Hello everyone. Happy New Year from our winter berth in Norfolk, VA.

At the conclusion of my last email, we were stuck in the mud in Hopkins Creek, somewhere up the Severn River. With the help of the midnight high tide and some kedging off, we got ourselves unstuck and moved to a deeper spot for the rest of the night. For those who don't know, kedging off involves setting a secondary anchor out to the side of the boat. The anchor rode is attached to the main halyard (usually used to haul up the main sail). Pulling in on the halyard pulls the top of the main mast toward the water where the anchor is set, tipping the whole boat to the side, making the keel slightly less deep, allowing us to wiggle out of the mud and into deeper water. Then we retrieve the secondary anchor and the primary anchor, while avoiding the shallow spot, and retreat out the creek to deeper water.  

The next day (Nov. 6), we left the Severn River and continued on our way south. We stopped at Tilghman Creek and Dividing Creek before arriving in St. Michaels. The weather was getting colder every day at a faster rate than we were going south! We spent several days in St. Michaels, where we were the only ones at the marina. We enjoyed the Maritime Museum and the local library. Michael and I even left Vienna and Rhiannon home alone one evening and went out for dinner! (They were able to call us on the walkie-talkie.)

On Saturday the 13th, we took a taxi to Easton for the Waterfowl Festival. Finally we were in the right place at the right time for a local festival. This festival is a BIG DEAL for those in the duck hunting, decoy making, and wildlife art crowd. The weather was sunny but cold, and there were lots of people decked out in their finest camouflage. We learned how to fly-fish, watched the retriever (dogs) demonstrations, and saw several decoy carving techniques. There was a wonderful bird tent set up, with a cage of exotic waterfowl and a juvenile sandhill crane. Several falconers were there with their birds, including a beautiful gyrfalcon. A man with a newly trained red tailed hawk gave a flying demonstration. The hawk flew from the perch to the glove several times. Then the hawk flew up into a tree. The man had only had this hawk for 2 weeks, and this was the first time it had flown into the trees since starting its training. Everyone was relieved when, after several calls, the hawk flew back to the glove and was rewarded with a piece of meat.

The next day was a long trip from St. Michaels to Solomons Island. Our first night there we anchored in the creek, but the next day we were able to move to the dock at the Calvert Maritime Museum. What a great little museum. We spent the entire day there, including an hour talking to a woman actively excavating a 12,000-year-old whale fossil brought in from the near-by cliffs. The next day we set off to the cliffs ourselves to see if we could find any fossils. We anchored off the cliffs and rowed to the beach. We didn't find any good fossils (we were really hoping to find some shark teeth), but we had fun on the beach in the clear fall weather.

The 17th and 18th were both long days, as we took the last of the good weather and favorable wind to get to Norfolk, VA. And here we are, winter quarters '04-'05. Our season #2 mileage total was 6941 miles, bringing our total mileage since leaving Port Townsend to 10,173 miles.

We are really enjoying Norfolk. Thanks to Nancy at QUUF, we were able to contact the Unitarian Church of Norfolk before arriving. Through UCN we have met several homeschooling families and gotten plugged into the homeschooling email loop. One of these families is involved in a Girl Scout troop of homeschoolers, and we have been welcomed there as well. There is a wonderful gymnastics facility nearby that keeps Rhiannon happy, and both girls are looking forward to some classes for homeschoolers that start later this week. Vienna is looking forward to an art class at the Chrysler Art Museum next month. We have a library, a bookstore, a Starbucks, a movie theater, several restaurants and a LensCrafters within walking distance, as well as the art museum, the maritime museum, the Douglas MacArthur Memorial and museum, and a church with a cannonball in its side left from the war of 1812.

We traveled to cold, northern climes via airplane to visit some of my family over the holidays, and now are looking forward to 3 months here in temperate Norfolk. We've settled right in to the schedule of homeschooling, gymnastics and Girl Scouts, but we are also looking ahead to plan our next year afloat.

Best wishes to you all for a happy and adventurous 2005,

Ginny