We have been a little behind our posts since we have been without any kind of connectivity for almost a week now. So get ready for lots of back-logged posts ahead!

If you don’t remember, our first few days of cruising were pretty chocked full of goodness…lots of fun and exhaustion mixed with some terror and that about sums up the cruising life…haha just kidding! But I digress…

We really didn’t have any major plans other than to get out around the Chesapeake. But when we discovered there would be a string of heavy storms coming our way, we decided to head to Annapolis and hitch up to a mooring ball. Figured it would be safer and less stressful and give us an opportunity to do some exploration and provisioning.

The wind was just so-so for our cruise south, so we motor-sailed the majority of the way. Sailing under the Bay Bridge was pretty cool. It was a little scary because we had to cross into a busy channel that was full of freight activity, but we made it through without any big issue. It only took us about 3 hours from Dobbins to get into the city and hitch up to the mooring ball.

Once we were ‘docked’ we tried to whip up a simple lunch and wait for the harbormaster to come by so we could pay for our spot. We figured we would stay at least 3 nights, possibly 4 depending on the weather. But as the minutes turned to hours, the harbormaster never showed. In that time both Jake and I tried to relax and soak in the view (and figure out what to do and where to go first), but it was hard to do because we were rocking around like crazy. The mooring field is right next to a very busy channel with tour boats and power boats drive by causing rather large wakes and shaking things up. It was very NOT comfortable, and after awhile, we decided to investigate a different spot. Good thing we didn’t pay!

We hopped on Active Captain (which is freaking amazing), to discover there is a mooring several hundred yards south of where we were, in an area called Spa Creek. The only caveat is there is a bridge we have to cross, which opens every 30 minutes. I was a little scared about doing this since I have only ever crossed under fixed bridges but it turned out to be pretty easy to hail the bridge tender and get across to the other side.

At that point we hailed the harbormaster and learned that this mooring spot is 10 bucks cheaper than the one on the other side – SWEET DEAL! The mooring was in a completely protected area that is surrounded by a park and has its own dinghy dock 100 feet away. We chose a spot at the far end, so it would be easy to go to and fro. There were ZERO wakes, and it was much quieter. PERFECT!

So now we could really settle in and relax for the night. The plan was to hunker down for 3 or 4 days, do some sight-seeing, provision groceries, water and diesel and catch up on our internet-time and book-reading time.

The next morning, we were planning to run some errands around town. As Jake got out to set up the dinghy, he noticed something inside. It was a little pendant from the Church across the way (the one with the big park), and inside was a message of good luck and blessing us on our voyage. How cool is that!?!? We’ll take it as a good omen.

Day 2 had some pretty decent weather. It was slightly overcast so the sun wasn’t as brutal as it had been. We decided that we would dinghy our folding bikes to shore and ride into town to stock up on fresh produce.

You wouldn’t believe how much longer it took to do these menial tasks. Probably the better part of 6 hours. First off, we learned that lugging two bikes, two of us and all of our bags/saddle bags/ gear take up a TON of space (and weight) on the small dinghy. Since we were so close to the dock, we didn’t even bother loading the outboard and just paddled our way, but it took a lot of effort and was super awkward.

Once on shore, we could unfurl the bikes and hit the road. The streets weren’t too crazy (yet) but we could tell the weekenders were starting to roll into town. Navigating around was a little tricky too. I was trying to use GPS on the phone while riding one-handed, in an area that was completely unfamiliar (and crowded)…definately a recipe for disaster! I didn’t crash but we did manage to get lost a few times. No biggie 🙂

Eventually we figured out where we were and where to go. We loaded up on goodies and headed back to the boat. Lugging all that gear and food would have been fine with decent bikes, but our folding bikes made it a much bigger challenge. They aren’t built for heavy loads and heavy riding, so they weren’t super comfortable. By the time we made it back (at the end of the day), we were wiped out. How sad!

Oh well. We made it back and all was well.

That night we hit up a cute little Italian eatery downtown and gorged restaurant-cooked gourmet italian cuisine without having to cook or clean. It felt like such a treat.

The next few days brought tons of wind and storms. We were pretty comfortable so it didn’t bother us much. We still managed to walk around Annapolis and enjoy some sights. We also took a dinghy ride up and down the little creeks and did some window shopping (or rather waterway shopping) for a kayak. Though we had no luck, it was a fun way to explore. I was most excited for Sofia’s Crepes, which we indulged last time we visited the city. They were just as good as we remembered, and managed to scarf a few down while watching a pretty phenomenal sunset.

The only real downside to the trip was that our boat decided to throw us some curve-balls. First off, the solar fan in our head stopped running due to a faulty battery. This doesn’t seem like it would be that big of a deal, but it is the only way that the head is vented…so without this fan, the head STINKS. Plus we had a fungus gnat problem in the head, which is YUCK. We thought we treated it, but I guess not well enough because they were back.

We also discovered that the electrical system on the boat is crap. The house batteries can’t charge much, the refrigerator is too energy-sucking to let us run it efficiently to keep things cold (or even mildly chilled), and the starter battery is done. We also don’t have enough battery power to charge even simple electronics unless we run the generator or have the engine running (or are hooked up to shore power).

So Jake decided that he would ride to the West Marine (only about 3 miles away) and get a replacement battery and possibly a larger inverter for the boat. Not a super easy task plus the weather wasn’t great…but he was back with goodies in tow within 2 hours. The new battery worked great once we figured out how to install it (there are no instructions with any of these marine things). It took only a couple of hours for the head to de-smellify. The inverter was faulty, so Jake had to ride back and return it for a different one (another hour and a half endeavor). He wasn’t a happy camper after that, especially when we learned the new inverter was too powerful for our crappy electrical system.

We hoped that we would have had more opportunity to take the boat out for a few nights at anchor, which would have uncovered many of these issues. But since we had such engine woes, our first time out was also our last time in (a marina). We probably could have rectified many of them beforehand, but now we will have to wait another month until we get to North Carolina.

Oh well. Such is the life of a cruiser. Nothing goes as planned 🙂

In the end we had a really great visit. It was so great exploring on our own terms, managing to navigate and live more-or-less as cruisers do. We learned another heaping spoonful of lessons and more importantly, the mentality, of this soon-to-be-cruising lifestyle.