Another Great Cruise!

We had a gorgeous night in the Mill Creek anchorage. There was no wind and by the middle of the night the clouds had cleared out. I haven't seen the stars so clear in some time and the water was so still that it acted as a mirror and reflected the stars. It was the first time I had seen that phenomenon. Sunrise was just as beautiful.

We hauled in the anchor around 8:30am and was underway by 8:45. It took awhile to clean the thick Chesapeake mud off the chain and anchor. Remembering the number of crab trap markers from the previous day, we took it slow winding out of Mill Creek and back into the Bay. The Bay waters were calm as we made our way to Cape Charles, VA at the southern tip of the Virginia Eastern Shore. We were heading directly into the sun and the reflection off the water looked like sparkling diamonds. Further down the Bay we encountered a pod of dolphin frolicking in the water. There were quite a few of them, but they disappeared as we passed by.

I saw one large car carrier on the AIS and moved to avoid his route. A few moments later, he turned directly into my path so I had to turn again. We were never close, but it was a little weird that he was swerving around so much.

Right outside of the Cape Charles harbor is a large anchorage area for commercial ships of all types. Most of them are probably waiting to head up the Bay to Baltimore. It looked like a traffic jam on the chartplotter.

We had traveled 42.3 nautical miles and arrived in Cape Charles around noon, loaded up with 225 gallons of diesel at the fuel dock and moved into our slip for the night. We are planning to get an early start in the morning and the slip is convenient to the marina exit. The fuel dock was in excellent shape and the floating docks work very well for large boats. The quaint town of Cape Charles is a block away and has quite a few shops and restaurants. There were a number of art galleries dotted around the town. 

Tomorrow we will officially enter the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway at mile marker 0 in Norfolk and head for Coinjock, NC. Norfolk is always exciting with loads of Navy warships and lots of commercial traffic. We will need to depart at the crack of dawn in order to transit through the city and make our way to the only lock between here and Florida at Great Bridge in Virginia.

Day 2 is officially in the books.