Big ships, little ships, red ships, blue ships

Monday, October 24

We dinghied over to the York River Yacht Haven this morning to check out their Ship's Store.  The tide was very low.  While we were there, we noticed a sailboat in its slip that was tilted to one side.  It was sitting on the bottom, because the water was too shallow!  How weird that the marina wouldn't make sure that all of their slips were deep enough even during low tide.  There is definitely a different mentality down here.  They're just so used to the differences in depths that they don't worry about it, I guess. 

Water is limited on a boat, so we have to employ many water saving measures.  For example, we never run the water when brushing our teeth, we use as little water as possible when doing dishes and laundry, and we don't wash the outside of the boat with fresh water.  The other way we preserve water is to have what Dave and Nicki call "Navy showers". This means we quickly get wet, turn the water off, suds up hair and body, turn water on and rinse, turn water off.  We, of course, call these Air Force showers, since we are RC Wings.  

Tuesday, October 25

We lifted anchor at 9:00, but waited for Off Duty II to get refuelled before we headed out. Going to Norfolk today!

We had a rolly ride, because there were still waves and swells that had built up from the high winds of the past few days.  Part of our trip put these waves on the beam, but nothing too crazy.  

Coming into the Elizabeth River toward Norfolk, we noticed that there was a definite Navy presence.  The Norfolk Naval Base is here.  A submarine was being towed into the naval yard, five aircraft carriers were at dock just a couple hundred yards away, small Navy patrol boats were buzzing around, and the Navy hospital ship, Comfort, was at dock.  Comfort provides rapid, flexible, and mobile medical and surgical services to the U.S. armed forces. She also provides mobile surgical hospital service in disaster or humanitarian relief.  

There were lots of cranes lining the shore, too, ready to unload container ships.  A huge one went close by us and was escorted in by two tug boats.  We had to wait while the tugs helped the container ship turn around and then they pushed it sideways to the dock.  

We arrived at Tidewater Yacht Marina around 2:30.  They were able to fill our fuel tank right here at our dock because we are so close to the fuel dock. Well, that was handy.  Almost immediately upon arrival, Dave and Nicki had met their new Canadian dock neighbours, Richard and Jeannine, who were from Fergus, Ontario!  Small world.  Richard and Jeannine invited all four of us over for Happy Hour.  Later, all six of us went out for dinner at the marina restaurant.  We had a really nice evening.  

Wednesday, October 26

Since we had planned just a short time at a marina, we needed to get lots of stuff done today.  We started the laundry in the morning, then washed the salt off the boat and the mud off of the anchor, the anchor chain, the windlass, and the fenders, filled the water tanks, vacuumed and cleaned, and emptied the garbage.  

Jeannine had offered to drive us to the grocery store, so Nicki and I met her at 11:00 and we went to the local Food Lion store. I needed to start provisioning for our ocean passage, so I was on a mission.  I filled a large cart full of groceries, and then we had to figure out how to fit everything in the car!  We eventually got everything back to the Marina and Carey met me at the car to help cart everything back to the boat.  Now, came the fun part. I had to take all of the cardboard packaging and labels off of the food items, and pack and label everything in Ziplocs, then try to find a place to stow everything.  

Here is a pic of just some of our provisions.  I will do the rest of our provisioning next week when we will be at the Ocean Yacht Marina with the World Cruising Club.  

We hosted Happy Hour on RC Wings tonight.  We are becoming such social butterflies!