Entering the Chesapeake

AYB Marina

Covered docks

We enjoyed our two night stay at AYB. It’s a located right along the ICW and is a working yard with storage facilities. The location is great, with several stores within walking and biking distance. I was able to bike to a fabric store, get a pedi and shop for groceries, score!  Of course I only brought 1 pannier and the rack bag for the bike because I wasn’t going to buy much. So when I filled the bike bags and had 5 more plastic bags to deal with, I panicked a bit.  I managed by hanging the plastic bags off the handle bars and walking back to the boat. A lovely couple from the marina were driving by and stopped to help by taking all my plastic bags to the marina for me J  Okay, lesson learned, always bring all the bike bags when shopping…

We had dinner out at El Toro Loco, a Mexican restaurant walking distance from the marina. We checked out the covered dock area at AYB. We’re thinking that this could be a good place to store Blossom on our off season. Our plan is to live aboard 6 months a year so we’re looking for a place to keep her July-December where is doesn’t freeze. They have covered slips and it’s in fresh water so the critters won’t grow on her bottom.  They have a great rating on Active Captain too (Active Captain is an extremely helpful “yelp” for mariners). Actually, we saw the Active Captain boat at AYB, Acapella. I'd love to meet them and tell them how much I enjoy their website!

 Pumping out (Martin was so pleased when I took this pic...)

In the morning, we moved to the fuel dock and took on 800 gallons of diesel, 15 gallons of gas for Petal and we pumped out.  Then we headed out through a bridge and then through our first lock. Cruised through Norfolk and all the military yards and out into the Chesapeake Bay.  We had military vessels passing by and had to share bridges with barges.  

We had a moment of realization today when we looked up and said "we’ve made it to the Chesapeake!"  About 1000 miles north, ocean passage, overnights, ICW, bridges, locks and channels.  It feels good to have made it this far and we feel like we’ve learned so much. Much more to learn of course, but we’re on our way J

Military landing craft coming through the lock

Barge coming south

As for the boat issues, we’ve had some success and some “not so much”:

·  Chiller #2. A dometic tech came out and spent a few hours on the boat. He confirmed that we had a bad harness, and a bad board, and that he can’t access the harness because it’s tucked so far away.  He left us with a new harness and the name of an outfit in Annapolis that can do the warranty work.

·  9K gen. The guys spent several hours working on the gen and thought they had solved the problem but after running for an hour, it once again overheated. Jim spoke with a Northern Lights tech who gave us a few suggestions to try tomorrow.

·  Engine temp. Martin spoke with another Nordhavn owner who has his engine fans pulling out rather than one in and one out of the engine room. Martin spoke with Delta T, got the thumbs up, and reconfigured the intake blower to be an exhaust blower. The ambient temperature is about 8 degrees less today but our engine room temp is 16 degrees less so we seem to have some success.

·  We found a bit of yellow liquid that we’re now thinking is coolant, under the main engine. It seems to be leaking out when it’s started up.

We also got some very good news today. Our training captain, Jim Mobley, had an obligation and was to leave us on the 10th.  All boat plans being written in sand, he’s now free and will be able to stay with us until the 19th.  Those extra 9 days are gold and we're really happy!

This evening (Thursday, the 4^th) we decided to anchor in the Poquoson River, north of Norfolk.  As we began to enter the river, we turned into quite a squall that was following us up the Chesapeake.  The seas were choppy and about 2 feet. Then 5 dolphins came to play, they were breaching out of the water, it looked like they were playing in the chop.  And then a rainbow appeared and the squall dissipated. Very cool.

Martin and Jim are in the laz working on the gen right now. We'll grill dinner and have another early night. In the morning, we'll practice deploying the dinghy and flopper stoppers and then head north again. Probably to another anchorage.  

Our plans for the next week are starting to come together. We made reservations at a primo spot, right in downtown in Annapolis for the 9-12.  The Dometic folks will meet us there to work on the chiller and we'll try to find a Northern Lights tech for the generator if it's still overheating.

Our friends Sean & Louise told us about a huge celebration that's happening in the Baltimore Harbor from the 10-16th, the Star Spangled Spectactular. It's a celebration of the 200th anniversary of the national anthem.  It looks like a huge festival. That's probably why we can only stay til the 12th at our Annapolis marina. We're hoping to see some of the tall ships, navy ship and the Blue Angles.