Bye Bye Annapolis
05 May 2019
Allan Gray
Thursday was to be our final day in Annapolis for this year so we were up and off the boat early armed with our "to do" list. First item to take care of was retrieving our dingy from the repair shop. Luckily for us we were using Sandbox as a base and the repair shop was at the head of the marina driveway. The friendly staff loaded the dinghy in their pickup truck and delivered it to the waterfront for us, besides repairing it they had washed it and it looked great. Lana had graciously loaned us her car for the day so we headed out for groceries and the last few items from the marine store. It was a beautiful hot day, however, severe thunderstorms were forecast for later in the day so we made sure to be back before they hit.
Around 4:30 while waiting for laundry to finish we could see and hear the rapidly approaching storms so we high tailed it back to Dagny, arriving just before the downpour. Included in the weather warnings were the possibility of waterspouts and microbursts with high winds. Our little anchorage at the top of Back Creek was surrounded by houses and tall trees giving us great protection from the storm. As the storm intensified it rained so hard visibility was reduced to a couple of hundred yards, the scuppers couldn't drain the deck water fast enough so it flowed over the toes rails. According to people on shore that's when the micro burst hit, our anonometer at the top of the mast only read 15 knots but at water level it blew so hard that the rain was horizontal and blinding. Thankfully this didn't last long but it sure was impressive. Since we were less then 150' from a couple of docks I had started the engine as a precaution in case the anchor dragged but Rocky held firm.
As planned we were on our way Friday morning after having bid farewell to Robert and Lana. After a quick stop to top up our water tanks we set course in the fog for Chesapeake City on the C&D canal. This is the midway stop on route to Cape May and we planned on spending a day there exploring the area. Unfortunately, the weather is still crappy and once we looked at forecasts and tide schedules we decided the best thing to do was to move on the Cape May on Saturday.
Today's picture, taken by Lana, is of Dagny anchored in her back yard.