Awake at about 6.30 – couldn’t sleep anymore so we got up, had our showers (Mary dried her hair while I did my engine checks), had coffee with Dave and just past 7 set off into the rising sun.
Had a great day travelling down the Chesapeake Bay which is a huge expanse of water. To put the size of this bay into perspective for all the Kiwis – it is as long as the distance from Auckland to the Bay of Islands!!!
Of course we had to backtrack once or twice as we ran into a minefield or 2!! Well, not actually a minefield but areas of intensive crab harvesting (Maryland is famous for the crabs). The areas were just strewn with crab pots and I didn’t want to risk getting their lines entangled in my props!!! So, sometimes the direct line from A to B is not necessarily the shortest. Lesson learned 
Amanzi performed beautifully and I just loved the throaty purr of my twin puppies, Apollo and Zeus! At 1200 rpm I was puttering along at 8.5 to 9 knots. Passed many sailboats motoring down
I just have to mention a few people/businesses that have provided fantastic service. First, there’s Andy of Dockcall who has been our engineer. But he has been more than an engineer!! He has been a tutor, a mentor, an easy to communicate with person who spent a lot of time helping me with various things – going over the engines and taking us out for our first run yesterday, helping with the anchor chain and much more – thanks, Andy.
Then there’s Joe at Westmarine, Baltimore who was great at organising bits and pieces (new chart chips, Epirb, Anchor chain, Spot, and more) that I needed for Amanzi – Thanks Joe!!
Of course, no trip is complete without some drama!! Coming to Solomons Island, we had been fully intending to anchor out but this was not to be. Firstly, Mary had got used to the finger tip (hynautic) control of the throttles and gear shifts of the boat she was training on during her 2-day course and so had some difficulty with the very stiff, manual cable shifters. So, out we went for her to practice in open water. All went well with that.
Then I decided to test out the anchor system that I only got installed yesterday and found that I could drop the anchor and chain without a problem but the winch wouldn’t release the chain on retrieval. Well, I didn’t see my way clear to anchoring and then having to lift up 45 lbs of anchor and probably 60-100 lbs (yes, I’ve Americanised my measures) using the old fashioned method of back breaking hand by hand haul in!! So we’re in a marina
Here are some photos – from sunrise in Baltimore to sunset in Solomons Island:
