Dear Readers, you're probably getting tired of hearing of all the great places we've visited, experiences we've had and people we've met. Well, it just keeps going. We leave Mill Creek around 8:00 and wend our way back out of the serpentine channel into the Chesapeake Bay. Very soon, we are stripping down and by 9:00 I have tank top and shorts. It is clear, warm and calm. We've charted and easy day today to allow us to do some shore based exercise, catch up on blogging and just chill (well not chill) out.

We head for Gwynn Island at the entrance to the Piankatatank River. It is a very complicated entry and we have to call to our first bridge for an opening.

An aside on bridges. There are many (dozens if not hundreds) of bridges which we will meet along the intercoastal waterway. Some are high and are fixed. We can get under them with our 60 foot mast. There are various others which are lower but "open" to let boats of higher mast height through. There are various types including; lift bridges, swing bridges, bascule bridges and barge bridges. If this were not enough, they have different opening conventions; some open on demand (you call them on the radio and ask (beg) fr them to open for you), some at specified times, some combinations of the two. Adding to the complexity, there are often currents to contend with as well as competition with other boats - sometimes tugs and barges. Anyway, veterans of the ICW have it all figured out but we face our first bridge today. So on the way in, I find their cellular number from out guide book and about an hour before we get to it I call them and tell them I'm a greenhorn and what to do. I'm told just to call when I round the corner and see the bridge; too easy.

So with typical male bravado, I round the corner, call them up on the vhf, and am told in an accent I barely can understand, that there is an emergency crew on the island and they cannot open while they are there. Well, the current was minimal (although the guide claims currents of up to 5 knots at ebb and Sea Sharp can only do 7.5 under full steam) and we just tooled around for a half hour before she finally opened and we smartly motor through.

Well, a place well worth the effort. We are anchored in a small cove on Gwynn Island. We are the only boat at anchor! There are Canada Geese all over and it is warm and lush. It is now 5:30 and 83 degrees in the shade and I am writing this in the cockpit of Sea Sharp in shorts and shirtless. Judy and Chopin are sleeping in the sun on the foredeck (foredeck - sounds grandiose doesn't it).

We returned from a several mile walk into "town" (one store and a post office). We purchased some crab cakes and shrimp salad for supper.

Did I mention that we were having fun?