Dog Walking in Annapolis

If you have never been to Annapolis, you owe yourself a visit. Go on a busy weekend when there is a regatta or the Naval Academy’s Homecoming or one of the in the water boat shows — sail preferably. It doesn’t matter that you are not interested in the Navy or sailing or boats in general . . . just go.

Walk down the main drag. Have a few beers. Buy a book at the classic used bookstore, or a hat at the best hat store I have ever been in. Make your way down to the water through too much traffic and too many people. And keep your eyes open for the fresh-faced navel recruits dressed in their whites and looking self-conscious as hell.

Annapolis is one of the few places where people dress like me: early American yachty. I fit right in even in a bright yellow rain slicker. There is the way-too-rich crowd, the snotty racing sailboat owners, and their cocky young crews. There are power boaters of every description and traditional Pete Seeger loving seafarers. And then there are the dogs.

Of course, it pays to dog walk on a warm summer afternoon, and that is what Adele, Charlotte, and I, and Miss Piggy and Cassie were up to. The latter two being the stars of the show: Miss Piggy, the runt of a litter of pugs, and Cassie, a fine example of a King Cavalier Spaniel.

These two canines brought more attention down on us than we deserved. Both were drawn to every opening shop entrance and it seemed like every other dog was drawn to the two of them. Big dogs, little dogs, middle dogs; dog that consisted of odd mixtures and pedigreed dogs; dogs with diamond collars and dogs with inch long spikes around their necks.

Dogs appeared from the N-S-E-W, from above and below and in between. When Adele and Charlotte left me alone on the street with Miss Piggy and Cassie to go get ice cream I was barraged with compliments: little girls, big girls; elderly and youthful. One classy older gentleman with a beautiful Eastern Shore accent offered to Miss Piggy that a pug was the best dog as long as you didn’t hunt or cared if they sat in your lap all night.

It was quite a whirlwind for the likes of me. Someone who has never owned a pet let alone a dog. Did these two beautiful little dogs make me more attractive — hardly. But did they say something about me, false as it might be — definitely.

I may just have to get myself a pug, move to Annapolis, and spend the rest of the days left to me promenading. So, like I said, you owe yourself a visit!

Back Creek

One of the nice things about cruising is not getting off the boat. Today (9/15/2016) finds us anchored in nine feet of water in Hunting Creek. We have been here before and did not get off then. The first time was to wait out a predicted cold front. It proved to be real. Huddled behind the small island that graces the creek’s entrance the storm raged around us. The island and its trees protected us from the storms multiple incursions from the NW.

This time the weather was coming from the NNE, so we opted for the other side of the creek. Here we anchored about 100 feet off a few houses and piers. There were still plenty of trees to block the worst of the wind.

Between the gaps in the foliage, I could see the ripe orange-brown of a dried cornfield. Other than the few people that made noise on shore the first night and the early risen crabber the creek was quiet.

A distinct line on the shores buttressing rocks marks the going of the tide. These rocks have been placed there to prevent further erosion. Where the rabble of rocks ends a more enterprising homeowner has had a wall of pilings and planks constructed to keep their property from becoming part of the mud that Carrie Rose’s anchor is firmly dug into.



Many grand trees cling to the shoreline's remaining soil. Their exposed roots drive deeper into the remnants of the earthen banks but I fear time is running out for them. The rising tide has recently become alarmingly higher than in the past, and due to the raising sea level large oceanic storms cause more damage in an afternoon then the tide could in a hundred years.



It is hard to comprehend what is happening. Of course, I am not an expert in these matters, only a casual observer on a cool cloudy day, on a quiet back creek, on the Miles River.

A Stiff Breeze

A stiff breeze can change a relaxing summer cruise into a challenging dilemma. Just getting out of a slip is froth with uncertainty. We arrived back to Maryland on Wednesday with plans to go cruising for a few days. Since we arrived in another heat alert, it was decided to defer leaving until it “cooled”. That, as it turn out, meant waiting until Sunday.

The cool arrived Sunday along with a 15 to 20 knots breeze from the NW. There were small craft warning on the surrounding waters but in these protected areas off the large bay, it is not a concern. So, it was time to leave, but the wind had Carrie Rose pinned in her slip, which is pointed west and open to the NW.

I proceeded to get the boat ready to leave all the while thinking we would be lucky to get out without colliding with the boat east of us or smacking the already abused dingy into a piling, or both.

I have gained enough experience that I know I should not repress feelings of dread. With this in mind, I walked from the foredeck with the wind rustling my almost nonexistent hair, through the pilothouse door and down into the saloon where Charlotte was cleaning up.

“I don’t think we should leave,” I said in a wimpy voice. To which she replied, “Well, we are only going 10 miles . . . we can wait”, adding, “When is the wind suppose to die down”? “Four”, I said. “Oh”, she said, and so we waited most of the day.

That Sunday (9/11) was the first day we were able to relax on the boat with the windows open for almost the entire summer. The stiff breeze brought with it less humidity and a high thin layer of clouds to shade us from the open sun.

As I sat reading, two guys on a large powerboat a few slips to our north prepared to leave and then spent the afternoon puttering around on the bow of their boat. A couple that had spent the night on their sailboat loaded up what looked like most of their processions and sauntered off. Just then, another sailboat came motoring in with its headsail in tatters.

Charlotte had started to draw this year’s holiday card, which she hopes to print using a woodblock she will carve from the drawing, and I began to write this. It was a day spent on the water listening to the wind howl in the rigging and wavelets smack into the side of the boat.



The wind calmed down as the last bank of clouds passed over us. We eventually left at three in the afternoon. It was 9.5 nautical miles southeast across Eastern Bay to where we anchored in Shaw Bay (N38 51.326’, W076 11.156’). It is deeper than most anchorages around here. I let loose 65 feet of chain to get the proper anchoring 4:1 ratio in 17 feet of water. The wind picked up a bit making the boat hobbyhorse, and at 5AM, a crabber arrived with lights blazing and started to circumnavigate the bay for the next 8 hours.



There is a saying in Chado — the Way of Tea — One Meeting, One Time. It means what it says, though there are many variations on its theme. This day only happens once, best not to ignore it, even if there is a stiff breeze.

Power Cord & Bilge Pump

For most, or I should say all of August, we sat in Chicago and monitored Maryland’s weather. It cooled down and we were ready to return, and then Herminie, a tropical storm in the Gulf of Mexico, turned into a hurricane. It vacillated back and forth between storm and hurricane, and in the process ruined most of the east coast Labor Day beach holiday.

The tracks of these storms are subject to the jet stream, the water temperature, the Coriolis effect, and the various land forms they pass over. A few super computers are needed to digest the data and come up with a probability curve for their path of destruction.

Carrie Rose was at the very edge of the warnings. I had faith in George, the marina’s owner, to act if needed. He did act last year when another hurricane threatened. This year the phone did not ring, so I called him. He explained not to worry; the marina is well protected, and then added the caveat that his prognosis could change at any moment. I decided to interpret this in the positive.

We postponed the trip back to the boat until the storm passed. It is a two-day drive for us that begins with the industry of Chicago and Indiana, and moves on to the farmlands of Ohio and then into the Pennsylvania and Maryland mountains. Once through the mountains it is a slow descent to sea level at Chesapeake Bay. The V6 Honda has registered close to 36 miles per gallon each time we have driven this way.

It was hot in Chicago when we left. The temperature moderated in the Allegany Mountains. Then with the loss of elevation came an increase in heat and humidity. By the time we crossed the Chesapeake Bay Bridge the radio was proclaiming a heat alert. It was as if we had never left. The locals at the marina confirmed our perception saying that this has been the hottest summer in decades.

The first task when reaching the boat is to connect the shore power cable. It is a simple job but the cable seems to get heavier each year. There is a sequence to follow before I plugging the boat into shore power. The boat side is attached first. Next, I lay enough cord out to reach the shore and secure the cable to the boat so it does not slip off or lay in the water. It also has to have enough slack to ride up and down with the tide, so it is a balancing act.

This done I plug it into the shore power side. A 30 amp marine connector has three prongs: power, neutral, and ground. It can only fit in one way and a twist locks it in. I looked at the prongs to align it properly with the plug and noticed that two of the connectors had black melted plastic around them. This is a bad sign of increased resistance and sparking leading to heat.

I took it apart to inspect the damage. I have done this before, so know the drill. It was time to head to the marine store. On the way to the car, I mentioned it to George who informed me that a new cord might be cheaper than the parts. It turned out a 50 foot cord was $30.00 more than the two plastic parts I needed to replace the plug, so I bought a new cord and plugged it in.

There were a few polarity issues to resolve then with the air on, we finally settled in after a long day of driving and fixing. Charlotte started to read a revised list of projects. The list was not too long since most of the summer has been spent repairing one thing or another. The most pressing problem, one that I have been delaying for far too long, was to repair the cantankerous bilge pump.

A bilge pump should be rock solid. It should pump immediately, but Carrie Rose’s pump has needed intervention about 25% of the time. To get to it I would move the heavy chest on the saloon’s floor off to one side, throw the carpet over the chest, and lift the wooden hatch off to expose the bilge pump. Of course, there is the large stainless steel propeller shaft that has to be worked around.

Since the pump is about my arm’s length down, I need to lie on the floor and reach into the opening. Most times, if I gave the hose that is attached to the pump a good shake the water would start to drain. This is hardly an ideal situation.

I needed to do some differential diagnosis. This meant taking the pump apart. When I tested the pump, its switches worked and plenty of water shot out.I did find a few cracks in the hose and the one-way check valve (a thing that most boating experts believe should not be there) was missing a spring.

My best guess was that the one-way valve was the culprit, and it turned out to be, but not before I wrestled with recalcitrant hoses and took several trips to the marine store. Over all, the bilge pump required about eight hours of work —where does the time fly! — much of it spent face down. That night, my ribs were aching.

I have been thinking, can I charge Carrie Rose an hourly fee for repairs, and considering my bruised ribs and multiple hand lacerations can I file for worker’s comp. I suppose not, I’d only be chasing my tail. Better to head out to sea and create a few more problems for myself to fix.