get away - the no-see-ums that appeared in the evening as we waited for the ferry were in swarms and were ferocious!





That's a family grave in the front yard.

Blue crabs really are blue!

Today, there was a small craft wind warning and possible thunderstorms predicted for this afternoon. To avoid the bad stuff, we got up extra early and were on our way just after 6. For the first time in a while, we were powered under sail only for most of the morning. Early on, we had some winds gusting to 18+ so in view of the afternoon forecast and the dark skies looming ahead, Bob put a reef in the main sail and partially furled the jib - unnecessarily as it turned out. Since we were making good time we questioned whether we should skip the anchorage just off the Great Wicomico river and keep going to Solomons - our hoped for destination tomorrow - but we considered that the weather might very well get nasty later in the day and decided that playing it safe was best. Well before noon, we sailed into the mouth of Great Wicomico River and then turned into Mill Creek. What a beautiful spot - one of the nicest anchorages we've been in - State side, that is - and very protected too should those "possible thunderstorms" materialize. However: nothing materialized - the sun shone, the wind moved onshore trees around a bit but - really - that was it. We had been sailing in south winds - perfect for traveling north to Solomons - and guess what - the winds for the next three days will be against us as we travel north, the waves are predicted to be big, and tomorrow, there is a 90% chance of rain. We should have kept going we all said - while the going was good.

Anchored in Mill Creek

After getting settled, Bob and I put the dinghy in the water thinking that we might as well get out and around while the sun shone. We cruised up the "creek" - which looks more like a wide river or even a long narrow lake. It's a lovely place - apparently far from most towns and large centres so not built up. It has the feel of some cottage country piece of water in the hinterland where there's still lots of thickly wooded areas and only a few cottages built and occupied by the intrepid. The Waterways guidebook lists this area as swimming territory. There is enough fresh water here mixed in with the salt to discourage the jelly fish found elsewhere - so no worries there - and it certainly was hot enough to get wet. (In the Chesapeake, fresh water runs in from the rivers and mixes with salt water from the Atlantic.) Bob and I went back to the boat and put on our bathing suits. The surface water was warm - a little farther down - kind of cool - but it felt good and we paddled around for a while, then soaped ourselves up and rinsed off with the stern "shower" (a hose with spray nozzle that pulls out of a recess at the boat's stern). Rather than use the shower in our head, this would be our shower for the day. We'd had our first Chesapeake swim. What a treat.

In the days to come, the predicted potpourri of bad weather includes much cooler temps - but then who knows? Today's forecast was a bit of a bust!

Monday, May 18th: Mill Creek off of the Great Wicomico River, VA

We're still in Mill Creek and hoping to venture out into the Bay tomorrow. The winds are strong and against us again today and the waves too high for us to be plowing into them - so it's another day at anchor and poking around the boat.

Since we never got to a proper grocery store in Onancock, I wasn't able to buy any decent bread. I did get some wonderful produce at the hardware store (funny, eh?) and milk at the gas station convenience but the white mushy Wonder bread sold at the gas station is just too awful to waste money on - well actually - it's too awful to eat! - so I've used my time to make English muffins (part whole wheat) and a loaf of baking powder beer bread (more like a biscuit). Since we have another whole day at anchor before us, I might as well try the yeast bread recipe I was given back in the Exumas. It calls for part sea water (since it's a "sailors'" bread) - but I'll substitute fresh water and salt.

I've also been getting back to the pressure cooker. Having tried a few recipes from the accompanying cook book, I've settled on 3 favourites - pressure cooked whole chicken (for a 4 lb chicken - about 45 minutes using a very low flame for part of the time yields very moist meat), stew (very good and no browning required), and what I made last night, "Curry in a Hurry" (chicken breast cooked in coconut milk with curry paste I brought from home - hard to find in the grocery stores here). Tonight I'm thawing out some stewing meat and getting out the cooker again.

Bob is still finding jobs to do about the boat - more polishing and cleaning - and he has scraped away some of the caulking around the head floor and is going to replace it - it's been leaking a little and messing up the cherry wood on the main cabin side.

Both of us have been doing a lot of reading - right now we're both reading books I've picked up at book exchanges. Cruisers read a lot and tend to leave all their books at exchanges when they're finished with them. I was almost out of books until we found a book exchange in the bar at Onancock (a big one) and then Barb passed along a bag of books as well.

I'm enjoying another day "stuck" on the boat but I must say - being able to share someone's Internet signal certainly helps. But would we welcome another day here? - not likely!