September 28, 1999 -- Dink to Annapolis
Today, we decided to take the Dingy to Annapolis to pick up fuel filters and spare parts for Tinky, and to see if we couldn't find a new Icom to replace the one on our fly bridge that died.
It was a beautiful day, in the mid 60s with not to much wind.
We headed out about 1000. We throttled up to planing speed at the mouth of Selby Bay, then out into the Chesapeake Bay. We cruised out around Thomas Point, and I discovered that in the chop, while I wasn't getting sprayed, I was getting bounced up and down. There were several times when the entire dingy went airborn! (the prop was still in the water) We found that the dink rides much better in a beam to quarter sea rather than head into the sea, or in a following sea. We played with the throttle till we found a speed at which we could move forward, but still be comfortable.
At the mouth of the Severn River, we stopped so we could make some phone calls as we also needed to head to the bank. It turned out that we would be better off just mailing our deposit. We then headed out again for Annapolis Harbour and the Dingy Dock there.
As we were coming in, we saw a beautiful sailboat that must have been 140 feet long. It was an awe inspiring sight. We also took the time to look at the mooring balls to figure out if we wanted to anchor out or tie up to a mooring ball.
We headed toward the dingy dock at the harbour and discovered, at least initially, that there was no space at the dock. There must have been 20 dingies there. So, we pulled up to Fawcetts where I checked to see if they had any Icom radios and to see if we could use their mail drop.
As it turned out, we missed their mail pick up, but there was a mail box on the other side of the circle. So, I told Mike I would be heading there to drop the letter in the mail, and I would meet him at the sea wall. He managed to find a spot to tie the dingy up so we headed over to Bay Country Electronics to see if they had one. We struck out there as well.
That should have been our fist sign to just return to Selby Bay.
From Annapolis Harbour, we headed back down to Back Creek to find the place that had the Northern Lights filters for Tinky. Unfortunately, Mike forgot to bring the name of the company, or the directions on how to find it once we got on land. We spent the next several hours tooling around the Back Creek and Lake Ogleton looking for something that would spark Mike's memory. This did not work!
Very frustrated, we headed out of Lake Ogleton and back toward the South River. On the way back, the chop had picked up a bit on the Bay and I was bounced all the way back. I am still not sitting properly!
We pulled into Selby Bay frustrated and grumpy from the unsuccessful run. Oh well, atleast we got a letter mailed.