Annapolis to Norfolk

We stayed in Annapolis for 14 days; first having fun, then having to wait for repairs to the alternator regulator which had failed on the way from Cape May. The regulator manufacturer, Weems & Plath, are based in Annapolis so we expected a quick turnaround but the item was no longer current and was sent to Baltimore for repair. Meanwhile, we were surprised to see another MCC boat, Summertime Love with Ron and Carol on board, which arrived in Back Creek during the second week of our stay. We spent cocktail hour with them and discovered that Reg and Linda Cyr (Capella), also from MCC, had arrived by car to visit Ron and Carol the Summertime Love and the boat show. They stayed in the area until Sunday.

Getting around in Annapolis was achieved by walking, dinking and by the Annapolis Bus Service. They are unique in many ways. In pre WWII Germany, the trains always ran on time; the bus drivers and clippies in London are known world wide for their efficiency and friendliness; the Toronto Transit Commission is justly proud of it’s record of safety and on time arrival, but in Annapolis MA there is a new breed of bus driver and a totally different point of view with regard to getting the customer where he or she wants to be. The drivers practice a different type of customer service , which involves instant voice communication by radio to other drivers (and sometimes it seems even Morse code) along with constant passengers communication. On a twenty-minute ride I was asked, four or five times, where I was going. It’s not that they are curious, but it is how passengers make connections. If your bus is running later than the bus you are connecting to, (not unusual) will be told by radio to wait for you. If you are a passenger on the second bus you will have to wait for the first bus to arrive. They will worry about your connections later and the domino effect

Sometimes, a bus which is operating on a route which you would not expect to take will stop at your bus stop and take you on as a passenger, because the driver knows the bus you want, will not be there. The driver will drop you at another stop with instruction to wait for a specific bus and will then radio the bus coming so that you will not be asked for a second fare, even though the drop off point is not a designated connection point. Time does not enter the equation. Everyone still gets where they are going, most of the time at least. If things are really slow, the transit authority will send out additional busses with no particular route. In fact they will pick up lonely frustrated passengers and ask the usual question “Where do you want to go?” and will then work out a route to get each passenger to the proper destination with no regard to normal routes, in effect, becoming an economical taxi service. One day the conversation went like this: - Conductor to an elderly woman and her companion: “Mam, where are you going? “ “Am goin to see my daughter, we have lunch every Wednesday” - “But Mam, repeat the driver, “where are you going? “ “ Am suppose to stop at the store with the red sign” reply the old lady. “ The store with the red sign, where is that? - Someone in the bus reply: “It must be Joe’s Hardware Store” – “Joe’s Hardware Store at the corner of Main and Bridge street” . The driver decided to transfer the old lady to the next bus. And that’s the way it is run. The Annapolis drivers say it is because of the Boat Show, and things are much better when there is no show. I suspect that they like it that way. Their passengers seem happy and as a cruiser, time was not so important and the constant customer service seems to makes the waiting bearable and fun.

ST-MICHAELS

TILGHMAN ISLAND

SOLOMON’S ISLAND

SMITH CREEK, MILL CREEK, DELTAVILLE, CHISMAN CREEK

NORFOLK

We anchored in the Hampton River on the Hampton University side, opposite Sunset Creek. There was a dinghy landing near the Radisson Hotel. The hotel provided us with a happy hour, which included chicken-wings, cheese and crackers etc. for $13.00 total including two drinks each. We joined a few other sailors from the anchorage, some of whom we had already run into on our journey . Lots of stories and experiences were shared during that time. We visited the Virginia Air and Space Museum and took a cruise around the famous roadstead, which include a visit to Fort Wool. We reviewed a large portion of the US fleet including three nuclear powered aircraft carriers and half a dozen nuclear submarines as well as battle ships, destroyers and troop carriers. There were other NATO vessels from France and Germany visiting. Quite an arsenal! We felt that we should have had radiation badges issued for the tour.

On Sunday afternoon, October 29 we motored to Hospital Point, which is at the beginning of the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) and designated as mile Zero. The wind was blowing at 25 knots and gusting to 30; unpleasant and cold. We motored to this supposedly unpleasant anchorage, to be ready the next morning to go through several lift-bridges, before entering the Dismal Swamp lock which lifts boats around eight to twelve feet into the Dismal Swamp Canal.

We said goodbye the Chesapeake and all it’s rivers: Patuxent, Choptank, Wicomico, Yeocomico, Potomac, Rappahannock, till the next time and headed south to where it is w-w-warmer! Jeffrey, an avid science fiction reader, thinks that the Klingons named these rivers!