We had a quick sail up the bay and even surfed a little down near the mouth of the Chesapeake in the bigger waves. Luckily, the rain and thunderstorms stayed over land and we didn't get wet until we turned west into the Rappahannock River.

Lynn was excited to see the Rt. 3 bridge over the Rappahannock since it means we are only 6 miles away from home. Ed wanted to stay on board and keep living the life of a nomad. We will have to do this again next winter!

We woke up with southerly winds to help push us up the bay and a double rainbow across the Elizabeth River. Are rainbows in the morning good luck? Probably not, but we went anyway - only 60 miles home and the barn door was calling.

After doing the Dismal Swamp Canal, we motored up the Elizabeth River past busy shipyards and downtown Norfolk to a quiet anchorage on the Lafayette River. There are nice homes along the shoreline in one direction and a view of container ship cranes in the other. They are actually beautiful lit up at night.

Saturday, we headed up the Pasquotank River as it narrowed and started winding up to the Dismal Swamp Canal. This would be a beautiful area to explore with a canoe. The canal was first opened in 1805 and was supposed to close a couple of years ago but it keeps getting funding at the last minute so we wanted to do this route before it closes for good (it was closed for low water levels in January on our way down).

The picture shows the South Mills lock at the beginning where we are raised up by 8' and then the Deep Creek lock at the end where we are lowered 8'.

We left Oriental early Thursday morning with a north wind, but it was tame enough to make good progress through the sounds and rivers to the 20 mile long Alligator-Pungo Canal and then to anchor in the Alligator River.

On Friday, we motor-sailed up the Alligator River then stopped the motors and sailed across Albemarle Sound and most of the way up the Pasquotank River to Elizabeth City.

The city has free city docks but because of our beam, we tied up to the seawall at the waterfront city park. After having a nice dinner out, we were entertained by spiritual music, a dramatic morality play, and preacher talk sponsored by the First Baptist Church in the park. Just when we were thinking this was a very laid-back religious town, the teens took over in the park after dark celebrating either not attending the Prom or just doing what they do on a normal Friday night. We went to bed listening to revving engines, boomboxes, and shouting voices. Unfortunately, about 11:30 pm, we heard footsteps and shouting on top of our deck. We jumped out of bed and Lynn yelled in the best mean parent voice she could conjure up, "get out of here!". The two teenage boys were probably shocked that anyone was aboard because they vaulted the railing on the seawall and we heard screeching tires as they sped away. We stayed awake until the nearby shouting and loud voices ended around 2am (kind of reminded us of being at the Cave Club Picnic that we are missing this weekend). Next time, we will probably anchor out at Elizabeth City.