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Cat TalesApril 1999 |
Bill Weeks, Commodore
Well since my last missive, I
have returned home from the sunshine of Hawaii and am sitting here watching the
Virginia snow fall. I finished up my Business Income Tax and will mail it
today. Doing one's income tax is a proper activity for a snowy day, not writing
for a sailing newsletter.
Club activities are beginning to line up
nicely for the spring. The Flag Raising Brunch arrangements are final, as you
may know, we will be at the Topsider Inn in Galesville. Pete Denholm has
arranged for a great speaker, William H. Shellenberger, author of "Cruising the
Chesapeake". See the article below for further details.
The Ice Breaker
will be changed this year. We are going to meet at Cantler's Restaurant on
Whitehall Creek for our gathering. Sue and Walt Dennison will be the anchor
boat, just up the creek from Cantler's. We will have plenty of water
transportation to and from the raft to the festivities for those of you who
come by boat.
Sharon and I will be the Raft Captains for the Memorial
Day Cruise. We will be in the Wye River. I have not scoped out the exact
locations yet, as they say on the evening TV news, "standby for
more".
We still need a couple of Raft Captains for this year's events.
We are short for the "All Catalina Rendezvous" in Solomon's, June 18th through
20th. We also need Raft Captains for the "Wahine Cruise" in July and the
Halloween Cruise in October.
I have loaded up Pete Denholm this year
because my business travel seems to preclude me from attending all the winter
meetings. I want to publicly thank Pete for his efforts. So Thanks Pete, I
could not have done this without you. I will try to be as much help to you next
year as you are to me this year.
We have had some success with new
members, thanks to Mike Davis and his efforts to get notices in local
publications. We have had three new members from an article in the Spin Sheet.
Thanks Mike. I can't say enough about Mike and his efforts with the newsletter.
I know it is a tough job, probably the toughest in the club. I don't help much,
being late with my input. We all owe Mike a round of thanks for his
efforts.
Well, that's about it for this month. The snow is still coming
down and will continue all day. I got my boat-fix yesterday, even though it was
cold and windy. I need to go to the storage yard and open up Fortnight, and
dream of the water; I wish I were sailing again.
See everyone at the
flag raiser.
Bill and Sharon Weeks, Fortnight
III
The annual Spring Flag Raising Brunch will be held at the
Topsider Inn in Galesville, MD this year. The date is April 17th and will begin
at 8:30 AM with an eye-opener and breakfast will be served at 9:00. The
Topsider has prepared a special menu for us. The menu has been simplified from
the regular menu and the prices are better. The food choices range from
traditional sausage and eggs through Eggs Benedict. I am sure that anyone with
special requests can be accommodated. The cost will be about $7.50 per person,
depending on what is ordered. We should be finished by 11:00, leaving plenty of
time for spring outfitting.
We have a wonderful speaker lined up for the
event, William H. Shellenberger, author of "Cruising the Chesapeake". This is a
super book for those of us who enjoy seeing new anchorages on the bay. I have
spent many a cold winter's evening reading and dreaming with "A Gunkholer's
Guide". I am bringing my copy for an autograph.
The Topsider Inn is a
quaint little restaurant in Galesville with good food. The view is of the West
River and Pirates Cove Marina. We will not have window seating, as we will be
in the meeting room, behind the bar.
Directions are:
From
Annapolis, MD, take MD Route 2 south about 10 miles to Route 255. Turn left
onto Route 255 and continue all the way to Galesville. The Topsider is on the
left at the end of the road.
From The Washington Beltway, Take MD exit
11, Route 4 south about 10 miles. Turn left at Waysons Corners onto Route 408.
About 4 miles later, 408 will intersect with Route 2. Take Route 2 North about
1.5 miles to Route 255. Take Route 255 into Galesville and the Topsider will be
on your left.
RSVP: I need a tentative head count. Please give me a call
(703) 848-1848.
Charles and Freda Gandy, LUV IT
March
8th
An ENE wind blows at 20-25 knots. As it passes through the rigging and
around the sails, it hums tunes that rise and fall, ebb and flow, much as my
congenitally deaf grandfather made while reading his newspaper. His humming was
certainly not like you would hear from a hearing person, but was filled with
humor and happiness, not a prearranged tune. There are clunk-clunks as the
anchor line strains at its harness. LUV IT gently sways. Sleeping
will be good tonight.
We lie at anchor for the first time since early
December. We had to prove to ourselves and the other cruisers that LUV
IT indeed hadn't become nailed to the dock since the last of our guests
departed. So we thought of all the important things to do before leaving:
watching Charles Osgood on CBS's Sunday Morning one more time while we still
had cable, filled water and fuel tanks to the top, had dinner out with Cori and
Ed one more time, dawdled late at the "sundowners" gathering at the marina's
picnic tables, gave and received many hugs, then departed this morning (Monday
the 8th of March). There are small craft warnings. According to the weather, we
should have left yesterday. But we would move south down the Straits of Florida
with the wind and waves coming from behind us, so the ride wouldn't be bad,
then cross the Keys at a bascule bridge at Snake Creek, and turn back north to
traverse through Florida Bay and Everglades National Park. Though the wind
would be in front of us, the waves wouldn't be so high, and we would find
anchorage in the lee of the Keys. The wind has remained 20-25 knots, but the
day has been enjoyable. We are anchored almost due west of the marina we left
this morning and only a couple of miles from it, after having traveled 30
nautical miles to a location near an "island" of mangroves. It was filled with
birds this afternoon.
Since we are between the Keys and southern
mainland Florida, the water is quite shallow. The ICW passes from Miami to Key
West through this body of water, but the controlling depth is much less than
the remainder between here and Norfolk, VA. We traveled for a while in 8-10
feet of water, then passed through cuts through the shallow spots, clearly
marked by ICW daymarks or flashers. By the time we reached anchor, I had a
headache from hearing the depth alarm go off . We'll enjoy the new depth
sounder with histogram when we get it adjusted correctly, and when we have
moved out of the Florida Bay.
Tomorrow morning's breakfast will be
fantastic, due to the generosity of the Gibsons. We'll have grapefruit and
freshly-squeezed juice. When I was in Tampa, John picked from their trees 6
grocery bags of citrus fruit. Though we shared some with friends at the dock,
we kept the lion's share for ourselves, and since we putting down anchor, I
have squeezed orange and tangerine juice. Marmalade from their kumquats will be
served on toast. We are definitely enjoying Florida's riches.
Mid-day
tomorrow, the wind will clock around to ESE, and where we are now anchored will
no longer be protected. So we'll move north about 9 miles to another place
where we hope to see many birds (No alligators, please.) Over the next few days
we'll move through Biscayne Bay to Miami. Have you noticed? We've begun the
move toward home.
Slowly.