We woke to the sounds of kids yelling " I got one", yes they were catching crabs. They put a line down with chicken on it and than pulled up the lines with the crabs hanging on then they get net under them.. Pretty small crabs though.. At 9 am Karen arrived and we went for  a ride though Urbanna. This is a very historic town, some of the building date back all the way to the 1600's. They say the old plantation is haunted, to bad we didn't get to go inside. We saw the marina , old courthouse and the tobacco store house. Karen told us that they used tobacco as a currency back in early times and everything was paid for with that.A stop at the grocery and it was back to the RV to have lunch with Steve while he was on his break. We called Dad to see how he was doing and his GPS was not working well and he went about 150 miles the wrong way, so it was gonna be a while before he arrived.. Knowing that we decided to deal with the heat by going to the water park.. What a blast..... We played there for a few hours, we went on every slide a few times. The tidy bowl was the most fun. You went down a shoot and ended in a big bowl like a toilet where you went around  a couple of time and it dumped out the bottom into a deep pool.  Man that was great....We keep getting on that one...The yellow slide was real fast, my suit came off a couple of times when I hit the water. The red one I hit my head on  and Carl scraped his back on the bottom, so we only did that once. The sprinkler area was great it was like getting a massage each time you went under them,   oh how my aching neck liked that...Carl was able to complete the water lilies and rope challenge, not me I feel off after the 4 lily pad. All in all it was a super day playing in the water and very refreshing in the heat.It was also a great thing  that we were able to use the golf cart all day, we would have to give it up later , but I love driving it around anyway, it's fun. Called to check on Dad to find out where he was and was told he had a flat in Norfolk, so he would be a few hours more. So back to the water park.. Carl cut his foot so he didn't get to stay in the water but I did.. Oh how refreshing.We ran into Steve at the water park, apparently he goes there after work to cool off .Can't say I blame him I would too..We headed back to their place and got dinner going, when Karen got to come home on a break, she had a bite to eat and back to work she went. Dad finally got there after being on the road for 19 hours, (I sure was getting worried that he wouldn't make it before dark) we had dinner and we were all tired, so it was back to the boat for us three.  In the middle of the night a storm blew in  and had Carl  on deck securing lines  and fenders as we were being blown against the dock.It was quit the storm and it had me worried for a while. When we awoke this morning it was sun shining like it never even rained. The RV park was completely  out of power.Today we sail to a small town not far away with Dad aboard...

Cool morning in calm water is what we woke up to . Coffee was made for Carl and it was time to pull the anchor and head over to our friends house.. Carl had plotted our compass setting for the way we needed to navigate  through the Chesapeake Bay.It was a beautiful day on the water, we would have been able to sail for a little while today but we needed to go 45 miles and we wouldn't have made it just sailing. Carl is doing a great job with his navigational chooses through all this water. If I were in charge of that we would still be floating around somewhere in Florida.. So that's why I'm the galley wench!!  As we traversed the bay we saw a lighthouse off in the distance with a sailboat passing by,all around the area there were sailboats, it was story book beautiful.. Once we turned to port in to the Rhappahannock River it was covered with lots of boats fishing and more sailboats, only there was no way to sail as the wind was on the nose.When we arrived at the Robinson creek where Steve and Karen live in the campgrounds we  had to take it real slow as the water is very skinny !! Let just say it was real scary getting into dock. It was low tide and we only had 2 inches clearance!! We couldn't pull into a slip as our boat is to wide for those, so we pulled to the end of the dock and I had to jump a few feet to get on the dock. I look into the water and there were tons of jellyfish , all I could think was whatever you do don't miss... We turned off the motor and pulled the boat down in between the poles after Carl had checked the water with our boat pole. He marked off 4 feet with black marker and put is done in the water to see if we would fit. Once we were all tied called we Karen and she headed over to pick us up and take us to her RV, an what a nice RV this is... Then we went and got a golf cart and got the tour of the park. This park has a water park in it with 3 slides, 3 pools and a huge area with sprinklers for the kids to run in.. So cool...We will be hitting in this heat wave... Then Steve came home and cooked on the grill, we sat outside all evening long exchanged stories and had a great visit ...I got to drive the golf cart when we took our night time tour.. Hold on I love these things.. I guess I shouldn't have told Steve, I flipped a golf cart before.. Steve and Karen are people we had met at Woody's in St. Pete Beach, they travel around the country with their RV and work from park to park. They have a great life and love what they are doing.. Karen works in the store and Steve repairs golf carts , they get free space rent and get paid so it's a pretty good gig. They love travel and this makes it easy for them to do it . Their by land and we by sea.. They never go to the same park twice.. Pretty cool life...They are just like us loving meeting all kinds of people and see new places.. We are loving being here.. Dad will join us today , so another  chapter will begins...

Excitement is all we felt when we awoke this morning. Yes we were tied to the dock and ready to drop those lines, but wait not till I get that last morning shower! Carl went to get his last free cup of coffee and Bella her last run on shore for a while..Then the lines were dropped. We still had many bridges and one lock to go through before we reached Norfolk Va. The Great Bridge and the Great Bridge lock were the first to go through, easy cheesy..We had gone through many railroad bridges but this was the first time they were closed when we got there. Every other time we came to them they were always in the up position, not this morning.As you can see by the photos I took pictures in the down and half way up position. As far as we could see it was America at work. There were tugboats, barges and trains in all directions.We had to wait on  train bridges all day long.  We felt like we were in  the industrial north.The air got thicker and there was  huge ship traffic all around us. Thats when we arrived in the Norfolk area. Talk about a town built on the Navy! Navy ships as far as the eye could see. Ships being worked on an returned to their former shape, new ships, battle ships and we even saw a submarine( hard for you to see that in the pictures)  they were from coast to coast all through the last few miles of the ICW. They had a huge base that stretched from on side of town to the other. And on the water many smaller craft flew by with Naval personal aboard, from smaller landing craft to midsize vessels all traversing the waterway. And in the middle of all that there was a tourist boat to show off our Naval strong hold.. The Navy had a very strong presence here!!! However the small sailboats of the area still found a place to sail without getting in the way of those big ships. The only question I have is what the heck were those fairies from Hawaii doing there ? I'm pretty sure they had made a wrong turn somewhere in the Pacific..and landed in the Atlantic up the ICW. Perhaps they didn't notice the Panama Canal.. As  we rounded Lambert Point( that's right Rita I said Lambert, who knew you owned  large point of land with a dock) the Chesapeake Bay  was in site. That was when  we noticed we had a tugboat pulling a barge full of containers closing in behind us, so what does Carl do , he says here take the helm I have to look at the charts.. Are you kidding me...Leave me at the helm with that thing closing in are you crazy....Needless to say we slowed down and it effortlessly went around us... Big sigh...Finally we had made the bay. This is a huge did I say huge I meant humongous body of water, so Carl plotted our course and off we went.. We were motoring along as the wind was still coming from the north.. What is this some king of conspiracy!!! I know why we can't caught fish, its karma from owning a seafood house so long, but what's with the wind...We are heading on a course of 20* and Carl tells me to take the helm , Bella's was very nervous because the waves were more than what she was used to in the ICW, but normal for big water. I was paying more attention to her than our course and got us off course... Not good.. Lets just say I was reduced to deck hand for awhile.. Back on course and all was well.. We decided to anchor before it got to late. The Mobjack Bay  was the next large body of water we had to cross and there wouldn't be an anchorage for quite some time so we set a course to  area  off the port side for the night.This was a quite area with only  the local shrimp boats, boaters out fishing and wake boarders but still very nice. We sat in the cockpit an just enjoyed the beautiful anchorage, it didn't even get dark till about 9pm. Once the bugs came out we went in. Ready for a whole new chapter today...

Good day sunshine... When we got up this morning the sun was shinning and the temp had dropped a few degrees. Cool enough to wear long pants at least until it got a little later in the day. I went to check on the TV being sent out and it was ready to go. With the discount rate at the marina I only had to pay $18.00 what a deal, I can't believe that's all it cost. It cost me more to send the water pump back to Florida. One of the guys who work at the marina, name Dee had told Carl that if we wanted to use his car we were welcome to since it sits all day. We told him we would love to cause I wanted to go to Walmart... I know .. I know.. but our buddy Rocky had turned us on to this wine called Oak Leaf that is only $2.97 a bottle and it's good.. I just couldn't pass it up. We all know how I am with my wine and only $2.97 I had to go.. Carl went to check on the parts and they had just sent someone to pick up the shaft and propeller so he decided to stay there and help install them while I went to the store. This was all good news so it put a smile on both of our faces, an a bounce in our steps.... Rocky needed to go to the store also, so I headed down to his boat to tell him it was time to go, and we were off. I enjoyed having him with me. He's  has lots of stories and is fun to be around. Plus he goes his own way in the store and meets me at the front when he's done.. We hit a couple of stores and it was back to the yard.. Upon our return what to we see , but a HUGE SMILE on Carl's face. this can only mean one thing.. The boat is fixed..OH HAPPY DAY... YEAH...OH  YEAH.!!!! We could see the new propeller and shaft and they looked great.. Next we had to wait to get back in the water. Carl tried on the shorts I had gotten him at the store and they were to tight , do back to the store I went. This time Rocky stayed behind .By time I got back Windward Spirit was back in the water. Carl had to reattach the stern stays for the mast and get everything back to ship shape and ready to get back on course.. This took most of the day. Then it was time to pay the bill. Let me just say we felt they were very fair with us. They had had a summer special so the haul out only cost us $5.00 a foot and no charge for all the nights we stayed there. Not even the first night we were on the dock. All in all we would be happy to recommend Atlantic Yacht Basin to anyone in need in the area.. They treated us right.!! Once we were ready to move the boat we went to the fuel dock to pump-out and fill with water. We had just filled the fuel right before we broke down so we didn't need any of that. It was late so Rocky suggested we ask the dock master if we could stay another night without a fee and the answer was yes. We tied our lines to the dock for one last time. We said our goodbyes to Rocky and exchanged email then it was time to let Bella get in her last chance to run around and chase the ball. Dinner was made and  the night was full of good feeling and anticipation for all the lays ahead...

It's been a hard days night.. That's right we are on the hard both day and night..We had hoped that our shaft and propeller would have come back this morning, but no such luck. We talked to the guys in the store and they said maybe today. I think we have heard that one before....I call Calf  about the TV and they said to send it back and they will take a look at it, and either send back a new one or fix the one we have. So there will be no TV on the boat for at least a few weeks. Guess we will have to keep busy doing other things... Could be a blessing... I took it to the marine store here in the marina and they packed it up and shipped it for us. I must say they do take very good care of the people here, they try to help you with whatever it is you need. In the morning Carl and I walked to the Dollar store to get Bella some new balls as she has totally trashed all her toys. I have never seen a dog destroy every toy she gets as quick as she does..Then the day was spent just sitting around reading and playing domino's , Carl won this time.. Yes he's the man....Late afternoon Mike the man we meet at the abandoned marina came by to bring us a couple of T-shirts from his company and to visit for a little while. He is such a good guy.. He chatted for a while when he had to go home and see his lovely wife and little girl. It was so nice of him to stop by. Carl gave him one the the T-shirts he had made years ago with him surfing with a shark on the same wave. Mike loved it..Mike is a surfer too so there was much to talk about. After he departed I wanted to see this guy Bob's  boat that he was talking about the day before , so he took us aboard. What a boat.. This vessel was 50ft long and looked like a pirate ship.It was built in New Mexico in 1976..  Once inside it had all teak cabinets, 2 heads, inside wheel house and room for 9 people to sleep.. I must say never saw a boat like that before. It would take at least 3 people to sail her..Bob just got the boat last year and has never put the sails up. His has always been a power boater so he just runs the motor.. To each his own...Bob talks a lot so it was all we could do to get away from him. But luckily our friend Jim's daughter was on Jeopardy last night so we had to go see it..  That's when the early evening storm rolled in. The TV in the lounge said it was gonna have gusts up to 60 miles per hour... Needless to say  it wasn't comfortable staying on a boat on stands and blocks, so we hung out in the lounge.After the storm passed Mike stopped by again with some sweets his wife had made and they thought we would like some. This time he visited for about an hour. We loved having him over. The night was spent in the lounge until it was time for bed. Might as well get some TV in while we can, since after we leave there won't be any of that.. So another day we await parts and sit on the hard.. And our friends and family get soaked in the rain.. Take care all of you...

Good Day everyone, hope you all are doing okay.. I know a lot of you are getting soaked and blown away from Debbie. Just be safe and know we are glad we aren't there.. I guess when I look at the news its not so bad sitting on the hard in the heat!! The day was spent was spent doing little things on the boat. Carl took a grinder to the stern anchor too remove the rust and gave it a new paint job. Looks good... Then he made up some jell coat and repaired a couple of dings in the boat.. When he was all done with his chores we took a walk to the little park on the other side of the river. They had plaques everywhere in the park and we read all about this area. The bridge we crossed was the first one we have seen like this, it has weights on the top of the bridge and rolls up  into a toothed wheel. It goes up and down much quicker that a regular Bastille bridge. The bridge is called the Great Bridge, it is the place where the first battle of the Revolutionary War was fought and won against the British. This area of  Chesapeake was very important in the history of that war. Many battles were fought here, plus George Washington was here often with his staff. The first free black man to fight was right here in Chesapeake , he went on the play a key part in the war. Now that we have had our history lesson over lets go on...After the park we saw a GIANT BLIZZARD walking in front of the Dairy Queen, so we couldn't let that kid sweat to death for nothing so we went in to have a couple. They were having a special and it was nice and cool after the long walk in the heat..I tried to take a picture of the marina from the bridge so you could see how big it is, but it didn't really turn out so well. It is about 3 city blocks from the fuel dock to the other end of the dock, so check it out anyway...The rest of the day was spent under the shade trees on the river reading a book , while Carl fooled around at the boat. I had invited Rocky and Chris over for dinner, I made Thai food and we was glad to have them over. Rocky is a hoot and Chris is a great guy. Carl and Chris even moved the picnic table over next to the boat so it would be easier for me to serve it. Rocky brought the wine and we had a fine meal and fun time.After we walked in the area of the marina and met a couple other people working on a big boat that here. Then there was talk of a fishing contest today.. I don't think we will be entering that with our fishing history.... plus I'm sure Rocky has something up his sleeve so he will win..Our T.V. on the boat quit working so we went to the lounge to watch some tube till time for bed. I will try to get a hold of the people we bought the TV from and see what we can do. I got it on line only 3 months ago, so I hope it wont be a hassle.. Today we wait to see if we will be repaired and back in the water. Anyway our best to all of you stay safe and know we miss you all...

Life on the hard goes on.  In case I forgot to tell you we are located at Chesapeake Virginia, not Chesapeake Bay that's another 20 or so miles up the river. Carl worked on the boat all day doing little things that needed to be done. He got the stuffing box back on so that will hopefully save a little money.We went to the Food Lion and got groceries but that's about all. I walk Bella a few times a day and sit in the shade and watch the boats go by. And in the afternoon I did beat Carl at 2 games of dominoes..Yeah that's right I won... After dinner we did have a little wine and cheese party with Rocky and Chris. They are a couple of sailors living at the marina. Chris is redoing his boat and Rocky has a 42ft Morgan (sailboat) and he stays at marina's for a month at a time.Rocky brought the wine, Chris the crackers and me the cheese.. It was a very entertaining to listen to everyone swap stories although  I think were a little stretched....It was fun, and  it gave us something to do to help pass the time.. .Sure hope they get us done tomorrow....Gotta go I'm gonna try to find something to do today... I would love to hear some comments or get some emails.. So if you feel like communicating  please do so.. My email is wavechasers2@ Hotmail.com

Up up and away, that's what we are.. Yes we are up on stands and away from where we would like to be... We got the news that they will not have our shaft back in till Monday at the earliest. Just as luck would have it they don't work on the weekends, and they sent our propeller blade out to  have the hole reamed out. They said someone had taken a hammer to it (Eric) and everything must be done well no half ass job here...So here we sit.. Today we walked over to the local shopping center. I didn't take my grocery list as a lady told me that the store was very high priced, so I decided to wait and go to Food Lion today. Its a lot farther down the road and a fellow sailor said he would  driver me there. We did go to the Dollar Store and get Bella's nails trimmed at a grooming shop, and bonus we got a smoothie at Tropical Smoothie's . We love that place. The weather is still very hot.!! The index said it felt like over 100*. I'M MELTING...So you know those smoothies were really a treat.. We meet a very nice couple name Craig & Sue on a 42ft sailboat called Stolen Moments (cool name) and Bob a tag-along sailor on a 38 ft Catalina ,who had followed them all the way from St. Augustine..Bob is 77 years old and sailing by himself , so they just seemed to have adopted him. Great People also on their way to Maine. They had made this trip many times as Craig is from there and they visit every summer. Craig invited us over so he could show us some places where to anchor at on the chart, so we stopped by their boat and marked our charts.Very nice boat.. From everything we hear we are gonna love this place.. Can't wait till we get there lots to see and do...As we got done doing that they asked if we wanted to go have a beer at Big Woody's. We were getting ready to leave the boat,when dark clouds moved in and  and high winds persisted for the rest of the evening. So we never made it to Woody's.. Love the name cause we all know that's where we hang out at home. So here we sit on the hard and just waited till the time we can move on, hope it is soon.....

All I can say is thank god Carl put those couple of fans on the boat, cause boy is it hot!!! Even when we got up this morning it was still pretty hot..Carl headed out  to find James Taylor , (marine manager not the singer) to find out when they can haul us out of the water. he had talked to him at 8am but no one had gotten there by 10am .Soon after that three guys showed up to move the boat, one got on the boat with us and another was in this small but powerful boat to pull us and one just helped with the lines. They towed us around back of the marina where they have the lift and readied  us to extract us from the water.By this time it was lunch break so we had to wait. Carl wanted to stay with the boat and I decided that I would do laundry today. The washers and dryers are only a $1.00 each and that's a great price, and it gave me something to do. It's not like we were going anywhere. So I gathered up the clothes and headed to the laundry, besides the lounge next to the laundry has AC . Someone had left their clothes in the washers so I had to go ask if I could remove them. Tim from the marina got me a couple of plastic bags to put them in and I got started. Rocky the guy who's wash it was, showed up to put his clothes in the dryer. He is quite the character, he decided to hang around with me all day while I did my laundry and tell me his stories. It made for an interesting time!! Carl stayed with the boat while they hauled us out and set us on stands. He helped the guy remove the shaft and talked about what they were gonna do. Then the rain came, glad to have it maybe it will cool it off  some around here. Carl got under the boat during the pouring rain so he could wash off all that muddy stain on the bottom from all the rivers we have been in.We are so happy that we will be on the outside once we leave the Chesapeake.  We can't look at another river.. We didn't eat all day, to much to do I guess. After the rain we walked to a local bar where they were have .25.cent wings for dinner. Only it turned out they were 45 cent wings. Still a good price.. I got  a salad and we had a couple of drinks and it was back to the boat. Strange to be staying on a boat that is up in the air and not in the water. How does that go ..oh yeah...this is one big adventure after another..

The morning good news is we are still afloat.!! Carl spent the morning trying to figure out how  repair the broken propeller shaft and get it ready for the machinist. After a time he decided it was more than he could handle by himself and we would need to be taken out of the water so Sea Tow was called. We are so far out in the boonies that they said it would be 3 hours until they could reach us .Once Carl was finished doing what he does it was time to go swimming.. YEAH PLAY DAY.....The navy returned  to do their exercises and we wished them good morning and went a bit farther down the beach to play.. Well what they call a beach in the country. This was a wonderful time...We spent a couple of hours swimming  and  running in and out of the water with Bella on our tail. As the day went on she got more confident in water and kept coming farther out each time..Carl would chase her and she would jump and splash around, this was great fun....And very cooling as it is sweltering outside...Mid 90's and no wind....The boys from the navy broke down on their landing craft and asked Carl if he had any tools... Does Carl have tools.. I guess you could say that...So he grabbed his tools and went to help.. Awesome he was getting to help the navy. Carl loved that... I think they must have been in Navy Seals training ,cause I asked them question like where is the base , are they on a ship etc. and all they said was somethings are better left not said...Then a lovely little family arrived on the beach and got out to go swimming and play and so we got friendly with them . Mike , Kate and 3 year old Avery. Avery took to me right away and was swimming to me and wanted me to build a sand castle with her. So I did... Mike turned out to be a surfer so he came over to check out the boat and how Carl had hung the surfboards inside..As he left he gave us his phone number and said to give them a call when we come back through and we will Bar.B.Q..Very nice people, we are meeting the greatest people on this trip..  Lunch was made then Sea Tow arrived to tow us away. Even though had a wonderful time in this backwater, podunk  little area, nothing around for miles we were glad to be moving on and leaving our new home,  the abandoned dock....Enough could not be said for how glad we are that we got our Sea Tow membership renewed before we left..This time we were towed for 2.5 hours.... 23 miles up river... The bill if we would have had to pay for it would have been $1687.50... could you imagine... Love Sea Tow....We are now at Atlantic Yacht Basin.. This is a huge marina they have facilities for any kind of repair you could possibly need. Just to walk down the dock to the office has got to be a quarter mile..They have many buildings and covered area to work on boats inside, also laundry,showers and lounge all with air conditioning and anything else you need within walking distance..Plus they are also having a special right now for a haul out at only $5.00 a foot... Bonus call us lucky...So we checked in , not like we could go anywhere else..Had dinner and took a couple of nice long showers, and sat in the lounge until we cooled way down.. Man its hot.no wind...It was hotter here then in Florida .. The rest of the night was spent inside the boat avoiding the dreaded mosquito's...Even with the breakdowns I am having a marvelous time.. This is a great trip.. I'm sure Carl would be happy if he didn't have to do so much repair ..But like Malcolm ( a man on another sailboat) said its all part of the adventure,,And we are living life to the fullest...

The began like most other days, up early and get a start on making our way to Norfolk. Only thing was we didn't make Norfolk...But we did make it to Virginia. We stopped by Coinjock marina and topped off fuel, and water.We were gonna get a pump out but Skipper Bob's  book said it was $5.00 and the attendant said yeah it was $5.00 to pump and $6.00 to dispose of it.. Well I didn't care for that kind of bullshit business tactics so we  left without doing it.. We were about 20 miles up the waterway when we heard a loud noise and the boat kind of shook  and that was all she wrote.. The propeller shaft had broke!!!!.. That's right out in the middle of nowhere , with little chance of getting much help..We dropped anchor in the middle of the channel and Carl got to work.. It took some time till he figured out it was. Water was coming in the boat so I had to keep running the bilge pump to keep us afloat...Scary.Then he had to dive in the water and see if the propeller was still attached, luckily for us it was. There was an abandoned marina we had just passed with a dock so he hailed the first  cruising trawler (Bluegrass) and asked for a tow to the dock...Thanks for the help.. As we were pulling in some sailors (US Navy) came running up the dock to grab our lines.. Turned out they were doing training exercises  just past the dock and saw us being towed and came to help...That's our boys.. Love the American Military!!! We had passed them right before we broke down, they saw us but thought we just stopped to fish. Until they saw the tow line.. It was getting very hot outside, the temp sure did turn from the last few days.. It had to be in the 90's.. There was nothing that Bella or I could do to help so we decided to go swimming.. . I had asked a local  if they had and gators in the area and she said no to far north.. Good for Bella...You know how gators love little dogs..It was brackish water nice and cool and it felt great.! We were having a good time until the same lady yells SNAKE... Yes there were water moccasins in the area...She never told me that.. She was high tailing it off the rocks she was standing on and I immediately got out of the water. Oh well so much for swimming and cooling off...Back on the boat Carl was trying to figure out his next move. Bella and I watched the local ladies trying to catch crab with chicken strung on a line, The old fashion way.. I don't think they got much.. When they were leaving they asked if we wanted a ride to town to see if we could get out shaft made or replaced. Carl decided to go with them while I waited at the boat...Oh lucky me..  He took off and we just hung around the boat.. Carl returned a short time later saying he got a couple of phone numbers and the possibility of a repair the next day. We could call SeaTow to pull us 12 miles up river to a big marina so they could pull the boat out of the water, but we have to see if  Carl can fix is some cheaper way first. The evening was spent inside the cabin as the mosquitoes were out in great force.. And as luck would have it we were able to get T.V.  always in the middle of nowhere we are able to get it..go figure..So here we sit until we get repaired or towed to the next marina.. So the life of a cruiser...

Good morning everyone , hope all of you are doing well. It a hazy day here in N.C. with overcast skies.  Carl couldn't sleep so he decided to get up and get an early start on the day. He pulled anchor at 6:30am. I had to get up and take the wheel as he put on all that anchor chain on  that we will need in the north and man is it heavy. I can no longer pull it, lucky me... Once we were on our way I went back to bed till 8:30 a much more reasonably time. We had clear day and early start with lots of big water to cross today, so we just went for it. I made breakfast, not an easy task with waves pushing you around.. Hold on to that pot of coffee.....Most of the day was spent reading and taking turns at the helm. Late in the day we had another problem with the fuel system and the boat shut down. We threw an anchor in 20 ft of big water and Carl got right to work. It's a good thing he can find and fix this stuff. Apparently it was air getting in the line and in 45 minutes we were back up and running.We finished out the day and dropped anchor at 6:30 pm , we had had a full 12 hour day of motoring. Wind still on our nose, we had hoped we would have been able to sail in all that big water, but no such luck. Bella is so funny, as soon as that motor slows down she knows we are about to anchor and figures its play time for her. She runs around the deck trying to get Carl to chase her ...Very cute.. When the day was finished we had traveled 80 miles...that's right 80 miles....biggest day yet.. Although we aren't out of North Carolina we are real close and will be in the morning. Today its Norfolk Va. 

Sorry I was so late in posting today. I had no internet connection or phone service all day, I just hope it holds until I finish this. We pulled anchor at 10am and headed over to the fuel dock to top off our tank and diesel was only $3.60 a gallon, boy were we happy!!! That's the best price so far.. While Carl was filling the tanks with fuel and water. While I walked over to the local provisions store to see if they had any cold medicine  since I am feeling the effects of the cooler weather. They had none, but let me use a bike to ride to the grocer about a 3/4 mile away. Thanks dude... I really worked up a sweat since I knew we couldn't be at the fuel dock to long.  You could say I peddled my but all over town..Bella got to run all around the marina while they waited for me, burn off some of that energy. Once we pulled away from the dock we noticed that Ryan and Rachael were having boat trouble and stopped to see if we could help. Carl and Ryan talked on the radio about how to fix the problem and then Ryan said thanks and we moved on. It was a nice day on the water. The winds had calmed down to 9mph and the waves were about 1 to 2 ft perfect, only wind still on our nose...Bella was a little nervous so she wanted to sit on my lap till she got use to the waves again...It was a some what uninteresting  day not much to report, but I guess that's a good thing.We did pass by a shrimp house where the outhouses were painted green with flames for the men and pink with daisy's for the ladies...You don't see that very often...I must say I 'm really proud of Carl with his ability to get us to all these different places using the  charts . Good job Carl...My friend Lori called and said she is gonna try to meet us in New York  for the July 4th celebration.. Hope she can pull it off.  We anchored for the night off Belhaven N.C . made dinner and  called it a night. We hope to make Virginia tomorrow...

Happy Fathers Day to all you wonderful men who have been great dad's!! You make the world a better place for the advise, wisdom and love that you pass to your kids.!!  I sure am glad I have the Worlds Best Dad!!! A pleasant day was spent in Oriental N.C.. The day began with me getting my blog done and jumping in the dingy and getting to the farmers market. We were so ready for some fresh veggies and bake goods.. Only thing when we got there there was only about 6 vendors , this is small town. Only one of them had veggies and that was only blueberries and corn however, we did get some nice homemade sun dried tomato bread. Seems lots of the people from town come out for this, its every Saturday and I think its just a place for people to get together and visit..So that's just what we did. Bella got to meet lots of other dogs, boy was she happy...Then we walked the mile to the local grocer and hardware. I needed veggies and Carl needed a chain link to attach that new chain we got yesterday. It was a very delightful walk, no sidewalks and no traffic to speak of. But boy were the prices high, I didn't buy much decided to wait till we got to a bigger town for supplies. Carl did pick up a chain link. As we were walking back we saw a yard sale sign and I needed a couple of things so on we went.. Cool haven't been to a yard sale in a long time and we love them.. They had just what I needed. A coffee cup and set of sheets for when dad joins us on the boat in Chesapeake Bay and all for $2.00.. Perfect...I stopped by the local fish market where a man was selling fish out  of  coolers, and bought some salmon.. Neat little place . I loved during business with someone so small, besides that's  the only was we will get fish!! Returned to the boat and Carl attached the new chain, what a mess. As he pulled up the anchors they were full of black mud...It was everywhere, ..So he got a bucket and was cleaning the deck.  Bella was chasing the black water ..It was hysterical.. Next Bella got a bath.. We have seen such diverse group of sail boaters from around the world, the boat next to us is from Croatia and another is from Finland and we had a couple over from St. Crux . Ryan and Rachael  have a 40 ft that they sailed up. They are going to Virginia to sell their boat, make some money and get a new boat to raise a family on. Rachael gave me some seeds to grow sprouts and told me how to do it... Wish me good luck..They had some pretty hairy stuff go on during their crossing the ocean..They had tried to help a very young couple and it put them in danger.. Good news all made it alive.. It was terrific to meet them , we exchanged email and promised  to keep in touch. I love meeting all these different and wonderful people..Later it was dinner on the boat, (  blacken salmon on the grill with spinach salad ) oh so good..After walk through town to check out the fuel dock. The dingy motor was acting up during our return to the boat, Carl will check that out in the morning.  Once back to the boat  it was time to lay our weary heads..