Today we passed Milepost Zero, motored through Hampton Roads. The AIS was going crazy with all of the container ships, tugs, and cargo vessels. The military vessels went incognito but there were plenty of those as well. It was neat to be able to call the tugs by name if we needed clarification on their intentions. Works a lot better than "Hey you by Marker 2".
Once we turned north up the bay we had wind and plenty of it. The promised west winds were more north than west and a bit stronger than predicted. However, with all sails flying, cool breezes, and sunny skies, it was a great ending to the trip. Our destination was the Piankatank where it turns out our sailing club is having its shakedown cruise. So we will meet up with them on Friday but first we'll enjoy a quiet evening in Jackson Creek.
As it often seems to be, the final approach to the Piankatank was quite exciting. The winds put us close hauled and were gusting from 5 kts to 20 kts plus. It's hard to make yourself reef down when the winds drop to 5, but you wish you had when they pipe up to over 20 and the water is rushing over the gunwales. After doing this half a dozen times we needed to turn straight into the wind to get into the river so we dropped the sails, kind of gladly, and finished motoring in. Murphy has decided that he prefers being a motorboat dog and was giving all that rushing water the hairy eyeball.
We missed our buddies Tropical Breeze this evening. Murphy was suffering from treat deprivation and ear scratching. He got loads of both from his new best buddies. We've traveled together for a 1000 miles and have spent most of the winter together. They plan to spend some time exploring the bay so we will hopefully catch up with them again before they haul the boat for the summer.