Ruby Slippers

Contrary to popular belief, we’re very excited to be heading home. We look
at it as a start of a new adventure, not the end to our current one. But,
like any good road trip, it seems the last leg of the trip is TAKING
FOREVER.

Last night we anchored on the Great Wicomico River. It wasn’t because we
wanted to, but the wind and cold conspired together to encourage us to pull
over. Rather than taking one long day to go from Deltaville to Solomons, we
decided to break it up into two days. (Actually, we more of “negotiated” it
with the weather forecast.)

When we left Norfolk on Monday morning it was sunny, 70 degrees, and we had
a nice light breeze behind us. We motored along and sometimes we unfurled
the genoa to let it pull us along when the winds were strong enough to help.
But that afternoon we knew things would be changing. We pulled into Fishing
Bay on the Piankatank River near Deltaville, VA just as the wind clocked
around from the south to the northwest and some rain arrived.

The next morning in Fishing Bay it was supposed to be blowing, but the
weather was calm, albeit cold. We quickly decided to get going and enjoyed
sunshine and some light winds until noon. We debated continuing on to
Solomons, but soon after we anchored on the Great Wicomico in the early
afternoon the wind shifted again to the northwest and increased. (Since
we’re heading northwest, we’re trying to avoid northwest winds, they’re
directly on our bow and very cold.)

Hopefully today we can reach Solomons, and eventually home by this weekend.
Since it’s cold and the winds are against us, we’re not traveling at night.
We’re used to traversing the Bay in a day or two when there is good weather,
so taking 5 days seems excruciatingly slow.

Add that to our previous 6 days in the ICW and I’m simply wishing I could
click my heels together and be home!