I left Middle River Saturday morning 11/19 after sitting 3 weeks at Rob's dock. There were boat projects to finish and the weather was poor so it was the right move to be there but the sitting added to the already growing anxiety I was feeling. Saturday turned out to be blowing 15 knotts on the nose so a rough wet motoring ride, Saturday night the anchorage that looked great in the forecast west wind was awful in the mostly south wind, although it did get quiet there by morning. Sunday was forecast to be northwest wind 17-22 gusts to 30. Ok rougher than I'd like it but I couldn't stay where I was anyway so I went and it ended up to be 25-30 gusts to 35+. Yikes. That's windy. It's intimidating. Just the sound it makes in the rig is scary. And you know that saying shiver me timbers? Well you can feel the mast vibrate in the wind. And it's spooky. Since it's the relatively shallow Chesapeake Bay and not the ocean the waves are steep, not like ocean waves which even when they're tall usually (hopefully) aren't very close together or steep. For example a 10-ft wave with a wave period of 15 seconds is almost nothing. The boat rises up and the boat goes back down and it's pretty gentle motion. The first time I saw an 8 or 10 ft wave come up behind the boat I was thinking there was no way that thing is going underneath this boat but the boat rises up and the wave goes under and the boat goes back down smooth as silk. So anyway I'm there motoring with the wind behind me because I'm too frightened to put up any sail and I'm thinking why am I here? Why would I possibly want to do this? Do I have to do it just because I'm scared of it? I think I'm done with this and I don't want to do it anymore. I got here to Solomon's ready to get off the boat permanently. If someone had offered to buy the boat when I got here I'd have handed him the keys. I called around to get a marina slip so I could possibly rent a car and just go home but nobody answered the phone. Go figure. So I anchor here and it's quiet so I remember how much I like living on a boat and I soften just a little. And I talk to my friend Rob and he calms me down a little bit and I soften some more. And I talk to my friend John and ask him if he ever thought about giving this up. He started laughing. Howling actually I think it was. Yes he said. In fact his truck is currently stuck in Virginia along with the boat he tows to Florida.
So I asked him why he didn't give it up and he reminded me of some magic moments we shared in the Bahamas. Like that magic thingy ride with lease and Rob on the backside of Allen's Pensacola kcay. Like those caves we found in Little harbor that nobody knew about. The dinners in the early morning coffee in the cockpit in the sunsets and the sun rises. Sigh. And I softened a lot. When I was just getting started cruising before I started in fact I met a Canadian couple sitting in haverstraw waiting for a boat part I think, that said cruising was either mind-blowingly awesome or brutal. Yep. It's true. So I'm going to continue I'm leaving in the morning on my way to Norfolk and I'm planning to head for the Bahamas.