Day 284
We left our rocky-rolly slip at Annapolis Yacht Basin Marina in Annapolis, MD, at 7:00 am on Monday morning, 06/21/21. The weather was overcast and humid – almost gloomy – but at least it wasn’t raining. This day’s destination was Sassafras Marina in Georgetown, MD, located in the northern end of the Chesapeake Bay. We were hoping to meet our friends, Mike and Brenda Wehrle, in Georgetown, as they were driving back south toward Nashville from visiting Brenda’s sister, Faye, in Portland, Maine.
We passed Whitehall Bay, Goose Pond, and Moss Pond as we neared the Chesapeake Bay Bridge (US Hwy. 50), northeast of Annapolis. We crossed underneath the bridge and passed Love Point, MD, to our starboard, Cape St. Claire, Gibson Island and Arcadia, MD, to our port. As we progressed northward, we passed the mouth of the Chester River on our starboard along with the East Neck National Wildlife Refuge. We then cruised past Hickory Point, Sparrow’s Point, and Hart Miller Island, MD, to our port and Rock Hall, MD, to our starboard.
Far off in the distance to our northwest, we could faintly make out the Baltimore, MD, skyline. We didn’t stop in Baltimore this time because of safety warnings we’ve heard and read about the downtown area in which the marinas are located. 🙁 It was a shame, because Baltimore is one historical place that we had wanted to visit.
Soon, we were cruising out toward the center of the Chesapeake Bay, due to shallow depths near the shores, and felt once again like we were out in the middle of an ocean. We could see land, but were way too far out to see any sights or take any pictures of anything but water. As we neared Torchester Beach, MD, we quickly surmised it was a hot fishing spot, as we encountered many heavily-crewed fishing boats, all milling around very close to one another, with lines in the water. The SUN finally came out, three hours into our trip. Oh, well – always better late than never!
At the entrance to the Torchester Marina they have planted four very large Queen Palm trees! 🙂 We guessed those get replaced on an annual basis, since there’s no way they can survive the winters this far north. To my delight, I noticed the banks here in the northern Chesapeake Bay actually rise up out of the water into rolling hills, rather than the coastal flat lands we’ve seen on so much of this trip so far.
At Betterton, MD, we turned east off the Chesapeake Bay and into the Sassafras River, which is yet another MEGA-river at its mouth. And to Steve’s delight, we discovered the Sassafras River is filled with crab-pots! As we wound around between the crab-pots, we noticed that many of them in this area are marked with actual flags affixed to the top of the floating styrofoam buoys.
During the last part of our journey on this day, I’d been texting back and forth with Brenda Wehrle regarding their over-land arrival at Sassafras Marina, and how closely it would be coordinated with our over-water arrival. We arrived first, at 1:00 pm. I showered and Steve washed down the boat in preparation for our friends’ arrival. The Wehrles found our marina and the location of our boat with no problem, and it was old home week for all of us. The four of us laughed and talked and reminisced inside Legacy’s air-conditioned salon, since it was very hot and humid outside. Eventually we all piled into the Wehrles’ car and drove to nearby Kitty Knight Restaurant, situated up on a rise overlooking the marinas there on the Sassafras River.
Position: N 39° 21.802, W 75° 53.028
Distance traveled: 53 SM
Total distance traveled: 4001 SM
Total marina nights: 260
Total nights at anchor: 23
Locks today: 0
Locks Total: 28