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[dserrell]

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[Ralph Erickson]

Sounds like a great trip, David!  I'll be taking 2 Chesapeake trips this year, one from Rock Hall, MD to Annapolis & back in August, and the other from Rock Hall, MD to St. Michaels & back in September.  Just curious, did you navigate with charts or do you use a GPS? 

Ralph

[tmorgan]

Sounds like a great trip.  We are headed to the Bay on Wednesday.  Sailing out of Solomons north.  We'll get to Oxford, not sure about St. Michaels.  My wife and I love the culture around the Bay and look forward to our trips each year.

[edbuchanan]

Hi Guys,

Glad to hear you had a good time in the bay.  Our boat is on Back Creek, in Eastport, just one Creek farther east than Spa Creek.  It is much more peaceful on Spa Creek as there are no cars on a draw bridge.  It is also quiet and dark, but is still only a 10 minute walk to downtown.  Eastport also features a bar and grill called Davis Pub, which is quite the hangout for sailors, yard workers and some adventurous tourists.  Boats anchor on Spa Creek all the time.  I suspect that it was fun to be tied up at Fawcett's in "Ego Alley".

Fawcett's is a nice store, eh?  They made new standing rigging for us and provided countless advice over many years.  On our last big refit they sent a salesman over to assess my projects and give advice.  Much of the sales help there are live-aboard sailors, and some of the lived in our marina.

We use both GPS and paper charts as the bay can be quite wild at times.  For awhile it seemed to us that Bloody Point was aptly named.   The worst was 6 foot seas and 28 kts.  On the last short trip we had fog with very little visibility.  By the GPS, Molly was only about 200 feet from the Thomas Point light and it was never seen.  I mark our paper chart with our position every half hour.

Tilghman Island is a beautiful place to stop on the way toward Oxford.  Very peaceful, some nice restaurants, and overall quite the Chesapeake experience.  The current in the inlet can be quite trying, especially since the wind often blows with some force.

My family is taking a 2-3 week cruise soon, with no particular plans to any where, but most likely Tilghman, Solomans and if lucky, points farther south.  I'm very happy to hear about fellow Com-Pac owners taking trips on the bay.  I just don't see to many of them, especially tied up at the trendy Annapolis Yacht Club!  That would have made a good picture.

Ernie (Molly, 23/II 1984)

[Gil Weiss]

Ahoy Captain Ralph . . . sounds like you need a good navigator? I may know someone who can get you to St. Mike's and back (via the Kent Narrows). Incidentally, this chap likes charts and compass navigation in the Chesapeake. He says that during daylight sailing it is more fun than GPS. (He is probably an old timer)

Capt. Gil

[Bob23]

  St. Michaels is a wonderful place. I've been to a few boat shows there over the years, and spent a weekend with my wife a while back. All trips so far have been by car, being only 3 hours away. I'd love to sail there via the Atlantic, Cape May Canal, Delaware Bay and river, C&D canal and the upper Chesapeake.
  Hal Roth, one of my circumnavigating heros used to live there before he succumbed to lung cancer just this year or last. I believe his wife may still be there. I don't know. I bumped into him at a sailboat show in Atlantic City, NJ a while back.
Bob23...trivia delivered.

[robb_black]

Sounds like a great time.  I am going to take my 16 across The Bay this summer from the West River to Sherwood, MD (just south of St. Michaels behind what is left of Poplar Island).

I would love to read about your experience navigating the shipping lanes.