Tilghman Island to Calvert to Somers Cove (Crisfield) - Hermine!

Day #330; Loop Miles to Date = 4,144

We're a bit tardy with this post, but will try to catch you up quickly.

We left Tilghman on Chesapeake after another very enjoyable stay...it's just a great place to relax and enjoy the peace and quiet. Our next destination was back to Calvert Marina in Solomons, MD...really just a reliable spot to crash for a few days in advance of our Labor Day plans in Crisfield, MD. It's easy...nice floating docks, courtesy car for provisioning, easy dog walking, no hustle and bustle at all. So, we camped out for 3 days, doing not much of anything...but we got provisions easily, filled up with fuel, pumped out, and were on our way on Wednesday this past week heading for Somers Cove Marina in Crisfield.

Lieutenant 1st Grade Sarah Chapel of the NOAA research vessel Bay Hydro II. This vessel is home ported here in Calvert and is one of the ships that performs the surveys that ultimately turn into updates for all of our nautical charts. They had just come home from a 3 month tour up on the Hudson.

Another shot of the Bay Hydro II.

This is a monument commemorating the location of the US Naval Amphibious Training Base that was located in Solomons, MD. During WWII, this base served as home to as many as 10,000 Navy personnel who were training for amphibious assaults.

While we were at Calvert, we started to track the development of what eventually became Hurricane Hermine. We knew we were headed to Somers Cove Marina in Crisfield, MD, and also knew that this marina offered an extremely protected basin that should provide excellent protection in the event that this storm system turned nasty. As it turned out, we also found that this marina was a designated port of refuge, meaning that anyone and everyone could be heading here if things turned bad. So, on Wednesday we headed for Crisfield knowing that we had a reservation that would last through whatever storm came our way.

Fortunately, Hermine chose to veer out to sea before inflicting much pain to where we were...about all we received was some gusty winds and a fair bit of rain. And the high tide was quite a bit higher than normal, but otherwise, we had no issues.

The unfortunate part of the story is that our plans for a fun filled weekend were dampened by the weather as many of the activities that were part of the weekend Crab Derby Festival were cancelled. No parade, no concert, etc. But, they rescheduled some stuff for tomorrow, and the main event is still scheduled - and we can't wait. It is a Waterman's Docking Contest. The watermen bring in their boats, and participate in a contest that promises to bring lots of excitement...we plan to have stories of boats crashing into docks, and fisherman flying off of boats to get tied up quicker than their competitors...it should be a ball of fun. We just hope that the winds die down a tad so that they are not tempted to cancel this too!

The good news is that we are in the company of a bunch of good friends who also came for the festivities. We pretty much have our own dock all to ourselves...our friends on Corkscrew, ACT III, Inspeyered II and Sum Escape are all lined up in a row...it's great to have them all here with us!

One of the highlights of our stay here thus far is that we did some crabbing! After all, this area is crab country, and much of the local economy is still fueled by the crabbing industry. Tom, the marina director grew up in a crabbing family, and offered to take us out for a few hours to see how it's done and catch some crab. It was phenomenally interesting and we caught close to a bushel within about an hour and a half. I say "we", but all we were doing was following Tom's instruction and he really did all of the hard work. 4 of us went out...Sonny from Corkscrew, Tom from Sum Escape, Jeff from ACT lll, and Rob.

And to top it all off, Tom (the marina director) cooked them all up when we came in, and we proceeded to have a crab feast! We ate all that we could, and we still had 15 to 20 crab left over. It was great fun, and a really cool learning experience. (Thanks to Tom and Julie for the pics.)

Rob, Sonny and Jeff getting some instruction.

Tom giving us a lesson in how to clean a crab so that you don't take all day to get ready to eat it.

After awhile we got the hang of it...and proceeded to scatter crab all over the place (Jeff, Tom, Sonny, Susan, and Sandy).

Now we've really made a mess...and still 15 to 20 crab to go (Phyllis, Susan and Sandy).

Last night, they had the carnival rides open, and also an open air market with all kinds of vendors selling wares and food. The night sky in advance of the storm was tremendous...this pic doesn't really do it justice.

All for now...hopefully some more pics and scoop on the docking competition...fingers crossed that this too doesn't get canceled. Stay tuned...