Sunday, May 17 through Thursday, May 21
On Sunday, we sailed from Bryant’s Bay to Fishing Bay at the mouth of the Piankatank River on the south side of Deltaville, Virginia. We started out with totally overcast skies but with enough wind to sail at 4 to 5 knots. As the afternoon progressed, the skies cleared gradually. By 4 p.m., the sun was shining, but it did not last. By 6 p.m., the cloud cover was 100%, and that was the last we saw of the sun.
Dreary, damp and dismal have been the days at Deltaville. I really did not want to come here, but this is Peter’s choice for getting work and repairs done on the boat. The last time we were here, in August of 2006, on our previous boat Epicurus, it was insufferably hot and humid, and the family’s best memory of that time is of me sitting on the countertop in the galley with my feet in the freezer. (It was not on but still had some residual coolness.) Deltaville anointed itself “The Boating Capital of the Chesapeake Bay.” I suggest a more appropriate appellation would be the boat storage and repair capital of the Chesapeake. It is not a destination for people! It is in the back of beyond, far removed from civilization.
Today, in choppy seas, with white caps on the unappealing, diluted olive drab surface of the water, we motored around the end of the peninsula to the mouth of the Rappahannock River, arriving after noon at Norview Marina to talk with the folks at Zimmerman Marine about jobs Peter would like to have done on the boat. The one bar of cell service we had disappeared as we approached so I got dropped from the family Zoom meeting about summer vacation plans. Apparently, there is only Verizon service here, and it is not strong. At least there is Wi-Fi, and after we docked I was able to re-connect.
I had carefully collected and bagged all of our recyclable materials since we left Charleston, South Carolina, but recycling has not yet been embraced here in this backwater of the world. So all of that went in the trash.
Calling Deltaville a town would be a real stretch. Really it is a stretch of two-lane road with deep drainage ditches on either side, meandering through a rural area dotted with marine related businesses, a couple of gas stations, a Dollar General store, and a rather small grocery store which does not carry fresh produce. For that, you have to go to the outdoor produce stand, a concept that has its charms, I guess, if you are not trying to provision your boat for several weeks or months. None of these businesses are nearby. We walked along the two-lane road for a mile just to reach the Citgo station, where we purchased ice cream bars for a treat, milk and some Diet Coke. (Everyone else going in to the convenience store was buying cigarettes.)
The four days we spent at anchor in Fishing Bay were uneventful. The water was always choppy, the skies were always dark, and the blustery wind was blowing at 15-20 knots all the time except when it would gust, usually from a different direction, at 25-30 knots. The wind in the rigging at this velocity is not a comforting sound. At times, the boat was rocking so much that we felt like drunken sailors even though we were not drinking.
Tomorrow (I hope!) we will get estimates from the other boatyard we are considering. It is supposed to rain all day, however. (It is raining now.) No sunshine is expected until at least Monday, and we need to hose off the sails and let them dry before we can bring them down and stow them. I am beginning to feel trapped here!
The highlight of the last few days has been this barn swallow (plenty of barns around here) on our dock line:
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